We’re Abandoning This Life We’ve Led

 Yep, this is a multimodal trip.  Car, plane, ferry, truck.  But which boat are we traveling on? 

Yep, 3 floating hotels in port right now, clearly not those

The Stikine is the Inter-island ferry that you can take to get to Prince of Whales if your name is Laura and you don’t like to take a float plane.  

Thankfully NOT this vessel, it’s what you use to cross from Gravina Island where the airport is, to the city proper.  And it’s about 85 degrees inside, so I stayed outside to avoid swooning.  Does that make it the boat to somewhere (recalling a prior boondoggle called the Bridge to Nowhere)

That’s the queen of the fleet, the Matanuska, currently in lay up.  Something about rotten steel, says Karen.  So definitely not that one.  

If you guessed the MV Columbia, you would be correct.  A quick search of the Alaska Marine Highway System site tells me the following history and series of interesting facts:  It is the only marine route that is recognized as a National Scenic Byway and an All American Road.  Founded in 1948, it connects 30 communities and 3,500 miles of coastline.  Our mighty ship, the Columbia, is going into dry dock at the end of this season, and will get some sprucing up.  It’s been in service since 1974, is the largest vessel and was the fastest until 2004.   Taking the ferry north from Bellingham (I did this about 20 years ago), the route is the same as those fancy cruise ships.  You don’t get the shuffleboard on the Lido Deck and you don’t stop in Glacier Bay, but otherwise the scenery is the same, and so it’s called the Poor Man’s Cruise.  Indeed, in warmer months, the upper deck doesn’t just have recliners with people sleeping on them but also tents set up.  We have an actual state room.  Interpret from that what you will. 

The crew that load this vessel are masters of Tetris.  People load up with cars going to all the different stops and so you have to be able to figure out which ones need to go where to not have to download the whole boat to get the one at the back.  And that’s Nolan Hooker loading up a truck that will ride without a passenger for Sitka where the owner will come aboard and drive it off.  It’s a huge rig, and took a few back and forths to turn that corner.