The day dawned bright and sunny, with gorgeous views as we pulled into dock.

Our time in port was very short, only about 5 hours, so we decided to keep the planned excursions pretty light. We signed up for the Great Alaskan Lumberjack Exclusive Disney show but that was it. We had to be at the Lumberjack show at 7:45, but had the option to walk over on our own, so grabbed a quick bite to eat and disembarked. The ship docks right in downtown Ketchikan and it was only a 5 minute walk over to the show.

Trip Tip #10: You would think after hearing it several times, I would have learned that you “can’t bring perishable food, including liquids” into Alaska when you disembark. As I was waiting to disembark, with my cup of coffee in hand, I thought to myself “They surely don’t mean COFFEE, right?!?!” Well yeah, they do – no coffee, no dairy, no nothin’ – except water. If they see you with it before you leave the ship, they’ll just ask you to throw it away (which is what happened to me). If they see you with it after you’re on Alaskan soil, they’ll ask you to throw it away but you can also be subject to a fine. I can’t imagine they’ll fine you for a cup of coffee, but i guess better safe than sorry – just don’t take it with you

The show is in an outside arena area with bleacher seating. It was a gorgeous day, so we didn’t need to worry about rain or anything, but the seating area is covered and they have heaters above you, so I’m sure it would be comfortable even if the weather wasn’t great. After everyone was settled in, we met our host, Lee. The show we went to was billed as “Disney exclusive” which meant that Lee was actually “Lost Boy Lee” and…that was about it. Oh, except for this “hidden Mickey”

Lee explained that we were going to be part of a little friendly competition, with the audience divided in half, each side cheering on a team of two lumberjacks who would compete against each other doing various “lumberjack-y” tasks. There was lots of audience participation, with kid volunteers being picked for various activities and to be the lucky recipients of the wood “cookies” that were cut off the logs being used in the competition.

It was a cute show and the kids really enjoyed it, so overall, I would recommend it for families with younger kids. Colorado Boy was very excited because he got to keep one of the wood pieces AND got it signed by all the lumberjacks after the show!

After we looked around the requisite lumberjack gift shop, we strolled around the city of Ketchikan, visiting some of the totem poles and the shops on historic Creek Street – Ketchikan’s original “red-light district” now turned into a shopping area unique for being built over the waters (literally) of Ketchikan Creek.

We grabbed some yummy clam chowder and wondered around the dock area a little bit before heading back to the ship

Colorado Princess was ready to head to the club as soon as we got back, so we dropped her off and the rest of us went to try our hand at trivia again. This time it was theme park trivia but we didn’t do any better, coming in 3rd place for the 3rd time

By the time we were done with trivia, it was time for the “Friendship Rocks” show. This cute 15 minute show provides a slide show of pictures from the kid’s club and brings all the kids together up on the stage of the Walt Disney Theatre where they get to do a little dance routine with Mickey and Minnie. This was the first time either of the kids did it and Colorado Princess looked a little terrified the whole time, but she survived it and got a cool t-shirt as a souvenir!

The evening’s show was Dreams, which is one of my favorites. Colorado Dad has seen it several times, so he decided to skip it while I took the kids. Everyone enjoyed their time and then we all met up in Triton’s for dinner. The dinner menu was the Captain’s Gala but both Colorado Dad and I forgot to grab the camera, so we have no pictures and for some reason, the only thing I remember eating was the chocolate lava cake!

Once again, we were exhausted after dinner, so headed straight to our room for bed.

Next up: Till we meet again, the beginning of the end

We had already docked in Juneau by the time we all woke up and it was pouring rain, so we made sure to grab our raincoats and umbrellas before heading to the Walt Disney Theatre to meet up for our excursion – Whale Watch and Mendenhall Glacier.

A bus was waiting to take us over to Auke Bay where we boarded a boat for the whale watching. The boat is pretty good sized – with 2 stories and enough room for maybe 100 – 150 people. There were 3 bathrooms onboard as well as a galley that served complimentary hot chocolate, coffee and donut holes as well as provided other snack options for purchase. I’ve heard some people complain about the size of these boats, because they can’t get as close to the whales as some of the smaller vessels, but we had no issues seeing the whales and a few came quite close to the boat, so I don’t feel like we missed out. The boat has a basic route it takes but the captain is in radio contact with other boats so will go wherever whales have been spotted. While we were heading to our first viewing spot, a naturalist talked about the animals we’d see as well as provided information about the surrounding area. We ended up seeing quite a few whales – 10 in all, including a baby and his mom, which was pretty neat. We also saw eagles, sea lions and seals.

We were out on the water for about 2 hours and then headed back into dock where our bus was waiting to take us over to Mendenhall Glacier.

In addition to the visitor’s center, the glacier area has a viewing platform that’s a quick 5 minute walk away as well as a longer hiking trail that will take you much closer to the glacier and waterfall that’s right next to it. The round trip estimate for the longer trail was 45 minutes and since we only had an hour to spend, we weren’t able to take that hike, although we did walk down the path a little bit. Both the glacier and surrounding area were beautiful.

After our visit to the glacier, the bus took us back to the ship where we boarded and headed to Parrot Cay for lunch. The ship set sail just a few minutes after we returned for our excursion, so we watched the Coast Guard escort us out of the bay as we ate lunch.

We all rested a little bit in the afternoon and Colorado Boy and I ran into an old friend when we went up to get a snack.

It was Pirate night, and the kids REALLY wanted to get their picture taken with Jack Sparrow, so we all got dressed up in our pirate garb and headed down to meet the Captain.

We scheduled our Palo dinner for this evening, so we did not go to the show, which was Toy Story The Musical. Instead, we dropped the kids off at the kids’ club and made our way up to Palo. Once again, our server was Hristo and he took excellent care of us. Unlike brunch, dinner is not a buffet – it’s all sitdown table service off the menu but you can order as many items as you want, so it almost feels like a buffet! For our appetizers, I ordered the grilled shrimp, Colorado Dad ordered the calamari and then Hristo recommended the mushroom polenta to share. I was a little skeptical of that one when it came out, but it was very good, as were the other items.

For our main course, I ordered the tuna, Colorado Dad ordered the lamb shank and then we both shared an order of the chianti-braised beef ravioli, which is my absolute favorite. I didn’t get a pic of the ravioli, but here are the other two.

For dessert, it was time for the famous Palo chocolate souffle. No pictures of this one either, because I dove into it immediately Hristo also recommended we try other desserts as well, so I got the almond cake and Colorado Dad got the apple crostata. Both were good, but the souffle is still number 1 for me!

We were stuffed by the time we left Palo’s, but it was almost time for the pirate party, so we figured we’d be able to burn off a few of those calories by joining in the dancing.

For those of you who have cruised before, you’ll know that the Pirates IN the Caribbean party is one of the highlights – fireworks at sea, swashbuckling pirates, dancing, plus Mickey saving the day – what more could you want? Well, I have to say that on the Alaskan cruises, it’s not nearly as exciting.

Because of noise restrictions in Alaska, fireworks are not allowed and they also do the whole show inside. It’s still the same show but it just doesn’t have quite the same impact. I’m not sure if it’s a smaller space, but it definitely FEELS smaller and the views aren’t quite as good.

Despite the differences, it is a fun party and the kids had fun dancing and bouncing around. By the end of the evening, our Pirate Princess was pretty exhausted

So we called it a night and headed back to our room where we found this guy “monkeying around”

Up next: Blue skies, plaid shirts and the smell of fresh cut wood

Did you miss any of our previous destinations? You can get to all of the Cruisin’ North to Alaska posts right here!

Our first Alaskan port was the town of Skagway, known as the Gateway to the Klondike, for it’s roll in the Gold Rush of 1898. We had an early meet time for our excursion, so we were up before the ship docked. It was very foggy, but luckily not raining!

Trip tip #9: If you have an early excursion meet time, or just want to leave the ship as early as possible on a port day, I highly recommend ordering room service to be delivered first thing in the morning. The options are more on the continental breakfast side and include things like cold cereal, bagels, muffins, etc. You should have door hangers in your stateroom desk drawer that you can fill out and hang on your door by 3am the night before and in the morning, you’ll have everything delivered to you. Quick and easy!

Our excursion in Skagway was the White Pass railway and Trail Camp combination. We met up with our group in the Walt Disney Theater and were led off the ship and onto a bus that took us the 5 minutes it took to get to the train.

We boarded one of the passenger cars and prepared for our ride from Skagway, AK to Fraser, British Columbia. Because we were going over the Canadian border, we all had to have our passports with us. Along the way, we had narration about the history of the area and the railway. The current set of tracks roughly follows the White Pass trail, which was used as part of the Gold Rush of 1898. It was pretty amazing to think that men seeking their fortunes traversed the narrow path almost 500 miles – from Skagway to Dawson City in Canada. At the time, Canadian authorities were requiring EVERY person who came into Canada to carry 2 tons of supplies with them in order to survive the brutal winters. So, not only were these men traveling long distances, but they had to carry a LOT of supplies. Quite a trip to take for what ended up being not a big reward – very few people found their fame and fortune. Our train ride was much less dangerous and the scenery was pretty awesome.

After making our way through White Pass, the highest point of our trip, we arrived at Fraser, BC, population 10. Here, the border patrol boarded the train to check our passports and then we got of the train to board the buses that would take us to the Liarsville Trail Camp and then back into Skagway.

Liarsville is a re-creation of what Skagway looked like back in the late 1800s, with a few old buildings and tents set up to show people how it probably looked back then. They provide hot cider and cookies and then you watch a short show. After the show, anyone who wants to can pan for REAL gold. Ooo, aaahh! They’ve basically seeded everyone’s pan with a few flakes of gold so that everyone “finds” some. Colorado Dad and Colorado Boy panned for gold, while Colorado Princess and I sat near the campfire and had some more cider.

We were there for about an hour, so with the show and gold panning, we had about 15 – 20 minutes to look through the gift shop and then we boarded the bus to head back into town. The lack of pictures from Liarsville kind of says it all – the train was definitely worth it, but Liarsville, although it was cute, was probably something we could have skipped.

Once we got back to town, we went over to the Skagway Brewing Company for lunch and to try a local beer made from spruce tree tips. It was pretty good!

The town of Skagway is pretty small – only 800 or so full-time residents, but there are lots of shops to look through and many of the buildings are historical landmarks – dating back to the 1800s – so we enjoyed walking around town before heading back to the ship.

Dinner that night was in Animator’s Palate and was the normal dinner menu (see the menu here - http://disneycruiser.info/menus_w2011/animator.htm). I had the baked potato soup, chicken and chocolate cake. Everything was good, although the soup was definitely my favorite.

Colorado Dad had the risotto, the beef tenderloin and the apple crumble. For some reason I only got a picture of his dessert.

After dinner, the kids went to the kids’ club and we headed down to WaveBands for one of our favorite adult-only “game shows” – Match Your Mate. Similiar to The Newlywed Game, Match Your Mate is always fun to watch and usually pretty hilarious. Our tablemates had mentioned they were going to try to be picked as one of the couples to participate and they were! She was sneaky though and told the host who was picking the couples that we wanted to play, so instead of watching, we joined in on the fun too.

After answering all the questions right in the first round right (yep, I know my hubby well!) and only missing one of the questions in the 2nd round, we ended up winning. Woohoo! The prize was a free day pass to the Rainforest Room at Vista Spa (awesome!!) and a bottle of champagne. A great way to cap off a great day!

Next up: Whale watching and glacier viewing in Juneau

Did you miss any of our previous destinations? You can get to all of the Cruisin’ North to Alaska posts right here!

Wednesday was our first full day IN Alaska and it was a day we were really looking forward to – it was Tracy Arm day! But, we weren’t going to be sailing through the fjord until later in the afternoon, so we had the morning to hang out. I got up before everyone else, so got dressed and headed up to Deck 10 to take some pictures. While I was up there, I spotted my first whale of the trip! I didn’t have my longer lens, but sort of got a picture of it…

Next up was our scheduled character breakfast! This is a fun breakfast where some of the Fab 5 visit each table for pictures and autographs. For our breakfast, we had visits from Goofy, Pluto, Mickey and Minnie.

In between visits from the characters, the serving team has a little bit of fun making “hats” for everyone. Don’t we all look fabulous??

Colorado Dad and I didn’t eat because we were heading to Palo for brunch shortly after, but the kids enjoyed a breakfast of chocolate chip pancakes, yogurt and Raisin Bran.

After the breakfast, the kids went to the club so we could head up to Palo for brunch. If you’ve never been to Palo for brunch, I highly recommend it. The food is incredible and the atmosphere, while still “upscale”, is a little more relaxed then at dinner. I’m actually not sure which is my favorite – brunch or dinner – which is why we usually book both!

Trip tip #7: You are able to make Palo reservations before you get onboard, but if they are all booked by the time you look, don’t worry! Unless it’s a really busy cruise, they seem to always have at least a few tables open every time we go, so you can usually get a reservation once you’re onboard. And I don’t know that this is ALWAYS true, but we typically book the first seating time at both brunch and dinner and then arrive a few minutes early. Every time but one we’ve been sat at a table next to the window, so if you’re  interested in a table next to the window, it might be a good strategy to try as well!

We were a few minutes early to our 11am reservation, but were seated immediately and welcomed by our server, Hristo from Bulgaria, who took excellent care of us. We hit the buffet selection first.

As if the buffet selection wasn’t enough, we also decided to order two of the day’s pizzas. The gorgonzola and grape and the spicy italian.

I know gorgonzola and grape sounds like kind of an odd combination, but it’s really the perfect balance of sweet and salty – really one of our favorites. Hristo also suggested we try the chicken parmesan (you know, because we didn’t have enough to eat already!) so we also tried that. It was very, very good.

Somehow, we found room for dessert as well.

All during brunch we had a spectacular view of the scenery as we sailed toward Tracy Arm and by the end of the meal, we were starting to see icebergs around us. We said goodbye to Hristo and made our way up to Deck 10 after changing clothes and picking the kids up.

Tracy Arm is pretty incredible. With the mountains towering above us on both sides, icebergs in the water all around us and wildlife around every corner, it’s one of those once in a lifetime experiences and something you have to see for yourself to truly appreciate. We ended up having really great weather for our sail toward Sawyer glacier – partly cloudy and in the 50s. The adults stayed on deck most of the afternoon, while the kids headed out to the kids’ club after yelling “Iceberg, dead ahead!” a dozen or so times and getting their fill of soft serve ice cream.

As we came up to Sawyer glacier, the decks were getting pretty crowded so we decided to head down to our cabin for a bit. Just as we got out to our verandah, we were treated to the sight of some ice “calving” off the glacier. That happened several times over the next 20 or so minutes which was very cool.

We spent probably 30 or so minutes in front of the glacier and then the captain turned the ship around and we headed out the way we came.

Trip tip #8: If decks 9 and 10 are full and you can’t find a spot at the railing on the way in to Tracy Arm, just remember that you go back out the exact same way and once the ship turns around, a lot of people leave, so you’ll have no problem getting a spot to check out the scenery as you head out.

That afternoon, Colorado Boy and I went and watched Chimpanzee from Disneynature while Colorado Dad and Colorado Princess took a nap. The movie was really cute and we both enjoyed it.

That night’s show was a ventriloquist named Michael Harrison. I wasn’t particularly interested in seeing him, so we decided to let the kids play for awhile before dinner.

Dinner was at Triton’s again, this time with their normal French menu (available here - http://disneycruiser.info/menus_w2011/tritons.htm). Somehow I missed taking any pictures, but I know I had the french onion soup (very good), the chicken breast (ok) and the chocolate mousse (good).

When we arrived back in our room, Mr. Elephant was waiting for us!

Coming next: Skagway, the gateway to the Klondike

Our first full day on the ship started out great, with the sun shining and the kids sleeping “late”. We wanted to attend the Disney Vacation Club (DVC) Members celebration first thing in the morning so Colorado Dad took the kids up for a bite to eat at Beach Blanket Buffet before dropping them off at the kids club. While he did that, I tidied up and made sure all our door magnets were out.

Trip tip #4 –  You may remember one of my previous posts where I explained how you can add some extra magic to your cruise by decorating your door. Not only is it fun, but it’s also functional! The hallways and stateroom doors all look pretty much identical so it can be tough to keep track of which door is yours. With our door magnets in place, we never had to worry about finding our way. Even our next door neighbors commented on how helpful it was to have the magnets up – they knew once they saw our door, their room was next You don’t have to do a lot – even something simple will help you find your way after a long day in port.

The DVC Member celebration is always fun. The DVC team goes through some of the latest incentives for adding additional points to your membership while you sit back and relax with a beverage. They also play fun little games with door prizes like waterproof lanyards and backpacks and one lucky member even wins a couple hunder dollar onboard credit (alas, we’ve never won it). Even if you aren’t a member, you can still join in the fun by joining one of the group presentations done during the cruise (there’s usually 3 or 4 different times scheduled).

Trip tip #5 – If you have ever thought about buying into DVC or even if you just want to see what it’s all about, attending a presentation on the cruise is a MUST. It’s a well-known “secret” that the very best incentives for buying in are always given on the cruises, so it’s a great way to save a little money and maybe get some additional perks as well. Last year we added points at Aulani and paid less per point than we would have elsewhere, got a $500 onboard credit and received 18 Fastpass tickets for Disneyland. If you do attend a presentation and Matt or Ann Marie are there from DVC, make sure to say hello for me

After the DVC meet, Colorado Dad and I headed up to the Outlook Cafe to grab a snack since I had missed breakfast. Added especially to the Disney Wonder because of its colder itineraries, the Outlook Cafe is an adult-only coffee shop/bar that has really great views of the scenery outside the ship. It’s a quiet atmosphere, with comfy chairs, so a perfect place to curl up with a coffee and a good book.

After our snack we went to go pick the kids up for the Princess Gathering. So popular, they do it twice every cruise, this is a mega photo opportunity with all the princesses on the ship in the atrium at one time for pictures, autographs and hugs. I won’t bore you with EVERY princess picture we got, but here are a couple of Colorado Princess’ favorites.

After our royal encounter, we headed over to Parrot Cay for lunch. Once again, I forgot to take pictures, but it was an Italian buffet and I remember it being pretty good. The highlight for the kids was the ice cream station, where they could pile on as many marshmallows, chocolate chips and chocolate or caramel they could handle.

Colorado Dad decided to head over to the Buena Vista Theatre to catch John Carter, which was playing in 3D. Colorado Princess headed back to the club and Colorado Boy and I decided to head over to the Disney Tunes Trivia session.

This was the first time we had done trivia on the ship (last cruise with the kids we had been sucked in to the black hole known as bingo), so weren’t quite sure what to expect, but it was a lot of fun! Charlotte was our host and Ryan played all the “tunes”. Each team was given an answer sheet with space for 20 or so answers. Each question was worth 3 points and you had to give the name of the song, what movie it was from and then answer a bonus question about the movie. There were definitely some tough questions, but we did ok – 3rd place out of about 15 or so teams. Scoring is all based on the honor system and the winners each received a plastic Mickey head “medal”.

After trivia, the kids and I headed back to our stateroom and we all hung out on the verandah looking for whales until it was time for the show.

No whales were spotted, but the scenery was starting to get pretty cool.

That night’s show was The Golden Mickeys and it was also formal night for dinner, so we got dressed in our fancy clothes before heading down to the theatre. We’ve seen this show several times and while there are some parts of it that are getting a little old, I really enjoy hearing all the music from the various Disney movies they talk about, so it’s still a show I enjoy.

Trip tip #6 – If you’re not into dressing up, don’t worry! You have a couple options. First, I’ve seen all kinds of attire during formal night, from ball gowns to sweatsuits (yes, really!) so you’ll be fine in whatever you wear to the dining room. But, if you’re not comfortable coming to the dining room, head up to Beach Blanket Buffet for a casual meal, or order room service and enjoy dinner in your stateroom. Either way, if you haven’t seen the show, make sure to check it out – you don’t need to dress up for the shows and it’s one I recommend seeing, especially if you’re a fan of Disney movies.

After the show, we went down to the atrium to the Captain’s reception where you can meet some of the ships’ officers and get your picture taken with the Captain. We stood in line to get our picture taken with Mickey in his “formal” attire

We wanted to do a formal family picture but Colorado Princess was beginning to have a meltdown, so she and Colorado Dad wandered around Deck 4 while Colorado Boy and I got our picture taken and then I took over so the boys could get their picture with Captain Fabian.

Our dining rotation had us in Triton’s (my fav for formal night) and the menu was The Golden Mickeys (found here - http://disneycruiser.info/menus_w2011/goldenmickey.htm). Unfortunately, dinner didn’t go great, so the only pictures I got was of our appetizers, but I had the crispy cheese ravioli, oven-roasted tom turkey breast and the Golden Chocolate Award. Colorado Dad had the bay scallops, the turkey and the baked apple and blueberry pithiviers. The few bites I had of everything were all good!

Once the Mickey bars came around, the kids were back in the high life again.

As we headed up to our stateroom we had a chance encounter with Princess Tiana and even Colorado Boy was excited to see her.

Tonight’s towel animal extraordinare was ready and waiting to wish us a good night’s sleep when we arrived back in our room.

Up Next: Iceberg, dead ahead! Sailing through the Tracy Arm Fjord.

Welcome to this week’s Wordless Wednesday blog hop, where we’re mixing it up with Mickey and Minnie. Here are a couple of favorites from our recent Alaskan cruise.

For more on our fabulous trip to Alaska on the Disney Wonder, make sure to check out the first few posts from my trip report!

Thanks, as always, to Deb, the fabulous host of our weekly Disney blog hop. Make sure to click through to visit the rest of the hoppers this week and if you’d like to share your own adventures with Mickey and Minnie, make sure to link up!

Settling In
Our room wasn’t going to be ready until 2, so after lunch, we headed to a table near the Goofy pool on deck 9 to hang out until then. We were immediately approached by a server who offered us a drink in the commemorative Alaska mug for only $9.95 each. Gee, what a bargain! We each bought one with smoothies for the kids and the Drink of the Day (plantar’s punch) for Colorado Dad and I.

When our room was ready, we headed down to check it out. Since we’ve cruised before and are members of the Castaway Club, there was a gift waiting for us when we arrived.

After several years of the same red bag, they’ve finally changed the gifts to these backpacks, which I like much better!

Our luggage hadn’t arrived yet, but we put a few things away and hung out until it was time for our Disboards meet down in the Promenade Lounge on Deck 3. We visited with our fellow Disboarders for a few minutes and then it was time for the Lifeboat drill. You no longer have to wear your lifejackets to the drill, which is nice.

Bon Voyage, Seattle!
From there, we headed to the Sailaway party so the kids could see the characters and dance a little bit. Yes, Colorado Boy IS dancing a jig in this picture

After the party, we headed back to the stateroom so I could unpack everything and get ready for the show. Tonight’s entertainment was “Let the Magic Begin” which Colorado Dad and I have seen 4 times and could have skipped, but the kids enjoyed it.

Dinner at Parrot Cay
We had the late dinner and our seating wasn’t until 8:15 so we did a little exploring around the ship until then.

Trip Tip #3: I always see a lot of questions about which dining to choose – early or late. Honestly, I think it depends on your family – you know your kids best – but, there are a couple things to consider. We specifically asked for late dining for two reasons – first, so we didn’t have to rush back from excursions to make the 5:45 early seating time. Second, with late seating, you see the show first (at 6:15) and we felt like it would be better for the kids to be “fresh” for the show, rather than dinner, because we could always feed them early if necessary. What we didn’t take in to consideration was the time change. Cruising to Alaska meant that we were two hours earlier than at home, so a dinner time of 8:15 was really 10:15 for us. Needless to say, dinner that late just did not work for Colorado Princess and I think it was a big cause of her grumpiness throughout the week. If we had been cruising off the East Coast, where an 8:15 dinner time would have been 6:15 at home, it would have been fine. So, just keep that in mind when you’re deciding which dining to choose with kids!

Our dining rotation started in Parrot Cay, the least favorite of the restaurants for me, but we enjoyed a nice dinner, getting to know our tablemates and our servers, Yusuf and Buyani. I know a lot of people love pictures of the food but after 4 years of almost the exact same menus, with the same food, I was pretty lax about pictures, so I apologize in advance. The menu was the Island Dinner menu which you can see here - http://disneycruiser.info/menus_w2011/parrotcay.htm.

I had the Ahi Tuna, Parrot Cay Salad, Jerk Seasoned Pork Chop and the French Toast Banana Bread. I was not very impressed with dessert, but everything else was really good

Colorado Dad had the Crab Dip, Cream of Asparagus soup, Mixed Grill and Creme Brulee cheescake. He ate everything, so I’m assuming it was pretty good

The kids had Macaroni and Cheese and a hamburger along with a special treat

One nice thing about the late dining rotation is they do something called “Dine and Play” which allows the kids to enjoy dinner in the dining room but then they are picked up at 9:15 to go play in the kids’ club so parents can enjoy the rest of dinner in peace. Unfortunately, this first night, the club crewmembers came before the kids got their dessert, so they missed out on their Mickey Bars!

After dinner, we were exhausted so we just went to pick the kids up and headed off to bed, where the first towel animal of the week was waiting for us.

Next up: A day at sea

Monday morning dawned cloudy and cool, but luckily it was not raining when we woke up.

Getting to the Port and Checking In
Since we were staying in one of the Disney hotels, we could have signed up for the Disney shuttle to the port ($30/per person/one way). The shuttle is kind of nice because they take care of getting your luggage from the bus onto the ship. But when we found out the first bus wasn’t going to leave until 11:30, we decided to cab it instead because I wanted to get to the terminal as early as possible (I’ll explain why in a bit).

We were a bit worried about getting all our luggage to fit in the trunk of a cab, but it all fit without a problem. At about $15 for the 10 minute ride to the port, I think cabbing it was the way to go, even though we had to handle our own luggage. Way cheaper than the $120 it would have cost for the 4 of us to ride the bus!

We got to the port around 10:30 and walked right in to drop our luggage off at the xray scanner and then went upstairs to wait in a pretty short line to go through security. There are lots of people standing there to explain what you need and to answer any questions, so it was a pretty smooth process. After getting through security, we had to sign the requisite “is anyone in your family sick” questionnaire and then we were able to go over to the check-in booths.

They don’t like people taking pictures in the terminal area, I guess for security reasons, but Colorado Dad was able to get one picture while I was standing in line. The picture below shows the basic setup of the terminal – you enter at the very far end of the room (back of the pic) where the security checkpoint is located and then come over to the middle section where all the check-in booths are. Colorado Dad took this picture from the seating area where there are a whole bunch of seats set up and then behind that is where you enter the ship.

After checking in, I moved over to the supervisor’s desk (you can see me standing in that line in the foreground of the pic above) to check on…an upgrade!

Trip Tip #1: If you’re interested in upgrading your stateroom, you might consider waiting to do so until you get to the port on embarkation day. Here’s why – If rooms are available, you can upgrade for a significantly reduced cost to what it would take to upgrade if you did it before sail day. Why? Well, at this point they’re not going to sell those rooms to anyone new, but if they upsell to an existing passenger and get some additional money, why not! The upgrades go pretty quickly and aren’t always available, so  if you want to try for this, get to the port as early as you can!

Our initial room was one of the secret porthole rooms, which provided us with a porthole that was obscured but for the price of an inside room. Definitely a great value, but for Alaska we felt like having a verandah room would be nice. There was one available so we went for it. One thing to mention here – if you do upgrade, they’ll ask if you’re expecting any stateroom gifts to be delivered so they can make sure to get it to your new room. If you are a Castaway Club member or a DVC member, make sure to say “yes”! We did not do this and it took several days for everything to get sorted out with the DVC desk (they give gifts and do trivia phone calls all throughout the cruise).

After upgrading, the kids and I went over to get a picture with Minnie (which didn’t turn out ) and check-in at the kids club. The line for the kids club check-in was pretty long, so if you want to, you can wait until you’re on the ship and just do it later in the day.

Trip Tip #2: All kids in the kids club get a “Mickey band” which is a plastic bracelet with a scannable plastic piece on it that is used to keep track of them. It’s about the size of a large wristwatch. You have the option of either putting it on the kid’s wrist or around their ankle. For young kids, I would recommend doing the ankle. We originally put it around Colorado Princess’ wrist, but in order for it to not slip off, it had to be really tight. Over the course of the first couple days, her wrist swelled a little bit and the band ended up cutting into her skin. Luckily, it’s easy enough to cut off and get a new band, but we would have saved her some pain if we had done the ankle originally!

Heading Aboard!
After all the check-in stuff, we sat down to wait until they called our boarding number. When you get to the terminal, they give you a card with a boarding number on it after you’ve filled out the “are you sick” questionnaire. The numbers start at 1 (for concierge guests) and go up from there. We got group 6, which wasn’t too bad. I think our group was called about 12:15 or so. When they call your group, you have the option of having an embarkation photo taken or just heading straight to the ship. We opted for the pic

and then headed to the gangway. We boarded on deck 4, which was a little different. Normally you go in on deck 3, so your first impression is of the 3-story atrium with the awesome chandelier.

Not sure why they didn’t do it, but regardless, we were still “announced” as we boarded. From there, we headed to Beach Blanket Buffet for lunch. I took zero pictures of our food and honestly cannot remember a thing I ate, but I guess it was pretty good I guess I was too busy taking pictures of the view to remember much else.

Up next: Sailing away to an Island-inspired dinner.

Hi everyone! Now that I’ve (reluctantly) gotten back into the daily grind I figured it’s about time for me to put together a trip report of our wonderful cruise to Alaska. I’ll be sharing highlights and pictures from each day and will wrap up with a few lessons learned. If you have any questions along the way, please let me know – I’d be happy to answer them!

Arrival Day
I travel to Seattle for work a lot because my company is headquartered there, but the kids had never been, so we decided early on to fly out a few days before our cruise to do a bit of sightseeing and to visit with some friends. We left on Saturday and our flight was uneventful. The kids kept busy with the usual tech gadgets

And I took pictures out the window, including this nice one of Mt. Rainier as we were descending toward Seattle.

We stayed at the Sheraton Seattle in downtown Seattle. This was one of the “official” Disney hotels although we booked too late to get one of the rooms in the Disney block. It’s a nice hotel and within walking distance of Pike Place Market and the monorail that takes you over to the Space Needle, Chihuly and the Experience Music Project.

We got to the hotel around 8:00 and just grabbed a bite to eat and hit the sack – we were pretty beat from the travel day.

Exploring Seattle
Sunday we got up and headed out to our friend’s house in Snoqualmie. We weren’t in too much of a hurry so took the “back roads” because the scenery is just so gorgeous. No matter how many times I visit, it always amazes me how green everything is. Coming from Colorado where everything is dry and brown during the summer, it’s a nice change!

We spent a great afternoon with our friends but by the time we got back downtown, it was too late to do much else, so we just walked down to Pike Place Market where we walked around and visited the Pike Place pig and what I would consider the grossest tourist attraction ever – the Gum Wall. Can you spot the cruise ship?

We ended the evening at one of our favorites – The Pike brewery, where Colorado Dad and I enjoyed some delicious beer and the kids enjoyed “kid beer” (aka root beer)

Good night Pike Place!

Next up: Heading to the port and Bon Voyage, Seattle!