Whale Watching Extravaganza

Thanks be to God for glorious weather for our Juneau excursions!! The sun was out and it was absolutely PERFECT for whale watching.

Whale Watching was amazing!!!! I put my camera on sport mode, and just clicked away every time I saw anything come out of the water. I got some really great pictures. One of the workers on the boat even gave me one of their business cards and asked me to send them one of my pictures (after Uncle Tom brought the picture to their attention). Words just cannot describe how amazing it is to just watch them jump out of the water and the HUGE splash that follows. Not wanting to be outdone, there were plenty of fish and/or salmon jumping as well. However, their splash was not quite so big. Mom and Dad enjoyed it as well although they stayed in the comfort of the sitting area and I was out on the observatory deck/area battling the wind. We also saw a bald eagle and some sea otters among other things.

Then we were off to the Mendenhall Glacier. We only had about 45 minutes there, so once again I seemed to be running everywhere trying to get pictures of everything, and take a quick gander at the gift shop before I had to fun back to the bus. It was truly an amazing sight. Once I figure out how to get pictures uploaded from here, I will try to post some. I can't find any USB ports on this computer, so there has got to be another way. The general consensus among our group was that 45 minutes to explore this natural wonder was definitely not enough, especially since most of them are not young enough or have enough energy to buzz around like I did.

After this we were taken to a salmon bake outdoor buffet. The food was delicious, the salmon was incredible, and they also had Alaskan blueberry cake, chicken, beans, pasta salad, cole slaw and 2nd only to the salmon was their Hot Apple Cider. Then they had buses to take us back to downtown Juneau. I walked around a couple of shops, and then headed back to the ship because it had started to rain (perfect timing if you ask me ;) .

We have just pulled out of port in Juneau, and are headed to the Hubbard Glacier via Glacier Bay. Uncle Tom says it is better that we saw the Mendenhall Glacier first because then we will REALLY be impressed by the Hubbard Glacier.