Alaska to Russia to Japan
In August we got tired of the warm and comfortable weather in our new province of British Columbia so we took a freezing boat ride across the Bering Sea to Kamchatka, Russia and ending in Northern Japan.
Actually it wasn't freezing but was certainly no beach holiday. Many days we're cloudy and cool but it really didn't matter.
We'd actually booked the trip about a year and a half ago. Why? Who knows why? Maybe another case of too much to drink? I think, in reality it's just the desire to see some new things and this certainly fell into the category "NEW"
The map below shows the stops. I'm not sure we actually stopped at all these places as the weather created some problems. But you get the idea. Right?
These are places that almost no one has ever heard of and no one in their right mind would ever want to go without being forced. Right?
Jump straight to day-by-day menu
It was a 17 day cruise and some of the stops were fantastic and some weren't (to put it it mildly). The trip started in Seward, Alaska and ended in Otaru, Japan. The last day of the cruise, in Otaru, was the day the North Korean nut-bar sent a missile over the Japanese island of Hokkaido - right where we were docked that morning. Luckily we weren't killed.
So this is us the first day - waiting to board the bus in Anchorage for the trip to Seward where our boat is docked. I'm sure we're not the only tourists to get our picture taken with this bear. It's a good thing we did as we won't see that many in the days to come.
On the bus on way to Seward. The weather is looking gloomy.
The trees below are referred to as "ghost trees".
There are quite a few of them along the highway. In 1964 the second largest earthquake ever recorded occurred in Alaska very close to where we are now. The land dropped about 10 meters (or 10 feet...can't remember) and saltwater invaded the soil and the trees died. Never to recover.
Our ship The Silver Discoverer.
This is a link to a webpage that shows some details of the ship.
Our cabin. # 511. Small but functional. We don't spend much time in the cabin on these expedition cruises so it doesn't have to be huge. Just a comfortable bed and a functioning toilet and shower.
The toilet only broke down three times during the trip and it was always fixed by the time we got back to the room. The plumbers on board have a shitty job I think.
A small shower with good pressure and plenty of hot water.
This evening we're at the Holgate Glacier
We haven't gone far since we sailed away from Seward.
The blue coats were given to everyone.
The red jackets are also given to everyone. You actually order them in advance and they are waiting in your room for you when you arrive. They go over the top of the blue coats. This was the first clue that this wasn't going to be a very warm trip.
The guys in black below are all part of the expedition team - the people that will drive the zodiac boats and explain to us what we're seeing or explain to us why we haven't seen anything.
The guy in the Spider man toque is Meetja (pronounced Meet-ee-ya). A Slovenian. A good guy. We find that most people on these cruises are good guys. There's some though, like the goofy looking fucker just beyond Meetja - , red coat, mustache, wearing a hat and with a camera around his neck who won't even make eye contact or say good morning to you when you meet in the hallway in the morning.
Sailing away from the glacier.
The rest of the trip was as follows:
Day 2 - August 12, Matushka & Chiswell Islands, Alaska
Day 3 - August 13, Geographic Harbour & Kukak Bay, Alaska
Day 4 - August 14, Semidi Islands, Alaska
Day 5 - August 15, Unga Island & village, Alaska
Day 6 - August 16 - Dutch Harbor, Aleutian Islands
Day 7 - August 17 - Seguam Island, Aleutian Islands
Day 8 - August 18 - Atka Island, Aleutian Islands
Day 9 - August 19 - Kiska Island, Aleutian Islands
Day 10 - August 20 - Attu Island, Aleutian Islands
Day 11 - August 21 - The day that didn't exist
Day 12 - August 22 - Petropavlosky-Kamchatsky, Russia
Day 13 - August 23 - Russkaya Bay, Russia
Day 14 - August 24 - a sea day, Russia
Day 15 - August 25 - Chirpoy Island, Russia
Day 16 - August 26 - Tyuleniy Island, Russia
Day 17 - August 27 - Korsakov, Russia
Day 18 - August 29 - Homeward bound
Matushka & Chiswell Islands
From Wikipedia: The Chiswell Islands are a group of rocky, uninhabited islands, accessible only by boat or airplane, within the Kenai Peninsula Borough of Alaska in the Gulf of Alaska. These islands are 35 miles south of Seward, Alaska.
Credit to: Nishimoto, M - U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
It's not sunny today but the scenery is still beautiful.
A see lion swimming past.
A colony of sea lions hanging out on a beach.
And check out the size of this guy. He's the alpha male. The picture does not adequately show how big he is.
Zoomed.
Lots of birds. Mostly gulls in this location. They nest in the most precarious locations.
At the top of the photo you can see a baby gull in the nest with its parent.
A puffin. We saw lots of these guys.
This one has a moth full of fish.
A couple seals. Seals and sea lions belong to the same group but are different in many ways. Click here for more info.
This is a short video of a gull feeding frenzy.
And another very short videos showing a humpback whale breaching and diving. We saw lots of whales from a distance - not too many close up. More on that later.
That's it for day 2.
Geographic Harbour & Kukak Bay
Today we're doing a couple zodiac trips to look for wildlife. In the morning we're in Kukak Bay and in the afternoon in Geographic Harbor.
One thing we found out on this trip that we will remember for future trips is that
- it is best to be in the first or second zodiacs to leave the ship: If you're in the first bunch of zodiacs to go out you will come across animals that have not been alarmed by all the noise and ruckus caused by multiple boats. Your chances of seeing critters will be better.
and
- it is best to go with male expedition guides: They are not as timid as the lady zodiac drivers and will get in closer.
We had instances where our driver was a lady and she refused to get in close to the animals, as she felt it would scare them. In USA (where we still were) there is a 100 meter rule - it says you can't get your zodiac closer than 100 meters to the animals. But what it also says is the animals can get as close as they like to you - and you do not need to move away. This stupid cow would move the zodiac away if she thought the animals were getting to close.
Anyway, it was maddening and we soon learned to ignore her zodiac and Susan's as well. Susan was pretty much the same and a bossy old cow to boot.
As a result of not being able to get too close to animals some of the photos in this blog were taken by the expedition photographer. We paid $150 for a DVD disc containing the photos and a short movie she made. On the disc is an instruction, only available after you've paid for it, to not post the pictures on-line. Screw that, I paid for them, they're mine, I will do as I please with them. And if stupid Louise and Susan would have got us closer to what we came here to see it wouldn't be necessary to use someone else's photos.
My photos cannot compare to the her's (the expedition photographer's). Her's are MUCH BETTER as she knows what she's doing, she has a private zodiac with driver so she can get close to the animals faster than the rest of us and shoot from whatever side she chooses and has a camera that's worth as much as a small car.
So we still haven't gone very far.
A sea otter. These guys spend their entire life in the water.
A bald eagle.
This is a cool shot - if you look you can see a wolf watching to see what the bear is doing. Zoom in. The wolf is just left of centre.
The wolf.
Here a couple brown bears meet and it at first looks like there could be trouble but they manage to work out their differences and get along.
Another group of red coats.
As usual I can't remember the name of this bird. I do remember he uses his long skinny beak to get food. Duh!
More bald eagles.
Another wolf. It might be the same one as before.
And some more bears.
A bit more sun today and such beautiful scenery.
And even a rainbow.
A mother bear and two cubs.
Another Sea Otter. He's got a crab that he's caught sitting on its chest.
And that's it for day 3
Semidi Islands
Two adventures today. First a zodiac trip to look at birds. There are a lot of people on this trip that really love looking at birds. I'm ok with it - I'd rather look at boobs though. HAHA! I got nothing against birds but they're really stupid I think, they live on a wee small ledges or out in the open when there is good grass cover nearby. See pics following. I guess their brains are pretty small (the expression "bird brain" comes from that) so how do they know any better.
Anyway, just a bunch of bird pictures.
There must be 10,000 birds living on this rock shelf.
Zoomed a bit. Hard rock. No grass no moss for a nice bed...nada! Just bird poop.
Not even room to sit down.
A baby bird waiting for food to come/
The following are all shots by the ship photographer.
Puffins.
A cormorant.
A seal sunning on a rock. These guys really appreciate a sunny day.
Can't remember what these guys are. They're very photogenic though.
More baby birds.
Some puffins having a discussion with a gull.
Another baby bird.
And a gull checking out a puffin. The puffin may have its nest just behind it. They like to find a crack in the rock to lay their eggs.
A couple shots of the fantastic volvanic scenery. I don't exactly remember the details ( I gotta start paying better attention) but the vertical rocks are as a s result of some special volcanic event. Whhooopppeeee!
In the afternoon we went on a hike.
There's a lot of grey hair in this crowd.
A rest stop with a fine view.
Cory, one of the expedition leaders and the leader on this hike.
The view from the top.
And that's it for day 4
Unga Island & village
We're well along the Aleutian Islands now. We're at Unga Island in the village of Unga. You'd think they could have come up with a better name for the village. I wonder if this is the island where the Unga Bunga joke came from.
Today we visit the deserted village and then go for a hike up a hill.
Up we go!
Some shots from the top. That's our ship.
The deserted town from the hillside on the way back down.
The weather is starting to turn.
We were going to explore the village when we returned from the walk - we didn't have time before we started up the hill. When we got back down we were told that we all had to get back to the ship right away. While we were on shore one of the crew on the ship had suffered an accident and we had to get him to the nearest hospital which luckily was only a couple hours away.
The following are all from the ship's photographer.
The guy in the picture is Gordon Russell. 88 years old and still full of life.
I think she must have used a drone for the next three.
That's it for day 5
Dutch Harbor, Aleutian Islands
Today we're docked in the town of Unalaska on the island of Unalaska - again - no freaking imagination naming their towns.
Dutch Harbor is actually the harbour where the the boat is stopped.
Here's a webpage with info on the name Unalaska
This is one of the stops that I would have been happy to miss. A couple museums, a crappy old Russian church, a hike up a hill in the pouring rain (that we opted out of).
There were supposed to be many bald eagles here so we walked and walked around looking for them. We saw two and I think they were both sick.
I'm sure it's a nice little town to visit when the weather is better - we'll never know though.
Just a few pics.
This is one of the two eagles we saw. He just didn't look healthy.
The old Russian church. We couldn't even go inside to look around. Damn Russians!
And another sickly eagle on top of the church.
A couple of crappy houses.
The roof is covered with moss. I think they get a lot of rain here.
And the weather does not appear to be improving.
That night we ate at a table with six other people. It's one of the nice things about these cruises - you can eat by your self, just the two of you, you can make arrangements to have dinner with another couple that you've just recently met, or you can go to the dining room and just ask to be seated with some other people.
Tonight Bernie and Miako (Me-ai-ko) were at our table. He had a picture in his wallet of what they each looked like 50 years age when they met. Cool!
That's it for day 6
Seguam Island, Aleutian Islands
We were supposed to go ashore on Seguam Island and go exploring and hiking but the Captain determined that the waves were too rough to board the Zodiacs. So we just cruised around and looked at the island from the ship. It just meant we could have a drink earlier than normal.
We're quite a ways down the Aleutian Island archipelago by now.
Seguam Island is part of the Andreanof group of islands.
So just a bunch of pictures taken from the ship.
Huge lava flow.
That's it for day 7
Atka Island, Aleutian Islands
Today, on Atka Island, there are two activities: There's an easy walk to see a World War 2 airplane that crashed on the island in 1942 and remains there still and there's a very rugged long hike and we're told you need to be super fit to go on it.
What they're doing is trying to keep a very few people who have been on previous hikes and who are not super fit from going on this hike. These people (one in particular) cannot keep up and it causes one of the expedition guides to have to hang back and make sure that the person in question finishes the hike and makes it back to the ship on time.
The weather is so pissy and overcast and my leg has still not been repaired that we decide to forego the long hike.
Here's where we are today - not far from yesterday.
This is a shot of the plane taken by the fellow mentioned below and taken when there weren't a hundred tourists gathered around.
Credit to: Steve Hillebrand , U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
Here are my shots:
And after the plane a walk down the beach.
Some from the ship's photographer...
Malcolm, one of the expedition crew. Australian.
Another one Sergei, a Russian.
And our decision to skip the hike turned out to be a good one. The entire hike was through a thick cloud. Nothing was seen.
That's it for day 8
Kiska Island, Aleutian Islands
Kiska Island is one of the few American islands that were invaded and occupied by Japanese troops during the second world war. At some point the Americans decided to take it back and invaded with the help of a few Canadians. The Japanese had anticipated this move and had already left the island. It's an interesting story, read about it here.
Today we're hiking up a hill and then after we're going to see a small two man submarine that was left behind when the Japs left the island.
It's a gloomy day on the beach.
A pier left over from WW2
The hikers.
The hill we're about to climb.
At the top of the hill we find a bunch of old Japanese anti-aircraft guns.
After 75 years the brass gear is still in perfect condition.
We saw lots of shells
A few of us continued on to a higher hill across the valley we saw much larger guns. Probably 75 mm shells.
Maximum zoom.
A wee video.
The weather has cleared up quite a bit by the end of the hike.
The two man Japanese sub.
It was completely powered by batteries. One is shown below.
The interior was pretty much filled with them
Back on the ship that evening we have a "hot rocks" meal on deck. This is where you cook your own meal on a chunk of rock that has been heated up. It looks like Terri has a huge chunk of chocolate cake but that's the rock. They also give you a baked potato and some veggies that are already cooked. And a bib because the meat really sizzles when you cook it. I've still got mine on.
That's it for day 9
Attu Island, Aleutian Islands
Attu Island is another of the Aleutian Islands that was invaded and occupied by the Japanese during WW2. Unlike Kiska Island, where there were no Japs left to fight, on this island there was a horrific battle with great loss of life. Read about it here.
On this island we're going for a fairly strenuous walk up a hill again. No sense taking all the old farts on a flat walk is there?
The day is starting out looking pretty gloomy.
There used to be a LORAN Station on this island. It operated from the in the early 1940s and finally closed in 2010.
A closer look.
A rest stop. Only one on the way up when a couple more would have been helpful.
Following are just some views from the very top.
Going back down.
The clouds just hang there.
As we sail away the clouds lift just a little.
The ships photographer took about 150 shots of this puffin.
I stitched them together to make this goofy movie.
and that's the end of day 10
The day we time traveled
The evening of August 20th was normal like any other. When we woke up the next day though we had lost an entire day - expecting it to be the 21st of August imagine our surprise to find out it was instead August 22nd.
We had time traveled one day into the future.
Not really - we had only crossed the international dateline. I don't know exactly where we crossed it - somewhere inside the red circle as shown below. We're getting close to Russia at this point.
and that's it for the day that didn't exist
Petropavlosky-Kamchatsky, Russia
A complete wasted day.
We had to stop here only (as near as I can tell) to let the Russian border patrol officers come on the ship and eat and drink their faces off. We arrived at a reasonable time in the morning but we had to wait hours for the border control guys to show up and then they had to eat and drink and then we had to have a passport inspection done before we could leave the ship.
In order to visit Russia you have to purchase a tourist visa. It was about $500 each for ours - we did opt for the three day expedited service which made it quite a bit more expensive than the regular 30 day service. Your passport needs to be sent to the Russian embassy in Ottawa so being without it for 30 days - plus the time getting there and then getting back - was not something we were happy about.
Here's what you get:
It's a page that gets glued right into your passport. For $500 I know how to spell my name in Russian now.
So everyone on the cruise had had purchased the Russian travel visas, we had all submitted proof to Silversea who in turn had submitted all this info to the Russian authorities months in advance.
But it was still probably 2:00 PM or even later until we could get off the ship.
And then they put us on buses and took us to some crappy monuments and two a museum in the basement of a building that was so hot and stuffy I couldn't stay in it. Then to a church and then to a crappy meal with some Russian natives singing an dancing.
If I could live that day over again I would just stay on the ship.
Anyway, this is where we were.
The city of Petropavlovsk-Kamchatsky is surrounded by volcanoes. There's a huge one on the way into the harbour but the weather is so shitty you could just barely make it out.
Here's what it looked like on one day five years ago when the sun was shining.
So all these border control guys finally show up. We were all previously warned more than one time - "do not take pictures of them and do not take pictures of the port. In fact don't even have your cameras out when they come on board". Apparently in a previous cruise one of the passengers had taken a picture of a border guard and then each and every person on the ship had to have their cameras inspected by the border guards to make sure there were no more pictures. Idiots!
Here's what they look like. Big goofy hats. All serious.
Some rocks in the entrance to the bay.
TripAdvisor says it's attraction #12 of 52 when you visit this city.
One of the lovely buildings we saw.
One of the stops on the bus trip around town was at a market. Like we'd never seen a market before. Those are pigs noses below. Certainly never seen that at a market before!
A new church they're building.
Lots of this kinda stuff inside. No chairs either...everyone has to stand.
A picture of Haysoos on the outside of the church...he looks really mad.
That's it for day 12
Russkaya Bay, Russia
If you look for "Russkaya Bay" with Google maps this is what you get.
So this is what our day looks like.
We were supposed to go ashore today for hiking but for some reason we can't. Don't recall the reason. So instead we're going to go in the Zodiacs to look for whales.
They've spotted quite a few of them and these shots were taken from the ship in the morning before we go in the Zodiacs.
A lot of camera zoom required so the pictures are pretty shitty but that's about the extent of our whale watching today. Zodiac ride turned into just a ride into the rain as the stupid driver Louise wouldn't go anywhere near the fucking whales.
These are some shots taken from a guy in another Zodiac who had a driver who wasn't afraid to get a little closer. PLUS it was one of the first groups to leave the ship that morning.
One of the guys even got a small video of this same whale.
Here's a video that shows how much fun this was.
A couple shots from the ship photographer. Killer whales.
And sea lions.
The redcoats lining up to get a good zodiac. We'll know better next time.
Back on the ship enjoying a beverage after the whale watch.
And for dinner that night we do the hot rocks thing again. It looks like we're both having fish tonight
And that's it for day 13
Another lost day, a "sea day"
One of the unavoidable facts about cruising is "sea days". These, as the name implies, are days spent entirely at sea - no landings, no excursions, nada, zip, zilch. On a Caribbean cruise or south seas cruise on a nice ship with a pool and lots of deck chairs they're not so bad. Time to relax (as if we needed relaxing), finish reading that book you've been working on for six months now, have a few cocktails by the pool (or more than a few in my case), maybe use the exercise room (right! - maybe just have another cocktail instead)...or do whatever.
On this ship however the choices are few. If the weather's ok you can hang out on deck. If the weather's not ok your choices are limited.
Anyway on this sea day the weather was ok so we just hung out deck. Not much scenery except toward the end of the day.
The map below shows how far it is from Russkaya Bay to Chirpoy Island. As there's no scale on the map I haven't a clue how far it is. Quite a few hundred kilometers would be my guess.
Anyways, there's not much to do except have a few drinks and have a few chats with fellow passengers. Luckily we've met quite a few good folks by this point so that's not a problem.
In the afternoon we pass an island with a volcano. Can't remember the name.
Just a few shots of it.
It's incredible how the clouds just sit on these island.
That evening after supper were having a few cocktails (well, more than a few for some of us) in the lounge and I got the server to take this shot. All good folks.
so that's day 14 done
Chirpoy Island, Russia
Chirpoy Island is an uninhabited volcanic island.
It's about half way between the Kamchatka Peninsula and northern Japan.
Not much to do here except go for a walk.
Beautiful black beaches.
Hike up a small hill to look at the other side of the island.
Scads of driftwood. You could have a good bonfire here.
Down at the opposite end of the beach there's an ancient lava flow to investigate.
The volcano on this island is still active. That's smoke rising up.
A couple shots of the island as we depart.
In the evening they have a captains farewell cocktail party. This is our third last night.
They also have a ceremony where all the bartenders, servers, room cleaners, etc. are brought to the stage and we all give them a round of applause. That's the captain to the right of the stage. Maggie Ettlin is her name and she's Swiss. Switzerland is a land locked country so it is very strange that she would choose to be a seafarer but she definately is.
A bigger shot of the captain.
That's it for day 15
Tyuleniy Island, Russia
I think they saved Tyuleniy Island for last so it would provide a positive memory for all of us. We finally got to see wildlife in the quantity that we had hoped for. Thousands and thousands of seals and sea lions.
This is Tyuleniy Island. Tyuleniy means seal in Russian so it is aptly named.
Our location is about 300 km north of the Japanese island of Hokkaido where we will end our trip day in two days.
Another shot of Cory waiting to pick up some passengers.
The seals so curious and inquisitive that some of them swim all the way from the island to inspect our ship.
This is not the main island but a pile of rocks jutting out of the sea about a mile or two away from the main island. Our guide explained that these are all juvenile males. They were probably chased away from the main island by the larger alpha males who don't like them hanging around heir harems.
Apparently there's something called "sneaky copulation" that takes place here. This is where a younger or smaller male hangs around until a larger alpha male goes out in the sea to get food or a drink or just to get away from all the bitching and complaining going on in the harem. Then the younger male swoops in and does some sweet talking and then mates with one of seal ladies of the harem.
This is Tyuleniy Island from closer in.
And closer yet. It used to be a sealing station but is now abandoned. Probably why there are so many seals once again.
We weren't allowed on shore but I'm sure it's a stinking place.
They really like to jump.
And so curious. They come right up to the Zodiac.
The following pics are from the ship photog.
Back on the ship just about everyone has lunch outside. It's a beautiful warm afternoon.
That's it for day 16
Korsakov, Russia
Here's where we are today. IN a town called Korsakov on Sakhalin Island. About a hundred kilometers north of Japan.
It's kind of a shithole town.
It's the same thing as when we entered Russia four days ago in Petropavlosky-Kamchatsky. Sit on the ship and wait for the Russian border guards to eat and drink their fill and when they've had enough they'll have a quick look at our passports and let us of the ship.
By the time this happens we have only two hours to be on shore and it turns out to be more than enough.
There's really nothing appealing about this town. I can't imagine why anyone would come here.
A couple pics.
A statue of Lenin.
That evening, before dinner, we say farewell to the expedition leaders.
Peter and Bodil (Swiss) having an after dinner cocktail with Ian (Aussie). Good folks!
Last day
So that was a quick trip. We saw lots, drank and ate lots (me!) and met a bunch of great people.
Going home was simple. Bus from ship to Chitose airport. Fly to Narita airport and eight hours later we're in Vancouver.
A toilet in Chitose airport. Who ever thought you'd need a control panel on a toilet.
You can even have it pay loud music. The Japs are way ahead of us.
And there's even a place to put your baby while you're doing your business.
Landing in Tokyo. I was amazed at all the green and the many golf courses.
And the ride home.
THAT'S IT!