Packing for Grand Alaska June 21, 2016 departure
Here we go again. Our last trip was to Patagonia and this time to Alaska, but with a common problem: what clothes and how much to take. Looks like it's going to be warm, so no real heavy jackets.
With the airlines and Tauck restricting the size, weight, and number of bags we can take, packing becomes a real issue. What really burns me is that Tauck restricts us to one bag each, but insists (okay, suggests) on everyone bringing a suit coat and dressing up for the cocktail parties like we are in some 1940's movie. Think Titanic. It is ridiculous these days with airline restrictions, not to mention Tauck's, to have to pack extra clothes to play dress up on a ship or for a hotel dinner when you are on a trip to rough it in Alaska for two weeks. I've decided to protest this trip and not bring the tux or those cute patent leather shoes. Seriously!
Tauck's one size fits all trip suggestions for packing needs some heavy editing. I've suggested this before, but to no avail.
We are packed and ready to leave on Tuesday, but we are cheating by tagging the one big bag for each of us to check-in and then we each will hand carry an over-night bag with enough clothes and stuff for three days in case the airline loses a bag. Oh, and due to bag weight restrictions we will also bring a backpack for each of us full of cameras and electronics. I decided not to bring the pork chop to tie to the lead sled dog so he would mush faster. (Grin).
Since we have a long, with one lay over stop in Atlanta, flight from Florida to Alaska, we are going up a day early in case there are any travel problems. An opportunity to repack before things get serious.
I'll follow up with details after the trip to let those who are curious know how things went on the trip. I hope this trip will be as wonderful as the Patagonia trip which was a 10+ out of 10. See my previous post (10,000 views) under South America.
Michael Echols
Fort Myers, Florida
