Port Day - Juneau

Sunday we enjoyed a relatively lazy morning around the boat before docking at Juneau after lunch.  We had success with our excursion waitlist and received a call from the excursion desk either  Saturday afternoon at sea of this morning.  (ah, the perils of writing blog posts after the fact!) After accepting the desired excursion, we knew we'd have time for little else at Juneau.  

One event Wifey did not skip during our lazy morning was morning dance exercise!  We'll save you wonderful readers the visual of that event :)  

With an extra hour before disembarkation, we enjoyed a sit-down lunch in the Main Dining Room (MDR).  

Blue Cheese Wedge - for the win!

Hubby's Chocolate Dessert

Wifey's Key Lime Dessert

After lunch, we finalized our off the ship bags and wardrobe and headed to our excursion meeting point!  The outing began with a quick van-ride over to the airport where we'd catch a helicopter to the Mendenhall glacier. 

Blurry Van Selfie:

There were a total of 10 folks in our group.  Step one was to suit up at the offices.  Each participant was met with a pile-o-clothes.  Outer coats, pants, boots, gloves, a fanny-pack and a harness were provided at this point along with a storage bag the keep our normal shoes in while we participated.  

From here we were arranged by weight ... a process that greatly disadvantaged Wifey ... to determine seats in the Helicopter.  She was the only participant in our helicopter who did not have a window seat.  *anger* and was the only participant who brought real camera equipment.  Hubby saved the day by filming some awesome footage of our flight touring local glaciers by air.  

VIDEO link for mobile:  https://youtu.be/Hj9Wst_Lpog

Once the tour portion of our flight was complete, we landed on Mendenhall Glacier near a small base-camp and added yet additional gear to our bodies .... specifically crampons (basically spiky metal shoes) and an axe.  The crampons were awesome. The axe was basically useless given adequate leg strength and was a huge pain to carry around.  

Once were were outfitted, we learned some techniques for going uphill, downhill, and traversing a hill.  They were conceptually and functionally simple, if not intuitive. Then again, Wifey has calves the size of ... large calves.  

With some basic skills practiced (and time annoyingly wasted as some of our party received feedback on how to ... walk?) we began our Trek.  We walked for the next hour to hour and a half in a large circle on the glacier, seeing various ice features along the way.  Honestly the description of this as a strenuous activity is deceiving.  Would have greatly preferred if they had a screening process and ensured equivalent skill sets among participants.   

Wifey checking out the view: 

Harvesting some glacier water to drink.  Anticlimactic. 

We returned to Ovation of the Seas *just* in time for a quick selfie and then Dinner.  

At this point, we've sat at the same table several nights in a row and are beginning to feel companionship develop with our neighbors.  How fun is that!?  One evening our immediate neighbors were late and the next table after them mentioned that "I guess the Christian couple is skipping dinner tonight" <- New life goal ... be that couple!