19 posts tagged “vacation”

Because of the high winds and waves the evening of departure, that continued into the next day, our progress to Sitka was delayed. We were supposed to be there from 12p - 6p Thursday. The ship didn't drop anchor at the Sitka harbor until around 2pm, and then we all had to draw a number for "tender transport". We drew numbers 540 - 547, but the numbers continued to around 1000. The people who had booked a shore excursion didn't have to draw a number and were transported off the boat first. Thus we didn't set foot on Sitka shores until 4pm! and they said we still had to come back by 6. This was quite the bummer as Sitka, home of St. Innocent of Alaska, was our premier destination.

More about St. Innocent from oca.org:

St. Innocent of Alaska

Evangelizer, Teacher, Visionary
Equal to the Apostles, Enlightener of North America
1797 - 1879

Drawing of St. Innocent by the Very Rev. L.P. Koulos which appeared on the cover of the 1997 OCA Desk Calendar and the OCA Sourcebook.

Throughout 1997 Orthodox Christians in North America will celebrate the two-hundredth anniversary of the birth of their "apostle" and first bishop -- St. Innocent (Veniaminov).

Born on August 26, 1797, in a remote village in Siberia, John Popov (who later assumed the surname of Veniaminov) studies for pastoral service at the seminary in Irkutsk. After his marriage to Catherine Sharina (1817) and ordination to the priesthood (1821), Fr. John volunteered for missionary work in Alaska.

Arriving with his family in Unalaska in the Aleutian island chain (1824), Fr. John began his remarkable career as a missionary priest and bishop in the far-reaches of the Russian Empire -- Siberia and Alaska. Following the death of his wife (1839), he entered monastic life by taking the name Innocent and was elected the first resident bishop of Alaska (1840-58).

A person with many skills and interest, Fr. John carefully studied the traditional cultures of his flock and well as their natural environment. He also designed and built churches including the Mission House and St. Michael's Cathedral in Sitka.

An accomplished linguist, Fr. John learned the various native Siberian and Alaskan languages of his diverse flock. While serving in Unalaska, he learned Unangan, the Fox Island dialect of the Aleut people. Along with Aleut leader Ivan Pan'kov, he devised a written grammar and alphabet, translating the Gospel of St. Matthew and liturgical texts. His spiritual treatise Indication of the Pathway into the Kingdom of Heaven was first published in Unangan and was the first Aleut book.

Later in his life he was appointed Metropolitan of Moscow (1868). However, Metropolitan Innocent's evangelical zeal never diminished -- establishing in 1868 the Orthodox Missionary Society. He died in Moscow on March 31, 1879, and was canonized a saint of the Orthodox Church on October 6, 1977.

I guess that gives you an idea of what it was like on the boat. I'll just post some miscellaneous pictures, and if you click on them there may be further description under the caption.

Thankfully there were laundromats on the stateroom floors because you can imagine we had a lot by this point. Tuesday night was one of two formal nights, the rest were "smart casual", so we spent a while getting ready for that. I had ordered a nice dress from a catalog, but had to have it altered, and even then, I wasn't happy with how it fit. This put a slight damper on the evening.

It was our first time in the Venetian dining room, 6th deck, where we were assigned a permanent table with permanent servers who get to know your preferences. It's like going to a fancy restaurant every night where they put the napkin in your lap, have things you never thought to eat on the menu, and scrape your place after each course with one of those scaper things. It was very nice, but I like serve-yourself buffets as I'm less tense when not conspicuously watched, hence the reason why I'm a blogger instead of a public speaker. But while eating my heaped buffet platter full of food, I feel like a pig. Whereas at a more carefully paced, multi-course, served meal, with small, attentively prepared dishes served on stacked china, it feels more respectful to the food and elevates the dining experience by making it more about the people around you.

Afterward Ben went with George and me to the Princess Theater, 7th deck, to attend the Piano Man show featuring the music of Liberace, Elton John, and Billy Joel, while the other kids went to the Vista Lounge at the other end of the same deck to see a magician show. The Cruise Director noted that there where a lot of kids on this boat, I guess more than usual, so they had to make the shows rated PG. The performers sometimes good naturedly complained that they had to edit their material, and gave the kids funny sideways glances as they paused and tried to work around certain topics. Some of it was still a little edgy, and Glenn Hirsch hid behind the curtains a few times or got on his knees in desperation because he couldn't go as far in saying what he wanted to. It was pretty funny, and I appreciated their acknowledging age appropriateness.

I wish I'd gotten some pictures of the Atrium during formal night. There were a lot of elegantly dressed people, including the fully dressed out crew with those shoulder braids on their uniforms, and walking among them made me feel sort of special somehow. I loved this Russian quartet who played familiar classical music in the Atrium and even had a command performance in the Vista Lounge another evening. On that night the first chair violinist played some very difficult solo's, including one where he mimicked several bird calls. It was heavenly.

That first evening at the Sail Away party, I finally settled in my mind that taking this trip was for sure the right thing to do, even with George's condition, when he called Father Basil on the cell phone obviously excited about being on our way to Sitka and St. Michael's Cathedral. His furrowed brow disappeared, his symptoms lessened, and he and the kids were so into the boat thing, that I finally relaxed about it. Knowing they are having a good time doing healthy things is what makes me happy.

Sleeping on the ship is really nice as the rocking motion, even with high waves and sea-sickness, is very relaxing. Having a fully stocked all you can eat breakfast buffet waiting for you until 11:30 is pretty nice too, not that we ate quite that late. This was the first day of the Dormition Fast, but the rules are relaxed if you are traveling, so we went ahead and ate meat, but George stuck mainly with fish for his heart.

The first day the activities included a fruit carving demonstration and a talk by the ship's Naturalist, Dean Something, who gave interesting lectures on flora, fauna, mostly US centered history, and other things Alaskan almost every day. He was the only crew member who was a US citizen that I can think of right now. The Captain was Italian, our servers in the Venetian Room were Romanian and Bulgarian, the Cruise Director was South African, and there were others from Canada, Germany, Mexico, Australia, the Philippines, etc.

The kids, except Jordan who was too old, were excited about the different young people's activities even though they would be split into three different age categories. Jared, Ben and Jeremy with the teen group called Remix, Rachel with the Shock Waves, and Rebecca with the Pelicans. Rachel had already surprised me by being willing to separate from us into her age group. This new tendency was foreshadowed when she went to Orthodox Camp by herself this year - but she already knew a lot of those kids.

Rebecca was barely curious about what the Pelicans were about, and as usual, didn't want me to leave her there alone. When I promised to help her color her very own T-shirt, she was willing to at least go into the room. After the shirt was finished, she was ready for me to leave! They all loved their separate activities and attended them every afternoon at least, and when they weren't there, they were asking when they could go back. My feelings were not hurt - much. My babies are growing up!

After we left the bay, it got cloudy and the wind and waves really picked up. I was surprised how much we could feel a large ship like that sway with the waves. We really had to hold on to rails and things to keep our balance. As I mentioned earlier, when there were particularly big swells, the elevators would make very loud clanging noises that were a bit disconcerting. The staff acted like it was completely normal, but I started to get sea sick after our second buffet dinner. We went to our staterooms, which for their size, were very nice and efficient. It felt better to lay down, but I didn't want to miss the introduction show in the elegant Princess Theatre. It went without a hitch as the singers, dancers, the comedian, Elliot Maxx, and activity directors really have their sea legs. Mr. Maxx performed with his guitar and sang a few original songs to familiar tunes like It's a Small World After All.

Thanks kids for helping me remember the words,

When I booked this cruise on the internet,
I saw a picture of the room I'd get,
I didn't realize, it was actual size,
It's a small room after all.

After the show we went out on the 7th deck, The Promenade. It was very cold and the waves where breaking over the side onto that level. I thought the cold air might make my seasickness feel better, but it didn't. As it was too cold, we just went to bed. Our very nice steward, Stephan, who was from Romania had provided a most welcoming and lovely turn-down service. Rebecca and Rachel slept on the top bunks, which folded down from the ceiling at night, and the boys had their own room. I wish I'd gotten a picture of the other side of the room with the white topped, but oak lined dressing table, tv cabinet with fridge, and the convenient mirror shelf that I kept my room key, sunglasses, and camera on. We should have also gotten a picture of our tiny bathroom, with shower and interesting, space efficient fixtures. We stowed all our suitcases under the beds and in the large closet, while all our clothes fit in the drawers and on shelves and hangers.

The next day at sea was still pretty rough. Here's a picture of what it did to the 12th deck swimming pool.  

After Liturgy we drove the short distance to the Golden Gate Bridge which was enshrouded by a cloud.

Our GPS told us that the nearest Wienerschniztel, hey, sometimes you get cravings, was in Oakland so we drove across Sausilito's pretty hills to another bridge back to Oakland, which also had a mall where we bought jackets for the kids that didn't have them yet. San Francisco is chilly and windy in the morning and evening year round, but nice in the afternoon.

Then we drove back across the bay to tour the Napa valley wine vineyards which, though beautiful, were a bit too commercial for our taste. We headed back west on 116, a moderately twisty turney up and down, forrested, sometimes with Redwoods, road, to get back on to hwy 1 before it got dark. I'll just say that going north on hwy 1, south of San Francisco, with the ocean across the oncoming lane was different than our second experience. Coming up on the ocean in Jenner was innocent enough. Even though we were on the ocean side of the road, there was a shoulder and a bit of land before it dropped off onto the numerous public beaches. So we strolled along enjoying the views with those gentle golden hills on our left and planned to drive until sunset when we would park and let the kids play on the beach so as to maximize our view while we afforded a short pause in driving back to our southern San Francisco hotel. The vineyard map we had was not written to scale so we misjudged hwy 1's progress along the coast, and the gps only shows you about 3 miles of map at a time. Anyway it was a relaxing drive, with about 30 minutes until sunset, but then hwy 1 started going inland after Bodega Bay - isn't that where Hitchcock's The Birds is set? *insert sense of foreboding* After about 15 minutes, with the sun already playing hide and seek behind those lovely golden hills, I started to get nervous and asked George where the next public beach was. He said Dillon beach, but we couldn't tell how far it was, and we didn't know if would be faster to backtrack, which we seriously didn't want to do, or if Dillon would show up in time before the sunset. So I was really getting nervous thinking we were going to miss it. Then I saw a sign for Dillon beach, so we turned off hwy 1 to go straighter west toward the coast on a farm road. Those golden twisty turney up and down hills are so pretty! There were some interesting rock formations too in a valley area. I had renewed hope we'd make it back to the coast in time, but then there was a dumb, slow car in front of us that I tailgated all the way to the coast which we barely got to, seconds before the sun dematerialized from view.  

When we rounded the end of the Sierra Nevada's the terrain changed

to rolling, grass covered hills. The grass got more golden and the hills more pronounced the further we progressed around the bend in the late afternoon towards our hotel in Visalia where we had reservations. I began to understand why California is called the "Golden State". Those were the most beautifully glowing golden hills I've ever seen. Unfortunately I didn't get pictures of them, but this one is a little like them. We were pretty tired out when we got to the hotel so we finished off our lunch meat, and called it a day.

The next morning we drove for a gorgeous 30 miles of rivers, lakes, and green hills which grew into the Sierra's and Sequoia National Park.

The Giant Trees grow at about 7000 feet and under that range's particular conditions, so once again we ascended switchback mountains on the scary, I mean thrilling, side of the road. And then we entered, tada!:

The weather was just perfect as we ascended further with our windows down into the expanding trees.

After the Visitor's center area, the parking lot for access to General Sherman, the tree with the most mass, not the tallest, widest, or the oldest mind you, was quite a steep hike above the tree. Luckily there was a place to drop off those who didn't feel like exerting themselves that much, like Rebecca and you-know-who. The rest of us got quite the work-out. The Park Ranger said he's about 2000 years old according to carbon dating, but with new methods he gets younger all the time. Here's some more pics of Sequia National Park: