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July 28 Ketchikan Alaska

So I may be grateful that we camped out, but it literally rained all night long. And the sad news was that the sun wasn't coming out so we had to keep shaking out the rain fly repeatedly hoping for it to dry out. The good news is that it wasn't raining. The silver lining is that Isaak had so much fun playing with some kids from Smithers. They tromped around again all morning long. Isaak is brave. He saw kids running around and immediately went over to get involved in the game with no hesitation. They welcomed him instantly. I think it may have been Isaak's favorite campground because of how much fun he had. It made packing up wet stuff much easier. The rain fly was almost dry when we had to roll up the tent and get headed to Prince Rupert to check in for our ferry. We hoped to leave around 930-10am, but we didn't We wanted to go check out a preserve, but we plainly ran out of time. Prince Rupert is a cute little beachy port town. We did drive through downtown and had lunch at the Pita Pit. We had the kids say their goodbyes to Canada. Chloe and Zelly wore their Canadian t-shirts for the occasion. Everyone was excited to finally be on the boat headed toward Alaska. We had made it. Our car had made it. I couldn't believe we had made it camping all that time. I feel full of gratitude for the experiences we've had and the things that we have seen.

We were taking our car on the ferry so it took forever for us to get on the boat. We checked in and then we sat forever with the car waiting for it to load. The Alaska Marine Highway Ferry is definitely not a luxury cruise, but it's efficient and much cheaper. If we weren't taking the car the tickets were incredibly cheap and children under 5 are free. Everything about the system seems tired but adventurous.

So we spent the next seven hours aboard our ship. The kids didn't love being out in wind, but it wasn't raining so the views were beautiful. We spent a lot of time making a puzzle, playing in the play area, hanging in the cafeteria and watching a movie. None of us were used to sitting still and simply hanging out for hours since we've been on the go since we left. It took a bit to settle in, but still Chloe kept wanting to get off the boat. The highlight was probably watching Ketchikan appear in the horizon and seeing Jellyfish in the waters. Hundreds of Jellyfish both white and pink swimming in the ocean and silver fish jumping out of the water.

We arrived in Ketchikan about 20 minutes early. Getting on and off the ferry is incredibly easy and quick. We had a lovely reunion with Derek and Teana and then we were off to bed. They set up the babies room for us with beds galore.  I was so grateful for their welcome and it felt so good to see them. It was amazing to have a flushing toilet, a roof and not have to worry about bears, wolverines, moose or anything, but simply sleep.

We snagged these awesome chairs on the deck
It was fascinating to be in a big port 
Look at all those shipping crates. In Vancouver there's actually a movement to use the shipping containers to make houses. Pretty brilliant. I saw another company that was using the to make pools.




KETCHIKAN!!!! ALAS!!!!

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