Alaskan cruise - day 3 — Captain Father John

We awoke to the sound of seaplanes taking off in Ketchikan Bay. Our cruise ship is tied to the dock and our cabin faces north into the bay. The water is flat calm so it is a perfect day for a seaplane ride or any other outdoor activities. Large fish are jumping out of the water near the ship. I know they must be large because I am 10 stories above the water and I can easily see them. There are jellyfish too.

Ketchikan is an Indian word meaning thundering wings of an eagle. It is the salmon capital of the world so it is also a haven for bears and eagles. The rivers in the center of Ketchikan are the main spawning grounds for the salmon. We are only 40 miles north of Canada in the southern most town in Alaska. With a year round population of 8,800 it is the sixth largest town in Alaska. Ketchikan is also famous for having the largest number of standing totem poles in the world. The tides range from 20′ to 26′ per tide change. Ketchikan is a rain forest with 300 days of rain per year creating 162 inches of rain ( 13.5 feet ) annually. It only snows a few times each winter and the rain quickly washes the snow away. We did not have rain have today. just a little drizzle in the afternoon. Our DUCK tour was a lot of fun.

One suggestion for future cruise ship passengers, consider bringing small walkie talkies for each couple. These ships are immense and there are many places to hang out. Your cell phone is often out of cell tower range or roaming so calling each other on the walkie talkie to find where they are or to make arrangements to meet later has worked very well for our group. We have even given ourselves extremely clever handles ( radio names ) Simons one, Simons two and Simons three. Our pleasure boat cruising friends ( live aboard boaters ) Bev and Dave Feiges use walkie talkies when anchoring their 60′ trawler Cloverleaf. Bev is on the helm providing Dave with useful instructions to help him with the anchoring process. We asked Dave if this was a help to him? He said he never turns on his walkie talkie so Bev can make all the suggestions she wants.

There are a lot dead heads around here. I am not referring to the generally stoned followers of the Grateful Dead band, I am talking about logs in the water. There is a major logging industry in the Northwest. They cut down the trees and raft the logs together to float them to Vancouver to be loaded on ships. From time to time the rafts break up or a few logs separate from the rafts. This is not a safe place to run a pleasure boat. It would be very dangerous to run at high speed at night.

We will set sail tonight and head for Icy Straight Point. Dinner will be in Samba which is a Brazilian themed restaurant.

A view of Ketchikan

We are the red triangle

Formal dining night.