Monday
KG and I are currently sitting in the cafeteria of the Sun Princess on voyage to Ketchikan, Alaska. We are taking the “inside passage” cruise from Seattle, up through Puget Sound, along coastal Canada and finally into Alaska. We will be visiting Juneau, Ketchikan, and Skagway, Alaska and then finally making a stop in Victoria, British Columbia on our way back. Our trip started with us getting dropped off at Lambert air port, a short flight to Minneapolis, and then a long flight from there to Seattle. Minnesota is aptly named the land of a thousand lakes. Flying in to the city we saw literally hundreds of small lakes. KG was impressed that they had Proactiv acne medicine in vending machines at the airport. I guess the Minnesotans must have serious skin issues, I’ll have to ask Justin about that later. Finally after a long trip we arrived in Seattle and checked into the Embassy suites. This was one of the nicest places I have stayed, and thanks to my Aunt we were able to stay for free. The place was actually a little too nice and we decided against eating in the hotel restaurant. Wearing our “just married” t-shirts we walked down to Wendy’s for a late dinner. Sunday morning we had an amazing free breakfast at the Embassy suites, caught a ride to the docks and boarded our cruise ship. Today is also my 30th birthday; unfortunately I’m not getting any phone reception, so I don’t think I’ll be receiving any Happy Birthday wishes.

Tuesday
We have arrived in Ketchikan this morning. We made our way through the “historic” shopping district, known as Creek Street, and to my delight found a nice little Cybercafe. For $6 an hour I can check my mail, and visit all my favorite websites. Ketchikan is a really neat city, if you can block out all the cruise ships towering over you from behind, the small town charm is very apparent. I keep humming the theme song from Northern Exposure as we walk up and down the sidewalks. The stores range from authentic looking survival stores, discount jewelry chains, and of course the occasional tourist trap. While wandering around the city KG found a great little coffee shop on the edge of the pier. We had bagels and coffee while we checked out their selection of locally brewed coffee. I was instantly drawn to the packaging of the Ravens Brew brand. The art just jumped out at me and after talking to the barista, we found out that the art was by a local Ketchikany named Ray Troll. I ended up buying a t-shirt for Dead Man’s Reach. Later we found a calendar feating Ray’s artwork and we snagged that up as well.

Wednesday
Today the ship was cruising through Tracy’s Arm, a huge fjord carved about by glaciers about 500 years ago. The ship navigated through a very narrow area with tiny icebergs floating on all sides of us, it was pretty dang cool. Later in the day we docked in Juneau, Alaska. We signed up for a Whale watching excursion on Auke Bay. The trip out there was pretty cool, we were aboard a 40-person catamaran that had a real smooth ride. We got free hot chocolate and cookies, which really made KG happy, and smoked salmon on crackers which really made me happy. It didn’t take us long to see our first whale surface, and the crowd roared every time it would do a deep-dive slapping its tail against the surface of the bay. After we left the location of the first whale it took us a bit to find any more. After searching around for an hour we were finally able to locate a small pod of three humpback whales (including a calf), and we spent quite a while watching them swim around and deep-dive. It was pretty neat seeing these huge mammals gliding across the bay. When we got back to Juneau we checked out the famous Red Dog saloon. It’s famous for keeping its Old-West style as apparent by the sawdust on the floor, the double swinging doors on the entrance, the trophy animal heads littering the walls, and Wyatt Earp’s revolver hanging above the bar. The place was a little too expensive for our taste (and too meaty for KG) so we decided to eat back on the ship where it’s free!

Thursday
Today we visited the final Alaskan stop on our cruise - Skagway, Alaska. Skagway is a small frontier town made famous during the gold rush of the late 1800s, and which featured old western looking storefronts surrounded by picturesque snow-covered mountains. There were several neat local-owned stores featuring native artwork, carvings, and jewelry, intermixed with your typical touristy places. For lunch I had a bowl of chili Skagway style, a sweeter blend of sauce and meat over spaghetti noodles.

Saturday
Late Saturday evening the ship stopped in Victoria, British Columbia. I instantly fell in love with the vibrant downtown district, crowded with shopping areas, historic hotels, government buildings, the harbor, and an eclectic mix of people. KG and I got dropped off at the beautiful ivy-covered Empress Hotel and just wandered around Victoria for a while. There were a ton of great stores and upscale bars and restaurants, and they even had a Quicksilver store. Kari had heard good things about Market Square so we decided to try and find it, and in the process we accidently stumbled upon the Victoria Electronic Music Festival. We found ourselves in the midst of a rave, full of young people, brightly colored hair, men in skirts, and wild make-up.

Check out all the pictures from the trip to Alaska.

Even more wedding pictures from professional photographer Kristi Foster

Oh yeah… this has got me more than a little pumped. UFC 75 is only a month away!

The new SciFi series Flash Gordon debuts tonight (Friday). Its a reinterpretation of the comic from the 1930’s. In 1980, popularity of Flash Gordon was greatly increased by a cheesy movie featuring Max von Sydow as Ming the Merciless and original theme song by Queen. Flaaaaaaaaash aaaaaaaah aaaaaaaaaah! After watching the original trailer its pretty interesting to see how they used to promote movies and how far special effects improved.