On the sixth day of our Ultimate Alaska Cruise, the ship docked at Icy Strait Point, for a relatively short stay in port. This was mainly because we had to reach a distant glacier by tomorrow morning. This was a great jump-off location for the long passage north. It was a relatively new cruise port, owned and operated by Alaska Natives.
As always, we woke up early, heard the engines thrumming, and headed up on deck to check out the views. We were still moving through the water. The Icy Strait itself was a popular route for cruise ships, and also had both whales and porpoises. We hung out and watched the sunrise as the ship pulled up to the terminal.
We had no excursions planned for this port, so we went back inside and ate a fancier breakfast than our usual buffet-fest. We had time, after all. Then we headed to the stateroom and got a daypack together, and descended to the gangway and the pier.
We walked along, following the other passengers on the wide path. Up ahead was a gondola ride. Two rides, in fact. One was free and headed over to the old cannery. The other cost money and went up the mountain. Vicki decided to go up there. While she was buying the tickets she suddenly got a yearning to ride on the ZipRider, the worlds tallest zipline! It was pricey as hell, I thought, especially for two of us! But that didn’t matter. Vicki wanted to do it, and I wasn’t about to stop her. Also, there was no possible way that I was going to let her have all that fun without me! So we got our tickets and a time slot on the ZipRider, then headed up the mountain on the gondola. It had some fine views as we ascended.
We wandered around on the summit for a while. There wasn’t much to do up there except look down at the two cruise ships, one of which was currently pulling into port.
We were early for our ZipRider ride, but we walked over there anyway. There was another couple waiting to do it, too. It was a slow morning in Zip-land, so they let both of us do a run right away. There were a total of six lines, but only four riders this round. I didn’t know that we’d be doing this, so I ended up using the video camera they loaned me, rather than my GoPro. They strongly advised not using a phone (it was prohibited, in fact) because there was no wrist strap. Nobody wanted to lose their phone, or be hit by one from above.
The ride folks strapped and buckled us into the seats slung beneath the pulley mechanism that rode the thick cable. I got out my video camera and turned it on. The gates opened, and away we went! The pulley sent up a steady scream as we built up speed. This thing was seriously steep up near the top! It felt almost as if we were in free-fall. Supposedly we would reach speeds of sixty miles per hour during the 1300-foot descent. And it felt that way. Like sticking your head out of a car window on the highway. Interestingly, by moving your arms and legs you could adjust your speed and attitude a tiny bit. So I stayed back behind the others in order to film them properly. Not that I always kept the camera aiming perfectly. It was hard not to get distracted!
We flew along, the wind in our faces, and near the bottom our trajectory started to flatten out, following the catenary arc of the cable. Our speed slowed a little, thanks to air resistance, but just the same, the dead-end at the bottom seemed to be rushing toward us awfully fast. This was the first time I realized that I had no idea how we were supposed to stop! Luckily, the proprietors knew better than to trust customers with such minutia. Yes, Petty Details, such as Not Dying.
Our pulleys slammed into a long set of coiled springs, arranged serially on the cable. Our momentum swung us forward, while the springs and pulleys pulled us back, and we stopped within a second or two. It was a fast stop, but not too fast. I liked it. An invigorating end to a thrilling ride. More employees came over and released us from our harnesses. I turned off the camera.
We went downstairs and into the gift shop. I handed over the camera and they uploaded my video for me. I paid for it, then was allowed to download the finished product onto my phone using their wifi connection. There was also a web link on the receipt so I could do it again at home, if something went wrong. But it didn’t. I got the video and we watched at as we sat outside to see the next set of riders come down the cables. In the beginning, they were so far away you could barely see them. And before we knew it they’d smacked into the braking springs.
All told, the video was about two minutes long. If you calculated the dollars per hour for that ride it would make your wallet spin! But it sure was fun! No regrets whatsoever. Thanks, Vicki!
The ZipRider let us off at the far end of the “free” gondola ride, so we continued walking along the shore. There was a crowd at one spot, and everyone was looking up, aiming their phones at the sky. Up above us, not 30 feet away, was a bald eagle perched in a tree. So we aimed our phones at the sky, too.
Vicki decided that all that ZipRiding had given her an appetite. We walked over the the Crab Shack. This is Alaska, after all, and seafood is where it’s at. For Vicki, anyway. She ordered some crab while I took a walk along shore toward the town of Hoonah. I got a text from her soon enough, and then I walked back to meet her. We weren’t really sure what to do next. She didn’t want to walk two miles to the town itself, so we walked back along the shore toward the ship, taking a short Nature Trail. It was nice, with typical rainforest vegetation.
We consulted a map by the gondolas. There was a small pond up on top of the mountain, with a short and easy hike to get there. Our gondola tickets were good all day, so up we went again. Then we walked down the path toward the romantically-named Hidden Lake.
Along the way, a local ranger/policeman passed us going the other way. He was armed with a large-bore rifle (or maybe a shotgun), and he said that there had been a Brown Bear around there recently, causing turmoil among the tourists. Maybe it was learning (via gunpowder) to stay in the woods where it belonged, because we never saw it. Yes, Alaska is still very wild and untamed.
The lake was small and shallow, but it was a lake. Definitely worth the walk. We met an older native gentleman who was carving hiking sticks. It turned out that Vicki was already carrying one! We picked it up earlier, where it was leaning against the sign at the trail entrance. He was a nice man, and we talked for a while. Then it was time to leave, and head back to the ship.
We got back to the ship in the early afternoon. I was still hungry so we ate a second lunch upstairs at the buffet. There was quite a view from there, looking out over the Icy Strait. We were really lucking out so far with the weather on this cruise. A bit of drizzle was to be expected in coastal Alaska, and maybe even a full-on storm, but we managed to have nice days most of the time. No complaints here!
As I said, we needed to leave early from this port in order to make it all the way to the Hubbard Glacier tomorrow morning, so we hung out on the Sun Deck and watched as we got underway. We cast off from the dock and headed northwest through the strait, directly toward the Pacific Ocean. Along the way we saw whales and dolphins, Or maybe they were porpoises. They played in the water in a similar manner, at any rate.
The ship’s acceleration was deceptive. You couldn’t feel it at all, and yet within an hour we were moving right along, and there was a stiff breeze up on deck. I took far too many photos of the water and mountains, just like I always do. I won’t bore you with showing all of them.
After dinner at the restaurant, Vicki came with me to the gym. It was located on the sports deck near the spa snd salon, right at the bow. The setting sun was blasting into the windows as we did our workouts.
Along the way, I got out my Peakfinder Earth app, and checked out the nearby mountains. I was hoping to see Mount Fairweather, whose summit defines the border corner between Alaska and British Columbia. And I did! That was the very first (and only) fifteener that I’ve ever seen. That’s a large mountain! There were much larger ones in Alaska, you may be certain, but they are further inland, and often shrouded in clouds. Today was perfect.
After that, we hung out on deck and watched the sunset, which didn’t happen until quite late. Then we went to bed and got excited for our visit to an Alaskan Glacier tomorrow morning.
For a topographic map of the cruise see my CalTopo Page
For LOTS more photos of the voyage see my Flickr Page
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