San Francisco

Late yesterday we watched from our hotel room as our ship

sailed away without us. Oh well, soon we start planning for

our next cruise.

In the meantime, we are spending a few days in and around

San Francisco before we return home. Yesterday we rode the

cable car and today we took a hop on hop off bus around town.

We stopped at Golden Gate Park and went to a Japanese Tea

Garden. The California Academy of Science is there and it looked

like it would be very nice but somewhere you should spend a

few hours. I didn’t want to spend $30 each and be rushed. Maybe

we’ll have another opportunity.

We rode across and walked across the Golden Gate Bridge. The

walk was only about 40 minutes. I wanted to walk on the

“crooked street” but we never seemed to be at a good access

point.

Last Day, Boo Hoo

Packing day, how awful! It has been a wonderful trip.

 We have seen a lot of beautiful places from land, sea, and air.

The guest speakers we had throughout the trip definitely

did their job as “enrichment speakers.

First we had our maritime expert who told wonderful stories

about cruising through the years.

Then we had both a former NASA employee and a naturalist

who works with the Hawaiian volcanoes, and they gave very

Interesting presentations. (Two more today).

I won’t close this blog until after we get home because I

may remember things I want to add.

Moon over Pacific

I told you about the moon. The next night it was one of the most

beautiful moons I have ever seen. We got some pictures but they

did not capture the full beauty.

A Distant View

A Little Closer

Really Close

After Dark

In the Clouds

WHALES! WHALES! WHALES!

One of the few we captured on film

It was there

At a distance\

A Nice Picture (finally)

Almost caught it

YES!

See what I mean about trying to 

photograph around others

Pal Sunday Part 2, WHALES!

Our afternoon adventure was incredible! I have not had

an interest in whale watching until recently. We keep sailing

through areas that have lots of whales and I never see any.

I decided we would have to take a tour and hope we saw

some.

 Did we ever pick the right day and time. We saw whales

Whales, and more whales. It was fantastic. People were moving

all over the boat trying to see them.

Whales do not surface and hang around, so you have to focus

quickly. The boat is not steady. Sometimes it bounces really

bad. Therefore, it is difficult to get good pictures. But I promise

you everyone was ecstatic at the number of surfacings we saw.

The guide with us described what we were seeing.

We saw a mother and calf with her escort several times. We

saw two whales that seemed to be trying to make a claim on a

female. We saw tails surfacing, we saw flukes. And we just
saw lots of whales.

It was an incredible new experience. We couldn’t have asked

for a better day.

After dinner as I was walking outside, we saw a small whale near

the ship. It was so small I wondered if it were really a whale,

but was told it was a calf. It had a small tail compared to most we

had seen earlier.

Then to top the day off, a beautiful full moon.

It was a really wonderful Palm Sunday.

Maui Helicopter View and Beyond

Grand Princess from Helicopter

Maui Mountains and Valley

More Maui Mountains and Valley 

Foster and Linda after great helicopter ride 

World's Largest Banyan Tree?

And this is not the Complete Tree

Aerial Views of Molokai

Coastline

More Coastline 

And More Coastline

Mountains and Valley 

Reef 

Closeup of Reef