Today is our last excursion day in Alaska, to Ketchikan marking the near end of our cruise trip, it’s also our third excursion day in a row and the fatigue is getting to me. I had to skip writing daily posts for a few days during this time because damn, I just don’t have the time nor the stable internet connections to even upload photos. Either way, this post is like a day or two behind actual events but that’s ok I guess, lets see how things went today.

Our excursion is a little later in the day like after 12:45pm but that doesn’t stop me from waking up in the morning and getting some breakfast at Cabanos.

A somewhat lighter spread this morning, the breakfast menu is always like 85% the same every same save a few other items but yea, still gotta eat to fuel up.

Decided to order a omelet as well since why not, it was kinda mid, not really worth the time to order and wait for it, even tho they give you little beepers to let you know your order is ready.

I was the only one fat enough to want to get breakfast again so it was just me this time alone but breakfast was super busy this morning, it was hard finding a seat in the seating area. We haven’t landed at Ketchikan yet so I guess everyone has the same idea, either load up on breakfast or wait until lunch and do the same.

After I finished my breakfast at like 10am or so, I basically just chilled around the fourth floor deck or on the ninth trying to upload photos using our shitty cell at sea internet which is super slow for uploads. I did this for basically 2 hours, semi sleeping sometimes on the deck lounge charges and playing mobiles games when it could connect like umamusame.

Anyways, after killing time for like 2 hours it was now time to be a fatass part 2 with Cabanos lunch service! Gotta got those meals in before our excursion at 12:45pm.

Their lunch menu is quite different everyday it seems, very different compared to their breakfast which is the same most of the time. This day they have mini corn dogs wow. They always have mac and cheese and fries however tho.

Spaghetti and meatballs huh, different I guess.

Some more grilled tuna and cajun shrimp huh. Maybe this is leftover from Tianas the other day, since the seasoning is very similar. I except a lot of these food items to be reused or reheated from previous food services at the buffet.

Having eaten breakfast like only 2 hours ago I wasn’t that hungry but ended get some new things anyway to eat. Everything was good except the tuna, it was horrible, spit that shit out, worse tuna i’ve ever had bah. Grilled chicken mid and meatballs ok, mini corn dogs pretty good shit tho, like eating them at CNE food stalls. Good shit.

This was some tomato soup with some rice in it. I thought it would be good. I was wrong, ate some spoonful and it was too sour for me, garbage that shit ah-well, can’t win them everything.

Our boat had already docked at Ketchikan but most people were staggering their way out past noon for expeditions and or independent exploration of the town, us included. Hm, looks like a interesting port town.

Following the same pattern as yesterday, we are team Mickey today for our excursion, cool.

Gather the tribes, what team are people are going to be in.

When you exit the boat to a port you have to check out using your ‘key to the world’ credit card thing which has all your id and shit. Likewise when you board you have to go through security again, and put your items through a metal detector thing again.

And so here we are, out on the port of Ketchikan, let’s see where to go first for our tour.

Following our team mickey guide, it leads us to a bus to start our tour. Our tour bus is fully packed unlike yesterday so that’s nice.

Proof of bus tour existence, lets go peace edition.

Our driver and bus tour guide goes around and uses his clicker to count how many people are on the bus. He finds that three people are missing. Damn, that must have been Sung Jin-woo’s and family. RIP. Damnnn. He waits no longer and begins the tour driving off. My sister says this guy might have autism or something but I dunno, maybe?

He doesn’t drive that far but he does bring us to a nearby native village promotional thing? The town itself is what you would expect from town in the middle of nowhere I suppose.

Found this company funny.

At the native village we meet our tour guide a women who is quite loud in speaking and kinda has a tired feel that she has done this hundreds of times already, which I’m sure she has. She leads us into some workshop of some native totem pole guy’s workshop at this tourist village.

In progress totem poles at work hmm but where is the artist himself?

Ah, there he is, this dude sleeping in the corner, unaware that a bunch of people in a tour just entered his workshop, I think he was like completely unaware or sleeping for real, like the woman guide just continued to explain all the shit in this place very loudly and it didn’t wake him up, nor did she try to wake him up, it was very awkward strange. Very surreal really.

The name of this dude him, hmm.

Outside of this tourist village thing for natives we gather outside and our tour guide explains the stories behind the totem poles and the house in the background. It’s kinda disorganized with little kids completely checked out by now and getting hyper running around.

The woman in sunglasses is our guide to this place, she talks so loud, I am not entirely sure if this women is native herself or not, perhaps mixed? or completely white? I have no idea.

She was just standing here talking about this toem pole and shit about his we don’t know the story about this one cause the creator died before he finished it, too bad.

This is supposed to be Abraham Lincoln, which is actually the name of a boat that came to visit them back in the day but since they not allowed to put non-alive things at the top, they put the man. Jokes.

The story for this one is this guy is some white asshole who took some shit from the natives which they gave him, but the natives expected to get something back in return, which is part of their tradition. Of course he never came back so the natives fucked up his face and shit by coloring on it to make it look like a clown or something with red ears.

After story time of poles she leads us to some meeting room for dances and shit, which is supposed to be for elders or community meetings.

We sit down and await a show I guess. Wait until more busses arrive and groups I guess before they preform the dance.

I don’t know what to expect but so far this experience has been quite unique to say the least, and not the good kind of unique.

Half expecting some professional dancers, I see a bunch of youth native kids of all ages in their native barb do a variety of tribal dances and shit. hm.

We see some nice moves like looking down at the ground, others taking a come at me bro stance, very creative. At this point it’s near the end of the dances and they ask for audience participation and give him some native barb to dance to. Oh boi.

I think the audience here captures the general feel of this dance performance perfectly, same folks, same.

I don’t know about this entire native dance thing. The music was real with some playing the drum on the side but the dances are just a bunch of native kids doing bullshit. It felt like a school cultural heritage stage performance for diversity day, extremely ghetto and cringe. I kinda can’t believe we paid money to see this and visit this place.

Once the performance was over we were led to the gift shop of course.

Oh look, it’s the same shirts being sold that I am currently wearing right now on this day. Wow, what a not coincidence, native day indeed.

This place is called the Saxman native village but it overall feels like a low budget scam of sorts? Is this what natives have to offer for tourism at this place? Damn, pretty sad. Their washrooms was only single stalls only so waiting is bad.

After leaving Saxman village we are taken to another visitor center of sorts for more native history. Oh boi.

Luckily this one is in in the downtown area so it’s not so bad. Our tour guide to this place straight up said again that it’s ok to skip this section if it’s not interesting to you and to just go to the lumberjack show later in the day at 4pm. Oh boi.

Our college intern briefly goes through the small native museum talking about shit that we largely don’t care about. Some families have already left already so our group is like only 12 people once again or so. With the little kids beginning to lose their minds lol.

More talking about native shit.

Some live in artist for this museum painted some pieces for prominent natives in the area, ok sure.

He also painted that totem pole guy we saw sleeping in the workshop lol. Damn I guess he was a local celebrity or something lol. Not famous enough for him to wake up for us however lol.

After a few more areas we reach the most ghetto part of this tour, which for some reason my sister was hyped about, making craft charm bead bracelets. Damnn.

I dunno, take some beads and shit and make it into a bracelet, we only have like 20 minutes or so so make it quick, don’t wanna be late to the lumberjack show or something. Damn, this was so ghetto, what is this shit? An elementary school field trip? Fuckkk.

Once we were done with bracelets our new guide to this place is like, yea your done, just go to the lumberjack show. It’s like right across the street and other notable fish places like this Alaska Fish house which they say is good. hm.

First thing in the lumberjack show is a gift shop, figures.

Oh boi it’s the lumberjack show. Lots of kids here and familes. Our show for some reason was advertised as a special version given to Disney cruise pepole. I wonder what’s different.

Within the first few minutes I understand why it’s special show for disney. They have goofy up there parting with the kids.

He invites all the kids in the audience to participate and legit asks him to do exercises and shit lol wtf. They did like jumping jacks, pushups, situps and stretches and shit. what the hell? lol I suppose this is important for lumberjacks but man, way to involve the kids I guess? After abut 10 minutes of this the special part is over and goofy runs away into oblivion, never to be seen again.

The actual show is not bad, with two teams of lumberjacks doing lumberjack things competing to be the best, what’s kinda hm is that the teams represented are like US vs Canada. uhh hmm. Seeing how we are in Alaska you can kinda guess which team won, yes the US, and it was a bullshit thing too, where like oh the points matter more so they win. Relationship with US, not so hot right now but this is Alaska, US always wins, no matter what rigged.

Some interesting merch shirts that we have in the lumberjack show shop, hm creative but stupid.

We only had like 2 hours left to shop the town before we were supposed to be back on so we began doing the usual souvenir gift shop crawl.

Tour guide said this popcorn is the bomb, I don’t care however, so no.

Alot of gift shops had this shirt being shilled, saying buying it supports the local schools and other community shit. It’s a not bad design honestly, I brought one, without actually knowing it’s going to school hmm that’s interesting.

Oh yea boi, Ketchikan is the place to be for these dumb collectable coins that I like to get, gotta get-em all bitch.

Lots of shops have deals that pair a shirt with a hat or like 3 for $30 kinda thing. Which is actually not bad deal honestly, if your looking for decent tshirts that is.

From the main port road shops you can see some nice mountain stuff going on still, cool.

Proof of being at Ketchikan sign existence, salmon capital of the world they say, but why was the salmon hatchery and salmon stores located in Juneau then? I have no idea.

This Tongass trading shop is apparently one of the oldest merchant shops still running in Ketchikan, and they have made it a point for tourists for their souvenir goods. Funny how back in the day they might have been selling wood and shit clothes, food, tools for miners and travelers but today they are selling graphic tees and baseball caps for tourists coming from cruise ships. Funny.

Aura farming the port, not much time left so we start to head back to the boat.

The town is quite big but unfortunately we were unable to see most of it such as Creek Street which people have said is another good tourist area but ah well. I got my fill I suppose.

Aura farming statues about fisherman or miners, guys, it’s just a job, you don’t need to glorify fishing and mining.

Unlike yesterday, we can get to the boat easily, no shuttle busses here, noice.

Back on the boat we rest a bit before dinner and depart. Get our daily ice cream today, it’s base ass choco vanilla because the special today is mint and chocolate, don’t like that shit so go base today.

Nice towels by the pool on the 9th floor. It’s disney after all.

We go to another one of those music song trivia, we are owned badly but my sister carries most of the songs from this session which is 2010’s music. I contribute almost nothing lol.

Pretty busy and big turnout for this one as you might expect.

I look out at the deck and think about Sung Jin-woo sometimes, and his family. What happened to him, are they dead or truly alive. I have no idea anymore.

Perhaps his soul is being carried in that little boat into the afterlife. He would like that I think, at least he can be with his family, which I think he would like that, as it’s a beautiful scenery to be spirited away to into the afterlife too.

For this last expedition day we are at Tritons again, which is probably the worst restaurant in terms of vibe and environment, ah-well, what can you do, it’s chosen for you.

Proof of mom existence, she is still here, the Mendalhall glacier did not take her just yet from yesterday.

Salute and pour one out for Sung Jin-woo and family, for those that never made it this far.

Today’s bread selection, some pepper sauce and better, not bad.

Got some oxtail soup, it was pretty good although it was a bit salty.

I think this was white onion soup that my sister got. It was categorized as a local specialty. I am not sure how white onion is considered a special ingredient but sure.

Some base cold cut charcuterie again, not bad but what’s with the small ass tomatoes? Need at least 4-5 more you know to balance out with everything else.

Some mushroom and oyster vinaigrette thing, was probably ok says my mom.

Parsnip and other bullshit salad, probably ok, say me mom.

For today we all got lobster tails. Nice.

Perhaps this is a white people thing but they had our waitress extract the lobster meat from the shell for us. Wow, such privilege and laziness that I never seen or heard of before. Lobster tail is already easy to open why do I need someone to do this for me? jokes.

Our fully completed lobster dish no shell. Honestly the lobster was just ok, it was probably boiled and a bit rubbery but what do you expect from a cruise ship? Can’t be the freshest of the fresh seafood you know.

My second main was this vension, luckily it was not gamy so it was pretty alright, shared with the others.

Chicken breast pasta thing my sister had, not bad she said, pretty base.

I also had this slightly asian inspired roast duck salad with a bunch of bullshit I can’t remember, it was not bad, better than average.

Can’t remember what dessert this was but probably for my mom, some chocolate no sugar bullshit I think.

Chocolate lavacake with ice cream, pretty good, my sister also had this too.

Some bread tart thing my sister also had, she said it was good.

With dinner done and the boat leaving port, we aura farmed outside once again on the 4th deck, look at that nice orange sky and shit.

In another half hour or so it would turn to this. Somewhere somehow, Sung Jin-woo and family is out there, maybe, but probably not. I can only dream.

My sister told me that she saw a video about this late night thing that happens at this pub from 10:45-11:30pm. They call it late night eats, and put out free chicken wings and munchies for patrons to visit for free, while all other food stations are being closed. We decided to check it out because I want to know since we saw it the other day, let’s try and be extra fat today.

We were a bit early and some people were already there to pick up some shit. wow.

Fruits pretty base.

Some mini sandwich sliders

Some chicken casadias.

And of course the main attraction, some chicken wings. They had blue cheese and ranch dips too on the side.

My selection, honestly the chicken wings are pretty decent, they are like baked wings but then dropped in oil to make it seem like they were fried, but they aren’t really. The quesadia was ok too. I am a bit surprised they even served wings here considering this pub is supposed to be a paid place with food and their menu doesn’t even have chicken wings.

My sister’s selection, she didn’t finish the mini slider sandwiches but was impressed that the wings are not bad.

Overall a nice little secret eating place that is only documented in the app but not advertised anywhere else. They only have the food out for 45 min then they just straight up close the place down I think but yea, nice little bonus fat ass snack tonight.

I went to the 9th floor, which is where they have drinks and shit outside and noticed that they were playing movies on the outdoor screen. Wow people are actually here on lawn chairs watching something.

They are watching the first Tron remake movie. My sister and mom thought about watching this movie since they never saw it, neither have I but once they learned that it was not in the proper movie theater but outside in the cold air, they like nope, not doing that lol. I dunno, I think it would be a cool experience, it’s like a outdoor movie drive in thing. Ahwell.

And that ends the last day of our port excursions, from here on out our trip is basically more or less done. The town of Ketchikan to be honest is kinda mid, I am not sure it’s because we only had a few hours to explore and we didn’t do a good job of looking around town or perhaps the tour excursion things today was kinda mid, from the native village dance shit, museum and lumberljack show, in retrospect, I think it may be better to have not done anything at all and just explore the town on our own, but what can you do, it’s the worst port and excursion day by far.

We have another full day at sea so there there are only in ship activities and a final Broadway like show tomorrow to look forward to, that and of course just eating shit all day and lazing around. For me, this is a time to catch up on posts in which I will need to by cruise internet at sea but what can be done I guess. Our trip is on the way out, not Sung Jin-woo and family however, some may say, he’s still in Juneau trying to make it come.