Sailing the BC coast to Ketchikan
I was up early for some ship exploring and possible blogging on June 3rd, which would be a day of sailing north along BC’s spectacular coast. The first photo, of the Lido Bar in the centre of Deck 9 behind the Lido Pool, was shot at 04:40.
The Sea View Pool on Deck 9 aft.
The Sea View Bar in front of that pool, with New York Pizza to the left.
I settled in towards the back of the Lido Market, which is the buffet dining area on Deck 9, and fired up my laptop. I didn’t get much accomplished with it, though. Yes, the ship is very quiet this time of morning 🙂
By 05:40, a crew had the floor of the pool area washed.
Northern Vancouver Island is one of my favorite sections of the coast to cruise. The next photo looks astern from our balcony, at 05:52. We were near the Robson Bight Ecological Reserve, a great place for orca sightings, though I had no luck.
The Solstice was manoeuvring through the channels ahead of us. This was shot right after the last photo.
The weather was uncertain, but this was much better than I had expected. 05:54.
Cathy was on whale watch duty as I shot the last 3 photos. I tried to light her up with a flash, but the result is more amusing than what I had intended 🙂
Continuing a stream of shooting as the weather and light changed in this complex area, this looks back to the south – it may be Mount Palmerston.
05:58.
There are a lot of navigational markers of various kinds along the route. There are also lots of boat/ship wreck sites.
Finally two humpback whales fairly close, at 06:06.
Calm seas and blue skies ahead, at 06:11.
The location screen on our tv at 06:15. Some of them zoom in to get really detailed location information, but this one didn’t seem to. The numbers on the map are our ports – Vancouver, Ketchikan, and Juneau.
Back on duty.
Even when we were in the sun, there were often storms close by. A small commercial fishboat can be seen in the centre, probably heading south from Port McNeill.
A dramatic sky at 06:34.
We hadn’t discussed plans for family meals yet, so had started by booking a room-service breakfast for 07:00 this morning. The meal was excellent, and this is standard service, with no charge.
I posted the next photo on Facebook at 07:29, with the comment “I haven’t seen seas like this very often. We’re just passing Port Hardy. Sailed by 2 humpback whales very close about an hour ago. The Celebrity Solstice can be seen ahead, just below our bridge.”
For a photographer, this morning was pretty much perfect, with huge variety. This was the view at 07:52, still from our balcony.
We had booked full service packages so pretty much everything was included, from drinks to the spa, and we started each morning off in the spa’s large therapy pool when it opened at 08:00. I’ll show you some photos of it in a later post.
The next photo was shot at 3:40 pm as we were running up a narrow channel east of Haida Gwaii to minimize the effects of strong winds.
That channel offered some unusually close views of the coastline.
By 5:35 when the next two photos were shot, the weather had turned, and gale warnings had been issued for our route for the next two days.
Our first family dinner in the dining room. Although a specific time can be reserved for the entire cruise, we chose to decide on a day-by-day basis and that worked out well for us.
After dinner we all went to the beautiful World Stage for a show. This 3-level theatre seats 890 people.
Helping us get into the Alaska spirit, our room stewards had a created a bear with towels while we were at dinner that evening.
The weather forecast for the next day, a port stop in Ketchikan, was for cold and rain, so we might not even leave the ship.
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