Text 11082, 80 rader
Skriven 2008-07-26 00:29:04 av Dale Shipp (1:261/1466.0)
Ärende: Alaska Trip Report 2
============================
Saturday 14 June.

As would come to be pretty standard, early morning call, luggage placed
outside the room and a breakfast buffet.  The tour took care of getting
the luggage from the room to the coach.  This day, the breakfast buffet
was served to the group and was pretty much the same as we had in the
dining room on previous days.  We had scrambled eggs, sliced fruit, home
fries, bacon, biscuits, butter, jelly, orange juice or other juices
coffee/tea.

Everything was fresh and hot and everyone gathered promptly, chatted
with new friends and enjoyed the food and the company.  Then we boarded
the coach for the trip north to Vancouver.

Lunch was at a small town named Lynden. There is a very small local
museum not far from the restaurant where we were scheduled to have
lunch.  We walked around the museum for about an hour and found the
displays very original.  Lots of motorcycles, farm equipment and
military memorabilia from World War I and II. Old fire trucks and farm
trucks, toy cars, gas pumps.  Several displays of buildings from the
1800's - nicely outfitted with some original furniture as well as some
reproduction pieces.

Lunch was at a local restaurant called The Dutch Daughter.  The group
had a private room and a buffet already set up when we all walked in.
Very tender pulled pot roast with gravy, steamed red potatoes, cooked
red cabbage, green beans with almonds, home made rolls and butter coffee
or ice tea.  Dessert was home made apple pie or a Bumble Berry
(strawberry, blueberry, blackberry combination).  Very nice lunch.

We arrived in Vancouver in mid-afternoon and immediately went through
the boarding procedure for the ship.  It was the Statendam owned by
Holland America.  1200 passengers and a crew of 600.  Built in 1993.

There are several food options aboard the ship.  Fixed dining, open
dining, cafeteria dinning and snack bars. There was also an up-scale
restaurant called the Pinnacle dining room (reservations required and an
extra $20 fee).

We had signed up for fixed dining at 8:00 PM in the main dining room.
Very elegant - tables for 6 - several servers for each table.  For the
three nights we were on board for the evening meal we had an assigned
table.  Our table mates were not from our tour group but just from the
passengers at large,  a couple from Cincinnati and two retired ladies
from Great Britain on holiday from their husbands.

For the first night there:
Dinner:

Appetizers
Gail - Thai Chicken wrapped in lettuce.  (fair)
Dale - Crabcake  (very good)

Soup
Gail - Steak/vegetable soup (v good)
Dale - Seafood chowder - (v good)

Entrée
Gail - Chicken stuffed with proscuito/cheese  (VV good)
Dale - Pecan crusted salmon (VV Good)
  Assorted steamed vegetables and rice pilaf  (VV Good)

Dessert
Gail - Lemon Sorbet  (VV Good)
Dale - Peach Rice pudding (V Good)

Finished dinner after 10:00 - chatty table.

Very tired after the long day, we retired before midnight.

                               Dale Shipp
                  fido_261_1466 (at) comcast (dot) net
                              (1:261/1466)


... Shipwrecked on Hesperus in Columbia, Maryland. 00:41:13, 26 Jul 2007
___ Blue Wave/DOS v2.30

--- Maximus/NT 3.01
 * Origin: Owl's Anchor (1:261/1466)