Solitude in Alaska
Rain, rain, go away… is what I would say to Alaska throughout the summer, wondering when I would feel the sun’s blooming rays on my skin again.
Taking a cruise with your entire family? Fun — is what I thought until I realized I would be trapped on a boat with no service for an entire week.
And that’s exactly what happened in July 2024 when I embarked on a Norwegian Encore cruise with my entire family, including cousins, aunts, uncles, and grandparents. We were celebrating my grandmother’s 75th birthday and my grandparent's 55th anniversary, making this cruise very special.
The journey took off in Seattle, Washington, which is where my family is from. The first couple of days were nothing but the deep blue sea, no phone service in sight. As someone whose screen time was on average over 10 hours a day, it was difficult to not get on my phone. We were each given 150 minutes of Wi-Fi for the whole week-long cruise. Nothing could top the hilarious moment when my 16-year-old cousin, Ryan, discovered he had used his Wi-Fi minutes in one day, believing the 150 minutes was given each day. Luckily, the cruise had millions of activities to offer, so we spent the first days at sea go karting on the racetrack, going down the water slides, and running around creating havoc with my cousins.
After a few days at sea, we made our way to the first destination: Juneau, Alaska’s capital. Excited to finally be exiting the boat, we went to the Tongass National Forest, to see Nugget Falls. Despite the rainy weather, we completed the hike to the base of the waterfall, where I focused on embracing the sounds of rushing water and bird twitters. After that, I traveled to a traditional Alaska Salmon bake, where I learned the intricacies of cooking an Alaskan-caught wild salmon over a wood fire. There, at the river bank, I got to see wild salmon swimming upstream, which is where they catch the salmon from.
Our next port was Skagway, a quaint little town in Southeast Alaska. The Wi-Fi was obsolete and nowhere to be found anywhere in town, which hurt as someone whose screen time is on average 10 hours a day. Disconnecting from the rest of the world was a blessing in disguise. At this point in the cruise, I had already used my free minutes of Wi-Fi on the boat. I was soon becoming consumed with the agony of feeling disconnected from my friends and the rest of the world.
Yet, as I was slowly forced to become comfortable with this discomfort, it helped me separate from my screen and appreciate the surrounding beauty.
Battling these feelings, my new adventure was riding the White Pass and Yukon Route Railway train. It crossed the Alaska border into Canada and eventually brought us back. On this solemn ride, we traveled to the Summit of the White Pass, standing at a staggering elevation of 2,865-feet. I was in awe of the vintage beauty of the train as I mentally screenshotted the breathtaking panoramic views of mountains and glaciers. I tried not to focus when the train traveled over the old wooden bridges. Coming back down to the town, I got to try traditional Alaskan Fry Bread, which was warm and delicious. It was a good ending to the day before getting back on the boat.
By the next day, we arrived at the Glacier Bay National Park and Reserve, but unfortunately, we didn’t get off the boat due to there being no port. Instead, the ship circled itself in 360-degrees around the area all day to ensure all passengers captured the beauty of the glaciers in all their angles. Now being west of Juneau, the national park contained over 1,000 glaciers. This was one of the most astonishing landscapes I had ever laid my eyes on. Everywhere I looked, ice white mountains and rich, royal blue water surrounded me. Seeing whales and bears in their natural habitat was a bonus too. Unfortunately, I came down with a fever and was in bed a lot of the day watching movies on the room T.V. This night was my grandparents 55th anniversary dinner celebration, so I mustered through to be able to show up for the night.
My favorite city in Alaska turned out to be the following cruise port: Ketchikan. Not only was it so full of life and energy, I was able to feed my phone addiction with the abundance of service there. The seemingly never-ending colorful houses and buildings reminded me of my time in Sweden, as it seemed I had teleported to Europe. There, I attended The Great Alaskan Lumberjack Show where I watched lumberjacks compete in tree climbing, log rolling, axe throwing and more entertaining activities. It was interesting to see the lumberjack lifestyle and all that they do, and learn about the logging history of southeast Alaska. This was one of my favorite parts of the trip, as it was cool to experience something I knew nothing about. I found myself thinking it would be so cool to drop everything, move to Canada and become a lumberjack.
The last port, before making our way back to Washington, was Victoria, Canada. We only had three hours to explore the shore, as we arrived at 8 pm and the boat left by 11 pm. This didn’t leave much time to explore much of anything, so my family and I walked to the Empress and the Legislative Assembly of British Columbia parliament buildings. I took advantage of this being the first port where phone service was strong.
Since I had visited Victoria every couple of years, I was already familiar with the city, hence why I didn’t feel too guilty about enjoying time with my phone on this part of the trip.
Yet, at this moment, I noticed I didn’t miss much of anything while I was offline, other than missing messaging my friends. Scrolling through Instagram and snapping people back on Snapchat wasn't as fun as the trip had been.
This summer vacation led me to make deeper connections with nature and my family. I learned to appreciate what was around me instead of only appreciating what was on my phone. Turns out, having no Wi-Fi or phone service is not as bad as it sounds.
