Bald Eagles, Sea Otters and Scenery to Die For, A Retrospective Tale of Two Travellers Part 4

On Monday 9th September we travelled from Seattle to Sitka, Alaska where the girls live.  To say the view from the plane window was spectacular would be an understatement, snow topped ranges of mountains dotted with the odd glacier, just seemed to go on and on forever.  The plane stops at Ketchikan, then Sitka, onto Juneau and then Anchorage, obviously we only went as far as Sitka but the landings in both Ketchikan and Sitka are amazing, runways surrounded by water and mountains, but on the way in, both were reasonable smooth (on the way out not so much with a thrilling and bumping landing into Ketchikan) and we were so excited to finally get to Alaska.

Ketchikan airport, waiting for new passengers to join the plane, see the mountains and how close they are?

We had booked accommodation on the Sound, a one bedroom apartment with a deck, but to say we were disappointed would be a understatement.  To get to the apartment you had to walk through a hallway smelling of cigarettes, diesel and who knows what else (I ended up just holding my breath each time we went in and out).  The apartment was basic to say the least, with no toaster and no kettle (although most Americans it seems drink drip coffee and there was drip coffee maker provided).  The bed was comfortable, the chairs a little less so, but we both walked in with a huge sense of let down (and this is after lugging our cases down 2 small flights of stairs as our car wouldn't fit in the parking space, and it wasn't until after we booked that we were notified it could only fit a small compact car in the parking area.  But still, I am philosophical about most things in life and seeing we were only sleeping here and the bed was good, as long as I held my breath through the hallway I could manage.  We complained about the toaster and the kettle and these were dropped off for us the following morning.

What saved the place for me was the view, we were literally 15 feet from the water, with a view across to little island, mountains and Mt Edgecomb the active volcano near Sitka.  This made up for all the wrongs with the accommodation.

First view from the deck, how could you not love waking up here each and every day??
Not glass half full, but glass overflowing I think.
I have just stitched these 4 photos together to give you an idea.

And lo and behold within a few minutes of us unpacking and walking back onto the deck, we spied a bald eagle just perched on the rocks to the left of us.

Our first bald eagle just below our back deck!!

But the icing on the cake was our sea otters, right there in front of our apartment, a daily parade of one, two, three and up to five sea otters at any one time.  Feeding, swimming, frolicking right there without a care in the world.  So close you could hear them using a stone to crack open the shellfish they had picked up from the bottom.  So close you could see their faces while they munched on the goodies they had found.

Our new daughter-in-law was however outraged with our accommodation and after a couple of days she complained to the rental service.  So we moved accommodation on the Saturday morning, thanks to K.  Lucky for us there was space in the cabin right next door to where we originally were staying.  So same stunning views, same otters and eagles with a couple of harbour seals thrown in for good measure.  The new accommodation was fantastic and we ended up with a bedroom that also overlooked the Sound and a window I could open so I fell asleep and woke up to the sound of lapping waves, and one morning a sea otter cracking his shell fish open, crack crack crack - I was up nice and early that morning so I could share some time just watching (that was the morning the movies below were taken).

Here are two short movies hubby shot on his camera (obviously at a lower res than the originals so they would upload here), I'm not sure if you can see them well which is a shame as on my computer screen they are awesomely close and if you click on the full screen icon here it is really pixelated - such a shame as I really want everyone to enjoy them as much as me.  Oh and you can hear me chatting in the background LOL.

We had been told sea otters were very wary of humans given they had been hunted to near extinction for their pelts, the softest fur you have ever felt.  The whole reason the Russians had first come to Sitka was to hunt the otter to trade the fur to the Chinese.  We were blessed with our visits and both of us enchanted by these creatures.

I love nature, I love the ocean (although not swimming in it) and so this was indeed a heavenly place, albeit with a unique smell (not just the hallway) but it was salmon spawning season and so dead and dying salmon where in abundance.

How could you not love waking up to this?  Can you see why I want to move to Sitka?

Thanks for popping by xxxx

And Now For Something Completely Different, Random Midnight Thoughts from a Stuffed Up Head

Last night I struggled to sleep with my sinuses so full of gunk, and all the coughing that followed, so I found myself thinking of the weirdest things.

Things like .... Rein, Reign and Rain .... all sounding the same and yet meaning something so completely different from each other and then thinking I have to blog about that!!! It was like all I could think about when I was going back to sleep, Reign, Rain, Rain or was it Rain, Reign, Rein?

Seriously what's to say, the English language is strange, hard to learn and has so many things to trip you up, I am so glad it is my native tongue.

Please be assured that when I finally get over this head cold that transmission will return to normal and I will continue my Retrospective Travel Tales, I even had the next one nearly written but strange things are occupying my sleeping hours and stopping me for getting to the good stuff.

I think I am just weird sometimes.

And just to remind me and give you a sneak peek of what is to come here is a little something we saw nearly everyday while in Sitka.

Take Me Out To The Ball Park, A Retrospective Tale of Two Travellers Part 3

On our last full day in Seattle hubby and I and the two girls watched a home game of the Seattle Mariners baseball club.  It was something I had wanted to do on our first trip to the USA and we were lucky that they were playing at home that weekend.

I thoroughly enjoyed the experience, even though the game is slower than I thought it would be, it was great entertainment and it would have been awesome if the Mariners had managed to win, but it seems they are not having a great season in 2013 and lost 3 to 1.

We paid a little more (just under $60 US) for seats in the second tier just to the left of home base (think that's the right term) which were wider and padded with lots of leg room and in-seat service from a bright and bubbly staffer, food itself was pretty cheap and I got to taste my first pulled pork sandwich and a hot dog (both of which I shared with hubby) given I can't eat very much post surgery. I am now a huge pulled pork fan, yum!!

There was a fair crowd, although no where near full capacity but the atmosphere was great, there was mid game entertainment including 'Moose' standing on his head, and dancing - a stunning feat for the person in side of the suit!!

Hubby got to taste his first America beer an aluminium screw top bottle no less, and to by a Mariners jersey and cap at the Team Store (which you have to show your ID to enter and to buy the merchandise which was interesting given we didn't have to do that anywhere else that we shopped).

It was great fun to stand up and sing Take Me Out To The Ballpark half way through the seventh innings (a tradition of the game it seems).

All in all it was a great day and I would love to go again next time we travel (of course if it is season).

Hubby was really impressed with the stadium compared to AFL stadiums he has attended, lots of glass to look out as you walk down the corridors, nice wide carpeted corridors as well and really reasonable prices for food and drink unlike here were they slug you outrageous prices for the pleasure of eating very average food.  He also loved the enterprising young men with bicycle rickshaws outside the game who for a small fee will take you to your car, would be great if someone jumped on that idea and provided a similar service here.

Safeco Field

Great seats with a view of the whole ball park.

Action shots courtesy of hubby's camera

Let's hear it for the Moose

The scoreboard and our pitcher for the first 7 innings

The tourists blending right in

Ride The Duck, A Retrospective Tale of Two Travellers Part 2

On Friday 6th we Rode the Duck!!!

K had organised tickets for us and on a drizzly Friday morning we all boarded the Duck ready for adventure. Our Duck Captain's name was Owen Money (LOL) and he was fantastic fun (I am sure all the other Captains are great too, there seems to be around 6 Ducks in the fleet).  You travel through the streets of Seattle, laughing, singing and dancing while some pedestrians join in and cheer you on - while others stare at you in bewilderment.  All good fun, but the best part for me personally was when we putted around on Lake Union.  We floated past some amazing house boats of all shapes and sizes including the famous one from the movie Sleepless in Seattle, we saw boats and ships of every kind and size, and even some other Ducks.

After the jaunt on the lake it was back on the road as we made our way back to the start point.  Hubby and our daughter K took some time to visit the Experience the Music Project which is right over the road from where the Ducks leave while K, her Mom and I went shopping.

If you are ever in Seattle (or one of the other places Ride the Duck occur in the USA) I recommend you hop on board, you will not be disappointed, I can assure you of that.

Thanks Owen for being our Captain.

Captain Owen Money, a man of many hats (I think there were at least 5 changes on the trip) with a huge personality and a great singing voice.

The famous Pink Elephant Car Wash

Street scenes

Space needle and antenna covered in cloud  

Two other Ducks out on the lake with us

The Old Gasworks Park with lots of geese on the lawn

Larger houseboats

Smaller houseboats

Driving past Safeco Field

Hubby drumming at Experience Music Project

A Retrospective Tale of Two Travellers Part 1

When we decided to make the long haul trip to visit our daughter in Alaska, it was with some trepidation.  The only time I had flown overseas was to Singapore, no more than a 6 hour flight (so not much further than flying to Brisbane).  The only time hubby and I had traveled overseas was on a cruise back in 2001.

So the thought of flying for 4 hours to Melbourne, then over 14 hours (to get to LAX) and then another 2.5 hours to Seattle and a further 2 or so hours up to Sitka was nothing if not daunting!!

We decided to beak up the trip by flying to Melbourne on the 4th, the day before the long haul trans-Pacific flight (rather than taking the red-eye midnight horror) and staying at the Park Royal at the Melbourne airport before leaving at around 9.15 am on the 5th.  As an aside, if you are very doing this, the Park Royal is nice and close (we could walk over to the airport) but it is really in need of some revamping.  The rooms are tired (the worn out frayed carpet especially) and not particularly large, the foyer cafe/bar has very stained fabric chairs (and I mean yuk worthy), the food we had for breakfast was at best mediocre and I'm being generous there.  On a positive note, our evening room service meal was not too bad, the bed was okay, the hotel quiet and as mentioned earlier very close to the international terminal. But in hindsight, we wouldn't stay there again.

When we originally were talking about heading off, there was no mention of a wedding, that came a little later, but also allowed us to further break up the trip by only travelling as far as Seattle and spending a few days there. On the way back we travelled all the way from Sitka to Melbourne with only short stops at SeaTac and LAX, around 27 hours worth of travelling and I must say I wouldn't do it that way again.  The more relaxed broken up travel on the way over meant we suffered no jet lag at all, while it has taken nearly a week for both of us to get back into the routine once we got home and that was with us having a 2 night stay in Melbourne at the fantastic Quay West Suites in Southbank.

I struggled to sleep on both long flights, in fact I got none on the flight over and no more than 3 hours broken sleep on the flight back, next time drugs may be the order of the day.  Hubby fared a little better with his dozing, but the sooner the 'Beam Me Up Scotty' technology becomes a reality the better.

When we reached Seattle rather than stay in hotel accommodation we shared a rental house with the girls and K's family, a lovely roomy 2 storey home in West Seattle, in easy reach of everything we needed including the fantastic Easy Street Records/Cafe where we had breakfast every morning (if you are ever there I can recommend the Easy Rider Breakfast Sandwich on egg bread - yummmm).  There were 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms and a gym-office upstairs and downstairs a lounge room, a great room-kitchen area, a downstairs powder room and a deck out the back.  We got to see (but not photograph) our first squirrel, while not a big deal for our American family it was a squeal worthy event for me!!

The Great Room-Kitchen area were we spent most of our time

Looking back up to the front door, beautiful wooden floors throughout.

There was some shopping for moi at Lane Bryant at one of the hugest shopping malls I have ever seen!  A wedding to attend and only a couple of days before we headed off to Sitka, so not a lot of sightseeing happened, but we did Ride the Duck (an awesome and recommended experience) and took in a Seattle Mariners baseball game at Safeco Field (I wanted to see an America baseball game on this trip).  Hubby and my daughter B also visited the Seattle Experience the Music Project but we missed out on the Space Needle, something for us to do next time we are travelling through.

While we both loved all the parts of America we visited, we both struggled with the way tax is added rather than included like our GST, the individual states set the tax rather than the Federal Govt and it is different in each place we visited and in Sitka is changes seasonally (higher when the visitors are there, and lower on off-peak times).  So when you saw a price it was not what you paid, but that didn't stop me from spending in the least!!  The other thing we struggled with was how much to tip, something we rarely do here in Aus, and it seems I was a little over-generous sometimes, but when I found out how much the hospitality staff are paid I felt bad if I tipped any less.  Hubby really found the 'over the top' personalities of some of our wait-staff difficult to deal with, but it would seem to me that they are just trying to do a good job and hopefully be rewarded with a good tip at the end of the service.

Another thing that was vastly different to us was the difference between the information the flight staff give you prior to disembarking the plane, when flying with Qantas you get all sorts of useful information and that is not the case with the American airlines we travelled with.  In fact if it hadn't been for a fellow Australian traveller who took pity on us in LAX on the way home I think we would have missed our flight connection.  I was also a little concerned that you use your bottom seat cushion as a floatation device on American airlines, no life jacket is provided, just another little quirky difference I suppose.

So as not to do one huge post, the trip will be broken up and I will continue with a Ride A Duck and a Take Me Out To The Ballpark post in the next couple of days, before covering the amazing time we had in Sitka.  So the fun stuff is still to come, along with the pictures, lots and lots of pictures and the odd video if I can get it to work.

Thanks for popping by xxxx