grand Alaska- September 5,2015

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Would love to chat with someone else going on this trip. Bob an I are celebrating our 50th this year and picked this Tauck tour because we enjoyed our 20th anniv Tauck tour to Hawaii.

We will be arriving in Anchorage a day early (supposedly to rest before the welcome dinner) but having read about the tidal bore will be renting a car and traveling the Seward Highway on Saturday along the Turnagain Arm and as far down to Seward as seems possible in one day so we get back in time for the welcome event.

Our flight home from Vancouver was originally scheduled for after noon time but was changed to 6 am, this made another day added to our trip. We discovered that the Vancouver sightseeing buses will pick you and your luggage up at dock and store luggage during day tour then drop us off at our airport hotel afterwards.

Usually on memorial day weekend I am hoping that the summer, my favorite season will never end, but this year, with only this one season between me and this Alaska adventure I have mixed feelings. 105 days to wait.


Gretchen

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Have received the trip booklet with the luggage tags.

When I went through the day to day information I noticed that the promised galley tour on the ship is not mentioned at all.
That sounded very interesting to me, so I hope it has not been eliminated. I spoke to someone by telephone but they had
no idea. Just going to have to wait and see.

As of today this wait is down to 38 days.

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28 days to go and I am half packed. And I mean exactly half packed. Instead of putting my clothes in one suit case and husbands in another , I decided to put half of everything in each of our two suitcases. I was a little worried that I was planning to bring too much. Probably still am, but even with all of the heavy bottles of toiletries in this first suitcase it weighed "only" 45 pounds.

Even though there will be opportunities to do laundry as we travel from place to place , the warmer clothing needed for this trip takes up a lot more space than swimsuits and shorts do for warmer travel. Not to mention the plethora of pill bottles and vitamin bottles and muscle and joint creams for two seniors.

I hope chatting with oneself is not the same signal of "loosing it" that talking to oneself is because unless someone else adds something to this forum , I have a real problem> lol

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16 days to go. It's 92 today ..starting to worry that I have not packed the right weather clothes. Somebody please assure me that it will really be in the high 50's in Alaska from September 4th to 19th in the daytime, lower at night. Layers only work if you don't have to wear only the bottom one every day!

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Im back . This was the best trip ever. Weather cooperated and didn't get too cold. Saw Denali moose , brown blob 2 white spots on top, bears, sheep, salmon and cougers (only on the bus) and met some of the nicest people ever. Thanks to jim for keeping us on track and up on time every day. It would not have been possible to have this experience on our own. Hint for those who may do this next year. In Vancouver it is possible to take a city tour right off the boat . They take your luggage on the bus and after tour, deliver you to your hotel in time to check in. I wasn't sure about how to find them but it is right out front in Canada place and drivers are very helpful.