I woke up in the middle of the night and realised that I had no idea where our excursion tickets were. They had been propped up against the mirror, but they were no longer there. Going back to sleep was not an option. We usually like our stateroom hosts and the stateroom host that we had for this cruise was no exception, but we would prefer if the stateroom hosts would not try to organise us. This would definitely have avoided a panic in the middle of the night. Fortunately, it did not take me long to find them. They had ended up on a small tray by the TV that was intended for jewellery underneath some other paperwork. I put them back in their old place, quickly went to the bathroom and then went back to bed.
I then slept through until the alarm went off. We got up and ready and then we headed up to the Windjammer for some breakfast. Graham had fruit, yoghurt and oatmeal. I had my usual congee. After breakfast, I did a bit of “shopping”. They always had drinks cart by the entrance of the Windjammer for breakfast. Apart from the ingredients to make breakfast cocktails like mimosas and Bloody Maries, they also had a range of souvenir glasses. There was a time when the drinks of the day used to come in souvenir glasses. I got a clear light up tumbler with a blue crown and anchor logo when we did our transatlantic cruise in 2016, and I loved this. Unfortunately, it broke a couple of years later as the bottom part had fallen off. I had tried to replace it ever since, but I never saw those tumblers again. Well, they had them on this cruise. They were only $4. I got two at that price. We took my treasures back to the cabin, picked up what we needed for the day and then headed out.
This was our second stop in Icy Strait Point. I had a little bit of on-board credit which could be used on the cruise planner before the cruise and there was a discount on the cable car tickets for Icy Strait Point at some stage. I jumped of this, and we ended up paying about $30 out of pocket for the two of us, which was a bit of a bargain. Once we were off the ship, we headed to the green cable car to get to pick up point for the wrist bands. There was no wait at all to get the wrist bands and soon we were in the very short line for the cable car. There was some light rain, but the weather forecast indicated that this was about to stop, and we figured that it was still raining when we got up the mountain, we could do a couple of loops on the cable car until it stopped. As there was not a great deal to see on the way up between the rain on the windows and low cloud, I used my mobile data to check in online. Unfortunately, there was some sad news waiting for me. Somebody we had cruised with a couple of times on Disney Cruise Line and who was one of our table mates on our second Panama Canal cruise had sadly passed away. This sad news made me appreciate being able to travel and making precious memories even more as you really never know what is around the corner.
By the time we reached the top of the mountain, the rain had thankfully stopped. We headed to the overlook for Glacier Bay, but low cloud was below us and obscuring the view. Graham was optimistic that the clouds would burn off in due course. We decided to come back later and went exploring. There is still some serious development going on at the top of the mountain. They were constructing a beer garden and a picnic area while we were there. We also spotted a departure area for the forest and nature tram and there was a member of staff in the area. We head read about this before our visit in 2022, but have not seen anything about this when we got there. We asked the member of staff about this and sadly he replied that he could not recall when he last had seen this tour operate. The loading area and the signage looked quite new. Hopefully they will restart this tour at some point in the future.
Graham wanted to check out the Hidden Lake Loop Trail. This is supposed to be a one-mile circular trail. We had walked part of this trail in 2022, but it was blocked off near the turn off for Hidden Lake. Graham offered to do this by himself, but there is nothing else to do on top of the mountain and I did not fancy just sitting and waiting. I went with him. I did have my misgivings as there were dire warnings about bears in the area and I knew of the reputation of the area around Icy Strait Point as the bear capital on the USA. Strategically placed security guards with very big guns were not exactly an encouraging sight either. Icy Strait Point does not strike me as the crime capital of the world and therefore there was only one reason for them to be there. Fortunately,the only wildlife we spotted during the walk was various birds. Potential bear threat notwithstanding, this was a very pretty walk. We initially walked through a dense forest and then a boardwalk led us to Hidden Lake. This was very pretty. When we were there in 2022, there was a lot of snow on top of the mountain even though it was about a month later. This time round there was very little snow, but the lake was frozen and there was some snow on top of it. We sat down at one of the picnic benches near the lake and enjoyed our surroundings for a while.
When we started to get cold, we decided to head back to the cable car. We found that this time the part of the trail we had done in 2022 was blocked off. We had to walk back the way we had come, but that was no hardship.
When we got back to the Glacier Bay overlook, the low cloud had burned off like Graham had predicted. It was still quite cloudy, but those clouds were pretty high up and did not affect our view.
Once we had thoroughly enjoyed the view, we headed back to the cable car. We had day tickets. The view from the top of the mountain is great, but the best views in my opinion is from the cable car. They were not very busy and were quite happy for us to just stay on and go round as often as we wanted. We did three round trips and then got off once we got back to the port level after this. I took plenty of photos from the cable car.
Once we were back on firm ground, I had a quick look at the gift shop in this area. There was nothing that jumped out at me. We then took the green cable car back to our ship. There we had a bit of a surprise. There is a rope course in the forest. It was not open in 2022, nor the previous week and I always felt it had a certain air of abandonment about it. Well, that day, it was not only open, but it was actually quite busy. Seeing it in action, it looked truly hair raising.
When we arrived back near the ship, I was tempted to have another look at the gift shops at the cannery. However, it looked like it may start to rain again. In the end I decided against this. We headed back to the ship, quickly dropped off our stuff in the cabin and then headed up to the Windjammer for lunch. We both had salad of some description. Graham then had pizza and fries. I had polenta fries with Romanesco sauce, roast pork loin, chicken nuggets and fries.
Once we had finished lunch, we headed down to the Schooner Bar. There was no trivia that was of any interest to us that afternoon. However, we were still docked in Icy Strait Point for a while and there was more than a good chance that there was some whale activity. We were not lucky enough to get seats by the window, but we were still close enough to get a decent view. There was not quite as much whale activity as the previous week, but we were still spoiled. We also saw some sea lions that came really close to the ship.
There was a funny demographic on this back-to-back cruise. The cruise was about 95+% US passengers. This is not surprising for an Alaska cruise or other relatively short cruises that either sail in the USA or stay very close like Mexican Riviera cruises. We had a few cruises like this and made some really good friends in the process. I believe the technical term for a lot of passengers on this cruise is redneck. Not everyone was like this, and we met plenty of very nice people. However, there were a few occasions on this cruise where I was not quite sure if I could trust my ears. It however all came to a head that afternoon. Now, as a rule, I am not a shy retiring flower, but even by my standards, some Americans are loud. That was definitely the case that afternoon. It all started relatively harmlessly with somebody very loudly and somewhat proudly proclaiming that his son was a quitter who never in his life held down a job for more than a couple of months. This resulted in somebody butting in boasting about his son’s criminal record. This then resulted in other people joining in. It almost became a contest on who had the most off the rails kids. I never had witnessed anything like this. Graham and I just looked at each other in disbelief, finished our drinks and then removed ourselves from this bizarre situation.
We decided to get some fresh air and took a lap around the promenade deck. Then we headed back to the cabin. Graham settled down for a nap. I played the usual game that I had every intention to just relax and read. However, I don’t think I even got to the end of the first page before I was fast asleep. Fortunately, I had set an alarm. When the alarm went off, we got up. We got showered and changed. Then we headed down for dinner.
Dinner that night was A Taste of Italy. This is probably my favourite of the current menus. Graham started with the parmesan arancini filled with portobello mushrooms and provolone and served with a Romanesco sauce. I had the crispy polenta fries with creamy hazelnut- red pepper spread. For his main course, Graham had the pan-fried fillet of sole with jasmine rice, steamed broccoli, cherry tomatoes and a lemon-butter sauce. I had the chicken Parmesan with marinara sauce and spaghetti. For dessert, Graham had the lemon curd tartlet, and I had the tiramisu .
When we came out of the dining room, Graham pointed out the backdrop that they had outside the dining room that evening. I would have walked straight past it as my mind was not really on photos that cruise. This was the first time I had seen this backdrop. I really liked it. My buddy Letitia was taking the photos. I decided to stop. I did end up buying one of those photos.
Once I was done with the photos, we headed back to the cabin. We got ready for bed, and I set an alarm for the next morning. I read for a bit, but soon we were fast asleep.
Dolphingirl’s Travels 
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