We did it!!! We spent an amazing 10 days in Alaska on a cruise with my family. It was so much fun!!! It was a wonderful present from my parents that we are so thankful for. Really it was a once in a lifetime kind of trip. I know the kids are young and they may not remember it all but we hope that through pictures and us talking about it alot they will remember some of it. We saw some amazing things. Alaska is very different from other places we have been because it is not about old buildings or "the sights." It is about the beautiful scenery and just enjoying nature. It was different for us but awesome!!! I am going to take a few days and hopefully blog about most of the trip as a special memory for us. There are over 2,000 pictures from the trip so I won't put them all up I promise. Just a snapshot of what it was like. Here goes...
It started very early Thursday morning June 9th! Our plane left at 8 am so that meant a 4:30 wake up! I went in to wake Ben up around 5 am and he would not wake up. I whispered that we were leaving for Alaska and he jumped out of bed and was ready to go!!!! He had been talking about the trip for so long and was so excited. A couple of days before we left he very seriously said " I don't think we are ever going to go." We made to to the airport no problem. Needless to say with 8 people being gone for 10 days (some longer) there was a lot of luggage!!!! I really lost count of how many bags. We spent alot of time just moving them around! 
The kids were really excited for the plane rides! It was Kate's first time to go on a plane.
I was really worried about how they would do but they did awesome. We had some long flights but they did great!
On the way out there we flew Huntsville to Atlanta then Atlanta to Salt Lake then Salt Lake to Vancouver. It was a long full day of flying. I will hopefully just write a post about flying with young kids as well as cruising with young kids because I read alot of blogs before I left that were really helpful to me.
We finally arrived in Vancouver around 5 pm. It was the kiddos first trip to Canada! We got through Canadian customs pretty easily and quickly got to our hotel for the evening.
Our first family picture at the Vancouver airport!
My parents were really sweet and offered to watch the kids that evening so that we could go out with Andrew and Kelly. Matt and Kelly had never been to Vancouver so they wanted to see as much of the city as they could. We took the light rail system into downtown and hit the town. If you hadn't heard the Vancouver Canucks were in the Stanley Cup Finals while we were there. Everywhere we looked were Go Canucks signs! This was the ticket machine for the rail system. Thankfully we were not there during the riots!
We were able to walk through most of downtown Vancouver. It is a really beautiful city. Of course we really hungry at this point so we ate dinner at a great restaurant called Chill Winston in the Gastown part of the city. They serve all organic and sustainable foods. It was a really neat trendy restaurant that was great!
After dinner we did some more exploring. We walked along the waterfront.
Saw the Olympic cauldron.
Got shot at by the 9 o'clock cannon! It was hilarious. I thought Matt was about to hit the deck!
Marveled at the beautiful skyscrapers. All of their buildings are all glass so it makes for a very modern looking city.
And even ate at the Canadian favorite - Tim Hortons!
We had a great time and really got to enjoy some of the city. The kids and my parents enjoyed dinner at a local pizza place and then got to bed early because it was almost time to get on the big boat!!!!
1 comments:
Wow I had no idea you were going to Alaska! I read the above post and sounds like you had an amazing time! So happy for all of you that you spent this unforgettable family journey together. You will for sure treasure that.
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