Saturday – Sitka, Alaska

It rains a lot in Sitka (Tlingit: Sheetʼká; Russian: Ситка). So they say. Everyone thanked us for bringing sunshine and blue skies. We had breakfast, as usual, in the World Cafe. Their scrambled eggs are great as is their bacon. What more could one ask for? Tlingit, by the way, are one of the native people from this part of Alaska. As we got up in the morning, surprised by the blue skies, I took a few pictures from the ship as we neared Sitka.

Click on the galleries below to bring up scrollable windows with full size pictures – the gallery previews may show just thumbnails of the pictures. By the way, the pictures look much better on a tablet or a computer than they do on your phone. Just saying.

After breakfast it was onto the bus for a short but enjoyable excursion. We stopped on a neighboring island where I took some pictures of Sitka, which is situated on Baranof Island. (Sitka can only be reached by plane or boat – there are no roads connections to the rest of Alaska. All cars, busses, food, machinery, etc. comes in by barge.) The name Baranof is from the Russian ruler of Sitka, Alexander Andreyevich Baranov, back in the days before Alaska was sold to the US.

I also took a couple of panoramas from the same spot (click to enlarge them).

Next we stopped at the Sitka Community Center for a theatrical performance about the history of Sitka in song and dance. It was very well done, and we enjoyed it.

Then we walked around downtown. We stopped in a few gift shops, but we did no buying. We planned on stopping in at St. Michael’s Russian Orthodox Cathedral, but it was closed today. Damn Russians!

We did, however, decide to have lunch in Sitka. We chose the Coldwater Bar and Grill. Salmon BLT and beer for Elaine. Cod fish and chips and beer for me. Elaine loved her sandwich. Mine was good but not memorable. You can see I was wearing my Nordkapp hat from the northernmost point in Europe that I acquired on our Viking cruise in May.

Then we caught the shuttle back to the ship where we relaxed for the rest of the day. The picture of the eagle below is the only one we saw although the city is noted as being home to lots of eagles.

(Aside: the island on which Sitka is located has hundreds of brown bears, but no black bears. The island on which Ketchikan is located has hundreds of black bears, but no brown bears. Hhmmm, or maybe it’s the other way around – I didn’t take notes.)

I took a few photos with my phone as we were about to sail from the dock (which is located about five miles from Sitka center). Most of the photos are taken with my Sony RX100 V7. At dinner and occasionally other times I use my Pixel Pro 7 phone.

Dinner tonight was in Manfredi’s, the ships specialty (but included) restaurant. It’s Italian themed but is noted for its steak. Click to enlarge the menu

We ate next to a nice lady from Philadelphia who was dining alone. Her husband wasn’t feeling well. I had pasta something or other followed by rib eye steak f=Florentine style and ice cream. Elaine had Caprese salad followed by a risotto and no dessert. We had a great bottle of French wine. I forgot to take pictures of the main courses. After dinner drinks were in the Explorer’s Lounge and then bed.

Glacier Bay tomorrow. No port call. Rain is forecast. Be back tomorrow.