Saturday, July 14, 2018

The Great Escape - Day 24: Seward and another Boat Tour

July 13

Today we left the Celebrity Millenium Cruise Ship.  Debarking proved to be a no fuss no muss process, a job well done overall by the cruise ship.


Here's a coincidence for you, back in May of 2013, I was in Steward riding my 2011 Ural Patrol Valencia.  I wrote on the blog how my stay at Seward was cut short as I saw this cruise ship come in and I expected hordes of people to flood the little town of Seward.

Link to the 2013 posting:  LINK.

Here's pics from that 2013 posting:

From May 10, 2013

If the ship looks familiar, its because its the same cruise ship that I just arrived on as a passenger on July 13, 2018!

We were led to our bus, along with 24 other people, who would go tour Seward Bay and Fox Island later in the morning.

We first visited the Alaska Sealife Center and toured the various sea life exhibits:



 Tufted Puffin


 A Sea Anemone you could touch if you wished.
I passed.

 Spotted Seal swimming about.

Steller Sea Lion

We also walked about a bit and I found the spot where the 0 mile marker for the Iditarod is marked:


If the above picture seems familiar, it's because I posed Valencia at the same spot a little over five years ago!

May 2013

 Larry on a replica of the iditarod sleds


Back on the bus, it was a short ride to the tour boat that would take us to lunch on Fox Island and then some wildlife sightseeing.

Our tour boat

Lunch on Fox Island was pretty nice and well organized.  After lunch, we reboarded the boat and went looking for whales and other wild life.


Yep, another Alaskan Glacier

Then, we found some whales, the circling birds would give away the whales' location and their sudden activity in flight would presage the whales coming to the surface some of the time.



A small bubble feed?

Closeup view of the previous pic





 At another spot, we saw a bunch of seals resting

As we headed into the tour boat's home harbor, we spotted a couple of eagles just watching over things.


Not a bad Wildlife Boat Tour, and the lunch was excellent. 

Back on the bus, it was a short ride into the outskirts of Seward to the Windsong Lodge where we'd booked rooms for the night.

Tomorrow: Anchorage.

5 comments:

Bob and Sharon said...

Looks like your seeing it all. that's great

Artie & Leinen's Grand Adventure said...

Hi, Dom, just a friendly comment. You have 2 pictures taken at the Sea Life Center with marine mammals you called Stellar Seals. Well, kind of. The top picture is a spotted seal. He is white with spots. The second picture is a Stellar sea lion. If you saw them standing side by side you would be able to tell the sea lion because it uses its flippers to move around, and has ear parts on the side of its head you can see. Later on in your pictures you show sea lions on rocks that you also called seals. I absolutely love the Sea Life Center and any aquarium. I have seen several sea lion shows, too. Seward is my favorite town in Alaska, or just about anywhere!

Andy & Laura said...

Whoever would have thought that you'd be one of those passengers that ran you out of town 5 years ago! Glad you stuck around this time! We enjoyed both your pictures and post. Thanks for sharing.

RichardM said...

Was the touristy activities less congested? It looks like yours may be the only boat in at the time. Seward is a beautiful place...

redlegsrides said...

Bob and Sharon, it sure was.

Bridget, no worries, thanks for the corrections, will update the notations.

Laura and Andy, quite the coincidence eh? Thanks.

RichardM, we went immediately to the boat tour, didn't really go into town much....it wasn't very crowded though.