The Alaskan Caching Cruise - Days 2 & 3

Welcome to our first full day at sea! Day 2 of the Alaskan Geocaching cruise started off with us learning the ropes of the breakfast buffet, and then joining the entire group for a meet & greet in the Crowsnest.

It was pretty distracting to look out the panoramic windows as we cruised along the north coast of BC to sights like these...

 Which frankly are pretty spectacular in person, and maybe don't translate as well to an image on a blog... However, the rest of the group on  board was a fun and interesting bunch with some cool stories such as:

• The person who placed the first geocache in Canada
• A couple on their honeymoon who had shared their proposal at the mainstage of a Mega event
• A cacher who had previously worked as the brakeman on the train we'd be taking as an excursion later in the cruise (spoiler alert)

Later Chris from the Landsharkz held a seminar for the group on how to take ideal vacation photos. Lots of great tips that likely helped all of us take better photos this cruise.

Then dinner. Then bed. Then breakfast. Then Juneau.

Welcome to Juneau!

Although slightly overcast, it was still a great visit in Juneau. Of course we were excited to get ashore and find some geocaches, but knowing that our primary excursion here was a trip to Mendenhall Glacier, and that we had a number of Earthcaches lined up... well, that was good news!

 We enjoyed the visit to the glacier, the park, and some wildlife (a trio of bears feeding on spawning salmon, then we got as close as we dared to a porcupine) and learned all about the park and the glaciers from the rangers who were very patient with us geocachers. I think it always helps to show a little interest in learning something beyond the required answers for the earthcaches.

Oh, and the Mendenhall Glacier earthcache was find #9,000 for the LANMonkeys. So we achieved the Geocaching.com souvenir for Alaska, and then our personal caching milestone!

A great time with a bunch of great new friends in the park, then we caught the bus back from the park to Juneau (and I should mention our bus driver was an absolute hoot).

Back in Juneau we then took the tram up Mount Roberts for some amazing views down over the city of Juneau, and then a nice loop hike where we met up with some other caching friends from the cruise and picked up some caches with amazing views. So glad we have lots of favourite points to award!

 After taking in the amazing panoramic views we made our way back down, toured the town (finding a few more geocaches, of course) including a fun group find at an iconic statue near the wharfs. 

Thanks once again to Chris from Landsharkz for taking so many great photos of the trip, including this one of RCA777 trying to figure out *how* Mrs. LANMonkey got that geocache out of *that* part of the dog statue...

And finally, after some more exploring and caching and even a stop for some local chocolate treats, it was back to the ship for dinner and another night's rest before the next adventure in Skagway!

But that story will have to wait for another day (or so)...