Here’s our list of new wildlife seen on the trip. We saw most of this on the excursions in Sitka and Ketchikan. Not as extensive as I might have hoped, but not bad for a week.

• Bald eagles
• Minke whales (I can’t hear that name without going full-on Clouseau: “…eez zat your minkey?”
• Sea otters
• Black tail deer
• Humpback whales
• Orcas
• King salmon

We really wanted to see some Alaskan bears, but talking with the locals they said we needed to stay overnight in one of the towns and hang out near the dumpsters after dark. So…scoring a bear sighting requires the same strategy as scoring drugs (or so I’m told). Didn’t see that coming.

Our final day included a leisurely disembark and a walkabout in downtown Seattle. We had scheduled a late afternoon flight home, not really knowing the logistics of leaving the ship and getting back to the airport. Doing it over, we’d fly home more like 1pm.

Even so we had a nice day, chilling out at a downtown hotel reading and writing, then  walking around the city center when we felt like it. With hotel lobby wifi it was productive and relaxing. Pro tip, if you have luggage in a large city and need to kill some time, just go to a major hotel, tip the bellman a little and you can store your bags until time to go to the airport.

Postscript – we arrived home around 930pm, tired, a few pounds heavier but with lots of great memories and experiences. I’d say that’s the whole point.