Today, 19 Jun 2011, is a repositioning day. We did a quick bag drag to some very nice buses and headed off to Seward and the MS Zaandam, our ship.
It's an all day trip with stops scheduled along the way. It seems the pattern of these long rides is to make sure the driver is talkative, and we were not disappointed.
Ours is a local gal, Melodie Milletta, just recently married, who knew all manner of things about the area.
The local area was not the limit of her conversation, however. She told stories about her family, growing up in Alaska, the unique problems presented by the winter in just attending school, overnight heating, going to sporting events -- actually very interesting as it conveyed a very real sense of life in such conditions. She told the story of a town about half way between Fairbanks and Anchorage in which the mayor and his deputy resisted getting cable and internet for a long time. Eventually the town folk prevailed, and in the flood of information that became available learned these two had run from the law (in Massachusetts, I think). At another point further down the road she explained one way Alaskans can tell tourists from natives was the way they pronounce Denali. The local pronunciation is with a hard "a" as in "Al". Others say it with an "ah" sound.
. . . and then a giant whale leaped right in front of the bus . . .
Actually, that is the picture on the bus in front of us just before we departed, and as the Geico Gecko says, it's a complete fabrication.
The map shows our route for the day. I mentioned in a previous post how most of the major improved roads are between Anchorage and Fairbanks. Well, today was a day to follow the railroad tracks back south as far as Anchorage, then continue on to Seward and our ship.
Melody clarified a bit of what we were seeing by noting that up around Denali we see the transition from normal ground to the ice caps. Just below the caps is tundra from the Russian word for treeless tract. We were a bit south of the area where one could see pure tundra, but we could see it in spots as we started south. The tundra give way to tiaga, another Russian word for "land of little sticks". You can see this in the next few pics.
It just depends on how deep the top soil is over the frozen earth beneath. All the trees have very shallow root systems, but their progress is impaired more in some areas than others. In general, the shallower the unfrozen soil, the fewer the trees.
Melody also pointed out the tall angled posts (below) along the side of the road. If you live in an area that gets its roads plowed during the winter, you will recall road crews planting sticks with reflective material on top so that when the roads are completely covered with snow, the plow operators will be able to find the edge of the road. This pic is taken from the bus about 8 feet up. Think of these angled posts as very large, very tall, permanent sticks.
Once again, the logistics of this operation are impressive. Melody has been talking to Holland's dispatch between stories and found that a glitch has developed. Seems some of the buses got a late start. Dispatch thinks this will result in more buses arriving at the scheduled lunch stop than the facilities can handle, so Melody needs to delay for a few minutes. We stop at Miller's Market where Ann climbs over top of three people to get to the ice cream.
This is not a fancy place, but I gather from listening to Melody this is a place she knows from growing up in the area.
Turns out its a bit of a "7-11" ish, tourist stop, ice cream parlor. The folks inside are very friendly and call in some additional help to handle the bus load of people taking advantage of the stop. The Alaska-berry ice cream is particularly good as well.
Eventually we make it to our lunch spot just north of Wassilla. We grab a bite of a particularly good buffet, go outside to see some sled dog puppies, and we're off and running again.
As we get closer to Anchorage the terrain gets more mountainous again and the rivers get substantially wider.
There is a lot of silt in and along these rivers. It actually gets much more overcast as well.
Our next stop is Portage Glacier. There are a variety of structures here, including a particularly nice touristy place with a very nice collection of art work.
As luck would have it, Melody's new husband just happens to have driven a bus here at the same time. This leads to the inevitable "awww" from everyone on the bus when she eventually comes back aboard.
We finally make it to the Zaandam, our ride for the remainder of the trip. It turns out she's not one of the larger ships, carrying only about 1490 passengers and a bit over 600 crew. That still seems like a lot of people to me, and substantially larger than the majority of towns anywhere in Alaska. There is a very efficient processing center in a tent beside the ramp. Eventually we're through with processing and waiting to depart.
We start exploring immediately. This is pic is on the stern looking forward.
Eventually we are underway and begin to get some spectacular looks at the landscape from off the coast.
Cue the dolphins . . .
. . . and the whales.
. . . as we depart Seward.
This is a view from the Crow's Nest, a particularly nice bar located just below the bridge and overlooking the bow (the line to the right actually runs to the bow). The landscape reminds me of the coast of Maine with all the small islands scattered about.
There is more to see of the ship and the surrounding countryside, but we'll get to that in subsequent posts. This view from the veranda outside our stateroom is a good way to wrap up a very long day. We're headed for College Fjord and Glacier Bay.
