Our Wonderful “Very, Very Lovely” Seattle & 9 Night Alaskan Cruise including Sitka & Hubbard Glacier! ~ with pics ~ July 2019 ~ Completed!

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 13 (Continued)

We made it to the Parliament Building.









We then crossed the street to the Fairmont Empress Hotel.











I found a store selling gelato and had to get some. Of course, I got maple!



We also found Rogers Chocolates and got some chocolate to take home.



DD loves to read. She especially loves Harry Potter. The past 2 summers she was fortunate enough to be in London when the 20th Anniversary editions of books 1 and 2 came out in House colors. DD is a Gryffindor. We saw a bookstore and had to go in.





Surprisingly to her, the store had the 20th Anniversary Edition of The Prisoner of Azkaban in Gryffindor colors!

We then continued down the street.











We eventually made it to Chinatown.







We found a very interesting alley. It was reminiscent of Diagon Alley of Harry Potter fame.





Here are the lions at the main gate. Legend has it that these were a gift from China and if an honest politician ever walked between them, the lions would come to life. Well, you can see how well that’s gone!













We decided to take a rest and go get a drink at one of the many pubs, specifically, the Irish pub. Unfortunately, you have to be 19 to even enter it. Anyway, we found the Bard and Banker. They had outdoor seating and had no problem with our underage DD sitting there. DD enjoyed an iced coffee, I had an ice tea and DH had a local craft beer. Ironically, we were seated next to our Head Server enjoying his time off.







It’s an historical building and was absolutely gorgeous inside.





While sitting, I got on my phone to see what was happening in the world and noticed that it was a scorching 115 degrees at home! It was only 65 in Victoria. A 50 degree differential!

To be continued. . .

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 13 (Continued)

After our drinks, we headed back to the waterfront. We saw some street performers and vendors selling their art work. I bought a nice small water color painting of the waterfront.













We then walked back to Fort and Government to catch the shuttle back to the ship. First we stopped in the Jade Store and DH bought a small jade bear with a fish in its mouth.

We ran into several cast members including Brandon, Derrell and Dustyn. They rode the shuttle back with us.







Dinner tonight was back in Tiana’s Place for Mardi Gras night. DD had been looking more forward to this dinner.











I guess I was excited too, because I forgot to take a picture of the dinner menu. Oops!

I had an Iceberg Wedge Salad and the Prime Rib.





DD had the Shrimp and Grits, Tomato soup and Chicken.







It was time for the Mardis Gras Conga Line, so DD took DNM around the room. Louis came looking for her.



He was glad to see her when she came back to the table.





Dessert







Of course, we had to go with the Beignets!



Mari went and found a kids menu, shaped like a trumpet for DD.



Our room steward, April, was so wonderful the entire cruise.



The Dreams show was tonight. DD and I went up early to stand in line for a seat because we knew it would be crowded. I love Dreams and was excited to see the new additions from Tangled since we saw it last. Meanwhile, DH stayed in the stateroom and put our luggage out in the hall to be picked up.



Natalie came up and gave us her last spiel. She likes to say “If your clothes aren’t tight, you ain’t doing it right” as she said good bye. Well, I must have done it right!

I loved the show! It was fantastic. They updated a lot of the show along with adding Tangled. I was kind of glad to see Frozen gone.

At 10:15, instead of going to the “Til W Meet Again” gathering in the atrium, DD and I went to Azure for the adult cabaret show of Kara Lindsay and Kevin Massey. Unfortunately, there was no game tonight with Jo. We really enjoyed hearing more of Kara and Kevin’s story and more songs from the musicals they performed in.

After the show, DD and I went out to an empty Deck 4. It’s the first time we saw total darkness since we left Vancouver.





Well, it had been an incredible cruise. We had to get up early in the morning.



We had a beautiful day to walk around and enjoy the city. I love Victoria. It has such an Old World charm! I would love to come back and spend a few days here and visit the garden again. There is so much to do, but I’ve only been here for a few hours at a time.

Next: So sad!

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 14
Wednesday, July 17, 2019
Vancouver



The dreaded day had finally arrived. We had to get off the ship!

I didn’t even get up to take pictures of us going under the bridge into Vancouver because it was raining! But I got pictures from our verandah.





By 7:00 AM we were docking.



Our breakfast was scheduled at 7:15 in Tiana’s Place. When we got down there, the line was all the way down in front of the Promenade Lounge. This was made more interesting by people trying to get by their luggage for express walk-off.









It was a sad moment all around. We gave our tip envelopes to our servers and bid them farewell.

We had left our bags in our room (We approved this with April the night before). After breakfast, we went back to get our bags and headed down to our neighbors room while they gathered theirs. We originally were going to try to go up on deck to take some pictures before our colored tags were called, but getting elevators going up were hard to get, so we decided to go to the Promenade Lounge and wait.

The first tag called was Grey Daisy. Unfortunately, while we were waiting we kept getting a very loud pitched and annoying reverb from the audio equipment. One of the bartenders thought it was the microphone and turned it off. Well, that didn’t fix the problem. It was so loud, we decided to go to After Hours and wait. Several other people fled the area as well.



By the time we got there, they also called Aerial. Our tags were Purple Minnie.

I think this was the longest we’ve ever waited for our tag to be called. I believe it was there were 2 others ships in port this morning and porters and port crew were busy.

Anyway, a little after 9:00 AM, Purple Minnie tags were called and we were on our way. But, not before prying our DD off the wall because she didn’t want to leave. The color reflected her mood perfectly!





By 9:07 AM, we were walking towards the terminal to retrieve our luggage. The saddest signs of all!



Not as soon as I’d like.



I have to admit, this was the most unorganized I have ever seen the luggage. There were multiple areas for Purple Minnie tags and they weren’t even next to each other. We all had a hard time finding all of our luggage. Then we had to wait in line to get out of the terminal. There was no customs to go through, as the ship took care of submitting our paperwork that we filled out earlier in the cruise.

Our next stop was the Pan Pacific Hotel. Everybody had to take an elevator up to the hotel, so there was another line for that. Fortunately, the 6 of us and all of our luggage fit in the elevator at the same time.

Once we got to the hotel, we went straight to the bell hop desk to check our bags. There were so many people checking bags that they had to lock them together.



We then went to check in, knowing a room wouldn’t be ready yet. We checked the view from the lobby of the Wonder.



We decided to go to Granville Island since most of it was indoors. We got 2 taxis and met there. We passed a community garden on the way.



We were dropped off under the bridge at about 10:45 AM.











After our neighbors caught up with us, we headed to the main market. There were so many stalls with prepared food, meet, veggies, fruits, flowers, crafts, etc.













We got donuts from Lee’s Donuts. They were so good.





We visited a couple of stores and then got some food for lunch. It had stopped raining, so we found a table outside.





Shortly after lunch, our neighbors got a call that their room was ready, so we headed back to the Pan Pacific. Our room wasn’t ready yet, so we went to the bar and ordered some drinks while we waited.

I sure couldn’t beat the view, even with DD’s sad face.





After waiting for another hour, DH went to the front desk and asked how much longer. The hotel clerk lauded DH for his patience and gave us a free upgrade to a corner, bay view room that was ready.

To be continued. . .

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 14 (Continued)

We had such a wonderful view of this!





DD has separation issues!



We watched as the ship started to fill up and the crew setting up for the Sail-A-Wave party. We watched as people lined up for the muster drill. Then we watched the Sail-A-Wave party!







We opened the window and listened to the Wonder’s horn play “When You Wish Upon A Star” one more time!

Then we watched her sail away on another Alaskan Adventure, without us! ☹



While it was getting close to 5:30 PM and we were heading out to dinner, I stayed to watch the Wonder sail under the bridge.







See you Soon! Hopefully!

We then walked to the Gas Lamp district for dinner. We passed the famous Steam Clock.





We were eating at the Flying Pig for dinner. We ate there when we were here for our last cruise. It was as good as I remembered it.



After dinner we walked back to the hotel and did some last minute souvenir shopping.





Once back in our room, we opened our curtains and enjoyed the view.



At 9:00 PM, Vancouver fires a cannon from Stanley Park. As it was, we had the perfect view of the cannon.





We watched the beautiful sunset over Stanley Park and the city.







Then we called it a night as we had a very early flight in the morning.

Going to Granville Island was a nice way to finish our stay in Canada. The weather cooperated, as the rain stopped, and we had some yummy food!

Next: The end!

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Day 15
Thursday, July 18, 2019
Vancouver

We were up and early this morning as we had an 8:15 AM flight out of Vancouver.

We called the bellman to collect our baggage at about 5:15 AM and were in the elevator.



We got a taxi to the airport. We were pleasantly surprised to see that check-in was not busy at all. We got our luggage tags and boarding passes printed out. We then had to take our luggage to an area to where we had to load them on the conveyor belt. We then got in line for security which was a little longer. We got through with no problem. Then we had to go through customs where we scanned our passports, took terrible pictures and then went to wait in line for an agent. The line was very short and we were through very quickly.

We then entered “The United States of America” as we headed towards our gate. We saw our neighbors enjoying breakfast so we joined them and had breakfast of our own before going to the gate.

Next thing we knew, we were boarded and heading home.

Thank you for reading along for our latest adventure and for your kind comments. I hope to have another one with DCL soon!

 

[lorimay]

Thank you for another great report! I enjoyed reading along!
Bittersweet watching the next cruise go

I love Granville Island, so much to choose from, yum!
Hopefully we will get a day in Vancouver after Hawaii next year.

 

[ukintheus]

Great trip report, and thank you for taking the time to share it. Being able to see the Wonder from the hotel and then watching it leave from your room without you was neat, although it perfectly sums up the sadness of back-to-reality. We hope to make it to Alaska one year!

 

[scottishclover]

I really loved your report. it brought back some great memories as me and my family were on the Alaska sailing on 22nd July. We spent a week in Vancouver beforehand and I got up early in the pouring rain to see the Wonder come in on the day you disembarked. Funny, we also headed to Granville Island Public Market that day to avoid the weather and then spent early evening in Gastown! Thanks for sharing.

 

[cruiseletters]

Thank you for your great trip report and wonderful pictures. My family was also on this trip and we had a terrific time as well, you captured those days beautifully

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Thank you for your great trip report and wonderful pictures. My family was also on this trip and we had a terrific time as well, you captured those days beautifully

Thank you for reading!

 

[MissyMouse77]

Day 15
Thursday, July 18, 2019
Vancouver

We were up and early this morning as we had an 8:15 AM flight out of Vancouver.

We called the bellman to collect our baggage at about 5:15 AM and were in the elevator.



We got a taxi to the airport. We were pleasantly surprised to see that check-in was not busy at all. We got our luggage tags and boarding passes printed out. We then had to take our luggage to an area to where we had to load them on the conveyor belt. We then got in line for security which was a little longer. We got through with no problem. Then we had to go through customs where we scanned our passports, took terrible pictures and then went to wait in line for an agent. The line was very short and we were through very quickly.

We then entered “The United States of America” as we headed towards our gate. We saw our neighbors enjoying breakfast so we joined them and had breakfast of our own before going to the gate.

Next thing we knew, we were boarded and heading home.

Thank you for reading along for our latest adventure and for your kind comments. I hope to have another one with DCL soon!

Thanks for the awesome trip report! We are thinking of booking an Alaskan cruise for 2021 and loved reading your report.

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Thanks for the awesome trip report! We are thinking of booking an Alaskan cruise for 2021 and loved reading your report.

Thank you for reading!

 

[teach22180]

Thanks for this report! I know things have changed since Covid, but it was still helpful. I'll be in Sitka next month on the Wonder.

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Thanks for this report! I know things have changed since Covid, but it was still helpful. I'll be in Sitka next month on the Wonder.

You're welcome. I'm glad you enjoyed it. We've been to Sitka twice. It is a great place to visit! Enjoy your cruise.