AuburnChick's Adventures

When I awoke on Day 4 of The Great Adventure, the sun was shining, and the ocean was beautiful…

The weather was deceptively cold, as I quickly discovered when I went out on the 10th deck to sit for a spell…

Then, the rain came…

Then, it went away…

It just couldn’t decide if it was going to be sunny or not!

The ship was headed toward Hubbard Glacier, the largest tidewater glacier on the North American continent.  What makes this glacier so unusual is that it is thickening and advancing while other glaciers have been thinning and retreating. It is expected that the glacier will eventually close off the Russell Fjord and create what will then be known as Russell Lake…

As it stands right now, Hubbard Glacier is in the perfect position to be viewed from a cruise ship.

It would take us several hours to get there, however, so we were left to our own devices.

After breakfast, Super Sis, Coupon Queen, Chicky and I attended the Totally Tea class, during which we picked up some information about tea and the best way to prepare it.  It was led by two gals…Jo and Rebekah.  Rebekah was the gal who had led the horrible hummus and pita demonstration, and she proved herself somewhat unprofessional at the tea presentation as well, yawning through half of it.  Her eyes looked somewhat wild, like she’d been up all night.

I was not impressed.

Jo, however, was quite the opposite.  She was the Lifestylist, which meant that she was in charge of the fitness classes.  She also headed up the scavenger hunt that Rooster, my nephews, Super D, and Grand Pooba participated in.

Jo was FANTASTIC and really knew her stuff.  She threw in a lot of health facts and really did her best to steer us toward healthier options.  I liked her a lot.

One thing she suggested was adding milk to your tea.  I’d never heard of this before!  She also cautioned us not to steep tea too long because then it becomes bitter.  No wonder my tea of late has not tasted good!  She cautioned us not to use regular tea bags as the white ones are bleached, and we don’t want those chemicals in our tea.  Eww!

She showed us a tea diffuser and advised that we use loose tea and the diffuser, which allows tea leaves to “bloom,” thus spilling out their flavor.  I already own one of these and have used it before.

After the tea demonstration, I headed to the Crow’s Nest to watch the ship’s progress toward the glacier…

It doesn’t look like we’re too far, eh?

Ha!

Here’s another picture…a little closer in…

Eventually, my crew went outside.  The ship’s staff had opened up two decks in the front…decks 4 and 5…so ship goers could have a better look.  The staff provided hot chocolate and split pea soup to warm us up because the closer we drew to the glacier, the colder it got.

I could not stop snapping photos, so be forewarned…this post has a LOT of pictures!!

The scenery was breathtaking.  The following pictures are incredible…I was amazed by the way the clouds seemed to split the mountains in half…

The closer we got to the glacier, the more of these we saw…

Those are ice-bergs.  The dark one is dirty ice, so to speak.  Pieces of ice as tall as ten stories regularly break off of the glacier, fall into the water, and make their way down the pass.

I continued to take more pictures…

I zoomed in on my camera…

Looks small, eh?

Just wait.

The mountains that surround the glacier are green with snow on the top…

We drew closer.

I captured this very short video…

As we neared the glacier, the water became more and more saturated with chunks of ice…

It was very strange indeed!

We saw several large ice-bergs…

There was a man and his wife standing beside me, and he kept estimating the size of the bergs…”That one is the size of our house.”  His wife was dubious, as was I (but I kept my opinion to myself…for a change).

The river of ice continued to approach us…or rather, we closed the gap on the ice…

I love the next picture.  It reminds me of the shoreline of the beach that is near my house, except that mine doesn’t have ice in it…

The crowd on the bow got larger…

We were all mesmerized by the sights before us…

The bergs got larger still…

And the ice just kept coming!!

We were making progress, and the glacier loomed ever closer…

See the black area halfway down the ice?  That is actually the earth that is being pushed up between TWO glaciers.  Hubbard Glacier is to the right, and Valerie Glacier is on the left.

Our long wait outside rewarded us with the sight of the following furry creatures…

Those were seals!!  We watched as they slid off of the ice-bergs and disappeared beneath the water.  They were adorable!

As we got closer to the glacier, I could not help but notice the different colors within the glacier itself…

And the ship kept going…inching ever closer…

The actual size of the glacier, in comparison to the ship, became more and more apparent…

Being near the glacier reminded me of how very big this world is, and how very small I am…

We were constantly astounded as large chunks broke off of the glacier, sounding like thunder as they hit the water with large splashes.  Unfortunately, I was never quick enough to capture this in a picture, but those images will live on in my memory.

I’m not sure how close the ship got before stopping…I’d guess about a half of a mile.  Then, the ship did a slow turn so people located all over the ship could get a view of this most amazing phenomenon.  As the ship turned, we ran to our cabins to get a better view…

Before we knew it, we were saying goodbye to Hubbard Glacier…

We snapped a few last photos…

I pulled out the Chinook Shawl that I had recently finished.  I had already used it a couple of times during the trip, and I wore it when we were approaching the glacier.  The kids had nicknamed it “The Cape” because of it’s size, and they’d been begging me to flap it.

The glacier scenery made me think of eagles, so I finally agreed to their request…

It was a little bittersweet…leaving the glacier.  I’m not exactly sure why.  Perhaps it’s because I was seeing something I’d never seen before.  I mean, you can’t get much further from a warm, sunny beach than an icy cold glacier!

Going back through the passageway from whence we’d come…back into the clouds and mist…made me grateful that God had opened up the skies and allowed the sun to shine on our time with the glacier, for that is certainly what He did, as the travel director announced on the P.A.  She told us that she had not seen such a beautiful day in months!

Then, it was time to get ready for dinner.

I have a funny story to tell about dinner.

Every night as I finished dinner, the dining room steward presented me with the following day’s vegetarian menu.  I would make my selections ahead of time so the kitchen would have time to prepare as my meals weren’t exactly the dining room’s norm.  I was also free, each night, to select items from the regular menu, if I wanted.

Well, on this particular night, one of the appetizers struck my fancy.  From what I could recall, I had only ordered two things off of the vegetarian menu, so I figured I was all set.

So I ate whatever was brought to me, never giving anything a second thought.

However, when it was time for dessert, which I was skipping, instead of removing my dinner fork, they left it.

I thought I was done eating.

The kids had already left the table so they could go see a movie.

The rest of the adults waited.

That’s when I was told that the kitchen had lost my vegetarian entree order but had found it and was scrambling to make it for me.

Oh.  My.  Gosh.

I was already full, but I didn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings.  I felt that I was already inconveniencing people by requesting a special menu, so I didn’t say anything.

Oh.  My.  Word.

When they brought up my food, I was incredulous.

Before me sat two or three skewers of vegetables.

With rice as a side.

Sigh.

The crew member in charge of the kitchen came up and personally apologized.

I assured him that it was quite alright.

Then, I sat down and stuffed that rice in my mouth, forcing myself to eat.

I ate a few vegetables and pushed the other ones around to make it look like I had eaten.

Guys, on a regular day, I don’t take in a lot of calories.  I haven’t been a big eater since starting my vegan diet…hence my weight loss and, now, smaller tummy.

I was beyond full, but I thanked my dining room steward graciously before Super Sis rolled me out of that room.

Sigh.

The next night, the manager of the dining room again came up to apologize.  That was when I told him the truth…how full I’d been from my other dishes and how it really would have been okay if he had permanently forgotten the dish.  He, with his French accent, got a good laugh.

Later that evening, the family attended music trivia in the Crow’s Nest.  Let the record show that I got the John Denver answer correct when nobody else did.

I headed to my room to get ready for bed, finding this awaiting me…

Day 5 would soon be upon us…

Filed under: Vacation | Tagged: Alaska, Holland America, Hubbard Glacier, travel, Vacation, Westerdam |