We stayed with the cruise people until Wednesday morning. The hotel where we stayed was deep downtown, so that morning we wandered around the piers and Pike Street Market. After a delicious lunch featuring crab, we went back to that hotel and walked to another for the rest of our Seattle stay, visiting with friends and family. That night, we shared dinner with Clare’s sister.

Although we have visited Seattle a few times, we had never seen the Chihuly Garden & Glass Museum. Spectacular!

We were happy that so many friends and family members made time to visit with us. We shared dinner with geo-buddies from graduate school days, an entire day with a high school friend, and met with two nieces, three grand children of one of Clare’s sisters and a different sister, for an enjoyable evening of hotdogs, hamburgers, and S’mores. A perfect end to our Alaska adventures.

There’s No Place Like Nome

Packing for leaving the ship can be complicated. They need your luggage the night before, but you have to sleep, and know what you need to wear the next day. No changes.

Our group was leaving Nome late for the flight to Seattle. We wanted to see Nome – no place like it – and we had a half a day. But what was the weather going to be like? Since we were landing in Seattle that night, where we have both friends and family, choosing the correct gear for the time we would be in Nome and the later flight was challenging.

All the locals were friendly on the streets. We received lots of smiles, hellos and welcomes as we wandered around. The 3500 humans and 2500 musk oxen seemed to want us there.

One of the locals told us that the Fish and Game department had to kill a young grizzly that morning. It had been rummaging through the garbage at an apartment complex near the town’s museum, which many cruise passengers would visit. She didn’t know who would get the meat or fur.

In the parts of Alaska where we met people who lived there, the desire to use every part of everything they had was strong. In general, everyone ate the meats of the local animals. When asked about musk ox, one said that they taste like beef, but more tender.

On this day, we are sailing northeast to arrive in Nome tomorrow morning. The weather is sunny, but there is nothing to see but open ocean and seabirds. We hope to see Orcas, but not as of this writing.

Here is more about the ship. The Roald Amundsen and its sister ship, the Fridtjof Nansen, were built in Norway in 2019 and 2020. We wrote earlier about the hybrid drive system and some of the features that we learned about while visiting the bridge. Further information was gleaned from a Q&A session with the ship’s officers.

The ship makes its own fresh water by taking in seawater and purifying it through reverse osmosis. The ship needs to be traveling at higher speeds (>10 knots?) in order to take on seawater. Production of fresh water is on the order of tens of cubic meters per day!

There is no single-use plastic on board the ship. We were given nice insulated water bottles to keep; Clare decorated them! Chilled and filtered water refill stations were placed on each deck. One could also drink the tap water in the stateroom, but it had a chlorine flavor.

Gray water, sewage, and food waste are treated onboard and discharged at sea in accordance with maritime regulations. We were told that this effluent is essentially drinking-water quality.

There are about 150 crew on the ship, which can accommodate up to 530 passengers. On this voyage, only around 280 guests are traveling. While discussing the food, which has been excellent, with a crew member, we learned that the ship is only re-supplied with provisions every two to three months. It seems amazing that so much of the food appears to be fresh, although perhaps most has been frozen.

The main restaurant is a breakfast and lunch buffet, but a-la-carte table service for dinner. Menus are only available through an app, not printed. The alternative all-day lunch restaurant has burgers and various small plates. The fries were quite good! The main restaurant assigns a table via computer at the maître d’ stand.

The ship features various science activities involving guests in both collection and analysis of samples. We only went to the lectures on subjects that were interesting and (or) unknown to us. The geology presentations were too elementary for us (not a surprise), but the speaker was entertaining. David was the comedian (and geologist) of the science team!

Last night, an auction was held to raise some additional funds for the Hurtigruten Foundation. One item auctioned was the pride flag that was flown on the ship during June. It was signed by the expedition crew members.

The lecture hall was used for numerous presentations, many of which were simultaneously translated for the German guests. Most were also streamed to the televisions in the staterooms.

There was a nice wool blanket in our stateroom that we never needed!

Fewer people visit Saint Matthew Island every year than climb Mount Everest! We’re in an elite group.

Saint Matthew Island in the Bering Sea has never been inhabited by humans, at least not for any extended period. A Russian expedition landed here in the early nineteenth century and named some geographical features. During WWII the U.S. Coast Guard set up a manned LORAN station and moved a couple dozen reindeer here to provide food. The reindeer population eventually grew to 6000, but there was a great die-off in 1963 due to extreme winter weather and lack of food. The last reindeer died in 1981. The geology is not the same as on Saint Paul Island, consisting of Cretaceous and early Cenozoic calc-alkaline volcanic and volcaniclastic rocks.

We never imagined walking along a beautiful beach on a perfect sunny day in the middle of the Bering Sea. The crew exclaimed how rare this day was — none had been here when it was this sunny. We were too warm in our Arctic gear, but no one complained. How could we?

We learned from our guide Lancy, an ornithologist, that we might see two rare birds on this island, a sandpiper and a bunting. We saw both!

A beautiful last excursion. It is predicted that the weather in Nome will also be dry and sunny when we arrive the day after tomorrow.