The whole bottom deck is for storing cars and motorhomes and a big door is opened in the side of the ship for loading.
For our four day trip, we had a 4-berth stateroom. Basically that’s two sets of bunk beds with a bath.
A lot of folks (mostly the younger crowd) did not have rooms and they camped out. There was an open (but covered) area on the stern of the ship on the second deck for tents and also there was the Solarium on the top deck. The Solarium was enclosed in glass on the top and three sides and was full of lounge chairs that people slept on.
The first two days of the trip was cloudy and raining, so most of the time was spent in the Front Observation Room. This was an area that spanned the width of the ship across the front with windows all around and theater-style seating. The front row seats were at a premium, but with a little patience we were usually able to get a couple.
The scenery all the way down the Inside Passage was fantastic - even in the rain the first two days. The third day (Thursday) was a beautiful sunny day.
We were disappointed in the amount of wildlife and birds that we saw. There were very few birds - mostly gulls. As far as wildlife, we saw Humpback Whales several times, and on Thursday we finally saw some Orcas (Killer Whales).
The ferry made stops in Juneau, Sitka, Petersburg, Wrangell, and Ketchikan. The stops in Juneau, Petersburg, and Wrangell were short ones in the middle of the night. We had a couple of hours in Sitka so we walked around some and saw a stream coming into the inlet where the salmon were running. There was an 8-hour stop in Ketchikan on Wednesday, but there was a hard steady rain all day so we didn’t get off the ship.
After four nights and three days we got into Bellingham, WA at 8:00 AM on Friday. After getting the motorhome and Jeep unloaded off the ferry and hitched up, we headed east across the state of Washington on US Hwy 2.
We stopped Friday night at a US Forest Service campground in the Wenatchee National Forest, and then yesterday (Saturday the 16th) we made it across the rest of Washington, across the “skinny” portion of northern Idaho, and got to Libby, MT. After a couple of nights here, we’ll be headed to Glacier National Park tomorrow.
Even though we're back in the Lower 48, the sighseeing is still interesting. Today after church we went about 10 miles west of Libby to see the falls on the Kootenai River. Here's a picture.
No comments:
Post a Comment