Sitka

Sunday, June 18, 2023

We parked our little ship next to the Crown Princess. We took the Crown with my mom when we took our previous Alaska cruise. It was nice to see them next to each other.

We visited the local raptor center where they rehabilitate birds. Once they get better, they are re-introduced into the wild – unless their injury doesn’t allow them to live there successfully. We met a red-tailed hawk that was picked up because it was dive bombing a hot dog cart. It had a hurt wing (not too bad) and in a couple months was healthy enough to return to the wild. It went right back to dive bombing the hot dog cart. It must have been raised by humans, because it didn’t know about hunting and natural food – just about hot dogs. She lives at the center permanently now.

Next, we went to Totem Poles R Us and Culture and stuff (Keith says it was called the Sitka National Historical Park). We mostly sat on a sunny bench outside and looked at a rocky beach and a volcano. The volcano was not doing anything, but if it suddenly did, that would have been cool (and really not cool). I took a gazillion pictures of immature salmon berries. Did you know there are salmon berries? All the ship people said they are terrific, but they know we are going home and can’t taste them when they riped in a month. Who knows. They are pretty, so I took pictures.

Next, they dropped us off at the hospitality house. We had 30 minutes before the trip to the airport and I figured out immediately that WE COULD LEAVE AND WALK AROUND. We left and walked around. Yay us. We went to a gifty shop. Shopping! Wheee!

The airport has one gate. The gate area does not hold as many people as the plane. It was challenging and hilarious.

We got to Seattle and our friend, Mike, picked us up. Kristine made us pasta for dinner, and we have been talking ever since. Delightful!