Alaska

Each year Stan and KK get to come home for the month of July. Since they are only here that month out of the year the entire month is spent with family time. Thanks to Stan and KK's generosity, all of the kids and their spouses were treated to a wonderful trip to Alaska. (Thanks to my sister-in-law, Tiffany, and my parents for watching the kids for 9 days so we could go!!!)

There is no way that I can recap the entire trip in a reasonable amount of space. So I will just give the highlights.

We flew to Alaska on Tuesday, July 15th. After a very delayed flight we arrived in Alaska around 9:30. We quickly dropped our things at the hotel and headed over Jess and Marlene's house (Stan's brother and his wife) for a delicious feast of King crab legs. The food was delicious and it was great to see all of the family there.

The next day we took at train from Anchorage to Seward. The 4 hour train ride was filled with the beautiful landscapes of Alaska. We saw a brown bear and a couple of glaciers on the way. There were several streams and lakes as well.

The first few days of the cruise were a bit dreary and cold. In spite of the rain, we went Kayaking in Sitka. It was cold but well worth the adventure. We saw several different types of Star fish and enjoyed observing the majesty of the bald eagles flying overhead.

Our next stop, and the highlight of the trip, was Juneau. Here I am going to insert Rob's description of this day. (Hope you don't mind Rob) "We arrived in Juneau after a few bleak days of continual rain. The sun was shining and it felt great to step off the cruise boat, stretch our legs, and explore the nature that belongs in an outdoors magazine.
My family received a complimentary shore excursion in Juneau (one of the perks of travelling with a small army) to go whale watching in the surrounding ocean inlets. Although the brochure listed a dazzling array of animals for which we would 'be on the lookout,' I did not board the catamaran with exceptionally high expectations. But after a few minutes of sailing through beautiful (but animal-less) scenery, we hit the mother load...
Our boat was surrounded by two different pods of humpback whales (a total of around 30 whales) and for a solid hour and a half, we experienced the absolute adrenaline rush of seeing these beautiful whales up close and personal. And they were active!
The great part of having an awesome camera (thank you Christa!!): I was able to take rapid fire shots, capture the entire progression of their dives, and basically felt like a National Geographic photographer. The not-so-great part: having to later choose which pictures to put on the blog. (I took over 450 pictures of just the whales).

We got to hear their songs to each other and see a mother instructing her baby. But perhaps the most spectacular scenes came when all the whales would Bubble Net feed together. The entire group dives down into the ocean, sends bubbles up to the surface in circles to herd their food into a compact group, and then they all feast together in one sudden, synchronated lunge.

The naturalist conducting our trip told us a lot about humpback whales. Unlike killer whales that you can see in Sea World, humback whales are too big and consume too much to live in captivity. Consequently there is a lot that we still don't understand about their species. For example, marine biologists previously believed their lifespan to be 70-80 years. Then as recently as 2005, Alaskan Native Americans found a dead humpback whale with a 120 year old New England explosive (previously used to hunt whales in the Atlantic) that had lodged into the head, failed to detonate and was sealed into place by scar tissue. Experts now believe humpback whales can live to be over 150 years old.

This experience was absolutely incredible!!

On Sunday we were in Skagway, an old mining town. Thanks to Joy and Darrell, we were able to do a walking tour of this town before church. The stories that this town has to tell are very amusing. It is a very fun town. I would have liked to have more time there.

The rest of the trip was very enjoyable and restful (for those who didn't stay up all night playing games :) ) I am so grateful to blessed with such wonderful people to spend my time and share my life with!!