OT: Alaskan Vacation Photos

For those that are interested I just recently completed our photo albums from our recent Alaskan vacation July (July 27 to Aug 15). My wife Jean, 6 year old daughter Alana and I flew from Toronto to Vancouver where we spent 3 nights. We then boarded the Carnival Spirit for a one weak cruise through the inside passage of Alaska on our way to Whittier near Anchorage. We then spent another week visiting relatives in Anchorage. We hiked up to a glacier, road the white pass train to the summit in northern British Columbia, saw 2 jumping humpback whales right from our balcony on the cruise ship, caught 2 salmon, landed on a glacier with a ski plane next to Mount McKinley, north America’s tallest mountain, saw wild grizzly bears, moose and other wildlife, and did some white water rafting. This trip wouldn’t have been possible without prednisone. I took more than 3300 photos on this trip. You can check out the best ones in our new photo albums at:
 
http://www.laflammefamily.ca
 
Our photo albums are labeled with the location visited and numbered 1 to 10 in the order we visited each location. The best way to view each album is to click on the album thumbnail then click on “Slideshow” just above the upper left thumbnail. Feel free to leave a comment on any photo by clicking on the thumbnail and scrolling to the bottom of the photo. You will have to sign up for a free account to leave a comment. Enjoy our photo albums.

I finished my prednisone taper about a week ago and now I’m off it completely and my pre prednisone symptoms have fully returned.
 
Take care,

Paul,

I enjoyed your Alaskan travel stories and it's great to see the photos that went with them.  Thank you for sharing!  You have a beautiful family!

Sue

Wow, such lovely pictures Paul. Thanks for sharing. It's so neat to see all the wild animals and the free land they have to roam around. Glad you had a great time; and you have such a nice family.

Thanks everyone,

Sherry, the daytime temperatures were mostly in the mid 50’s to the high 60’s Fahrenheit. We had to wear light spring jackets most of the time. A few times when the sun came out I took off my jacket. The picture I think you are referring to with the glacier in the background was taken from the cruise ship. The last full day of the cruise was spent at sea cursing up College fiord. It is named that because most of the glaciers are named after American Colleges. The one in the picture is the Harvard Glacier, located at the end of the fiord and is the largest. It is about 1.5 miles wide and rises several hundred feet above the water. The ship just arrived near the glacier as we came out of the main dinning room. We briefly stepped out on the deck without our jackets to take a few pictures before we went back to our cabin. We then took more pictures from the balcony of our room before getting my jacket and going outside on the upper decks.

those pictures were amazing,the pictures of the scenery are unreal.What a place!!Would you mind if i copied one of those snow covered mountain pics to use as my screensaver? Sounds like you had a great time? 3300 pics!!! they must have took an age to download to your pc:):)
Pred really helped you through, great pics again Paul!!
Marty

Thanks Debbie, if you do decide to go on an Alaskan cruise I must warn you that we had much better weather than usual. It rained continuously for the 3 weeks before our cruise. We had no rain at all on the cruise and only a few hours of rain the week after when we were in Anchorage and surrounding area. When we were in Denali Park we were told that only 20% of visitors actually see any part of Mount McKinley and only 5% see the whole mountain. We were lucky and saw the whole mountain on both days we were there. Good luck if you do decide to go.

Dear Paul,
Many thanks for sharing the pictures of your holiday. The scenery was great. I was brought up hiking and climbing in the Scottish mountains and miss them so much since retiring to near Blackpool in England !! Going up north soon for an autumn break and really looking forward to it. I only have a few photos that I have submitted to Google Earth under "Kathcurt" --sorry I am not really wise about sending you the link !!
I love the outdoors and am hoping to travel to the Alps in 2010 for my 60th -- it was a childhood ambition of mine to go there , but I never got the opportunity to travel as I wanted. So your photos can transport me to other places. Thank You. Take care.
PS Predfoam enemas are the only form of steroid I can tolerate and only taken during the day as it causes restlessness. Bye for now !