Last stop before our cruise to Canada
Trip Start
Sep 23, 2010
1
99
366
Trip End
Jul 13, 2012
Where I stayed
Nauti Otter hostel
Seward, Alaska
Wednesday, May 25, 2011
Up at 8am for a quick breakfast and off in the car to Anchorage airport to take the rental back. Cat stayed at the hostel and helped out around the place. While I was returning the car and waiting for the bus back to Seward, Cat was working hard. She was dusting, changing beds, etc. earning us a free room for the night. I returned back at 5pm to find Cat still working hard, making smores by the fire! When we got bugged out by the mozzies we went inside and then made dinner. Ian who is staying long term at the hostel came in around 9.30pm and was heading back out with Casey to go fishing and asked us if we wanted to join them. As Alaska is the place to fish, we found some waders in the shed and went along for the ride. Down at the estuary we waded across (mine leeked a bit and I got a wet foot) to the middle and Ian and Casey got casting for Salmon and we cracked open a beer or two. We got a bit excited at one point as Ian snagged one but it slipped the hook, classic case of 'the one that got away', but we were there to witness it! There were a lot of people there and some were catching some decent size fish and the Eagles were waiting around for some scraps. Ian lost his hook, so that was that until the guy next to us gave him a spare before packing up and flying his plane off into the sunset. And what a beautiful sunset. Great fishing the Alaskan way! Around 11.30pm we gave up and headed back to the hostel for a hot drink to warm up and then bed.
27th May.
Had a nice long lie in until 10am this morning and a late breakfast. We then packed our stuff up and hung around the hostel checking email and surfing the net until around 2pm when Heather (the hostel owner) came back with too much pizza and asked us to help her out. We love Alaska, not only is the place beautiful every where you look, but the people here are very friendly and keep giving us food! We definitely want to come back. At 3pm we loaded our bags into Heather's small Jeep and she drove us round to a couple that run a B&B round the corner to drop off a lovely cheese cake she'd made and a chat. The husband had not long ago had a car accident and they were going to need some help to run the business this season. We chatted about how we could help if we decided to come back to Alaska and work for the season. They gave us a week or two to think about it as we're heading off on the cruise tonight and they are going to a wedding and won't be back until the 13th June. Heather then dropped us off at the cruise terminal via Safeway for some drink supplies and we then checked ourselves in. As we had a few hours before we could board we stored our bags and wandered into town to meet up with Paul and Ana. After a nice chat, at 7pm we caught the free shuttle bus back to the cruise terminal and boarded the ship. Compared to the last one we've been on, it's huge! Once on board we headed to our cabin where we found a couple and their daughter trying to get into our cabin! The room attendant confirmed on his list that the room was theirs and we would need to go up to guest relations to sort it out as 'it wasn't his problem!' How rude! So we went to the desk and told them that we were told that we had the wrong room number. The lady behind the desk said 'but it is your room, I'll come down to sort it out'. When we got there the family had stored a few things in the room and the guest services lady asked the attendant whether he had checked the key-cards to which he said no but they were on his list. It turns out that the family had booked a long time in advance and when we'd booked the cheaper room, they were upgraded to another floor and an outside cabin but they had used the luggage tags they were sent in the post. The room numbers were similar but we were surprised that they weren't informed of the change when they checked in. Anyway, the attendant was asked to remake the bed and not long after, the family came back down to move their stuff as they had also gone up to guest services to ask why their key-cards wouldn't fit our door. After we finally got into our room and our bags turned up, we dumped our stuff and went for a look around the ship. At 9pm the ship was meant to leave port so we took advantage of still being docked to grab something to eat from the buffet before the ship set off. We left port at 9.30 and we sat with a cup of tea and hot chocolate with a slice of bread and butter pudding and waved goodbye to Seward. At 10.30 we went to the Celebrity Theatre to watch the opening night show which gave us a glimpse of what to expect the week's entertainment would be like. After that, we went back to our cabin for a shower and off to bed. The families bags were now outside our room, so we informed a guy on duty who said he would get it sorted for us. We weren't surprised that our useless attendant hadn't sorted it out earlier and that the family still didn't have their luggage.
