All aboard (well some aboard in our case)

 The view from my window today.

If I never see another bank queue with a millionty people in it it will be too soon. One thing that travelling alerts an Aussie to is just how populous the rest of the world is. In the last couple of days I have seen more people gathered together, intent on moving to another place, than I thought existed in the world let alone one country. 

This morning, after wrenching ourselves away from our Best buds, who are heading back home in a couple of days, we said thankyou to the Opus for that respite and embarked on the last leg of our journey - Alaska. 

Unlike Sydney which has two cruise ship terminals (we found this out the hard way) it seems that all the cruise ships line up and leave from the one terminal in Vancouver. The traffic getting to the terminal was horrendous and our Uber driver said ‘yep, always like this when cruise ships are in port.’ I think three ships were heading out today. 

In a feat of logistics second only to the moon landing terminal staff separated people from luggage and people from people according to their ship. Then the herding began through I think as many as 4 queues, each in different auditorium sized rooms. The security queue fortunately is not like airport security, the guy in front of me had a Swiss Army knife which the security guard examined ‘nice’ and handed back to the passenger (I took note in case I see him, so I can go the long way). In one of the airports yesterday I got the 3rd degree & my bag completely unpacked for an orange.

It was worth all the queues though bc look at this

We’ve unpacked and our bags are under the bed, that’s the rule for … cruising has begun!

We did some exploring, found the important places (library)

Had our staff meeting (apologies received from Wendy, Tony & Erin) while waving goodbye to Vancouver.

Enjoyed the scenery while waiting for the coast guard to pick up an ill passenger - how sad.

Tony! I played golf! I think mini (my first go, it was fun) will be all I can ever manage.

We caught a glimpse of the sunset which happened while we were feasting on lobster & crab cakes.

And felt like we were the only two people in the world, enjoying the tranquility on our deck as the day drew to a close.