A Visit With an Old Friend

It’s always a very pleasant experience to visit the waterfront and watch the commercial shipping come and go, and I’ve enjoyed doing this in many different places.  On a recent vacation in Alaska, I spent many happy hours on the Coastal Trail in Anchorage.  Stomping through the snow and gazing upon the placid but cold water of the Cook Inlet, I had the pleasure of seeing several vessels, both underway and anchored.  The star of the show, however, made her appearance just before I was due to return home.  This was a special ship, one my family and I had sailed on fourteen years earlier.

But let us begin at the beginning.  I arrived in Anchorage on Wednesday, April 15, 2026.  The next morning I made my way to the waterfront, about twenty minutes’ walk from my sons’ and granddaughters’ house.  While they were busy in school and at work, I found this tug and barge reposing on the anchoring ground just past the snow-covered tidal flats:

This is a popular spot, with vessels anchored here frequently.  On the following Monday, April 20, I found another tug and barge combination reposing there.  By this time, though, milder temperatures had eliminated some of the snow:

In the early morning of Saturday, May 2, yet another tug and barge rested at anchor there, while to the left, the tug One Cure pushed a loaded cargo barge ahead, bound for Valdez[1]:

Half an hour later, the One Cure and her barge were gradually fading into the mist as they proceeded seaward:

With some of the family joining me in the late afternoon of Tuesday, May 5, my son Steven took this profile view of the freighter North Star departing Anchorage:

A few minutes later, he caught the North Star farther along the channel with Mount Susitna in the background:

Finally, the big day arrived.  In the cold early morning of Friday, May 8, the cruise ship Nieuw Amsterdam of the Holland America Line came into port.  We had made a Caribbean voyage aboard this grand vessel in February of 2012, and we’ve had very happy memories of this occasion ever since.  Ten years after our voyage, Steven and the granddaughters and I had the pleasure of seeing her moored in Whittier, Alaska, one Sunday afternoon on May 15, 2022.  Today’s arrival in Anchorage would thus be our third rendezvous with this great ship.  And so, shortly after 6:00am, she came into view as she rounded Point Woronzof by the Anchorage International Airport:

Several minutes later, I caught a lucky shot of the Nieuw Amsterdam with an Alaska Airlines 737 passing overhead and coming into port as well:

After a few more minutes, the Nieuw Amsterdam aligned herself with Mount Susitna:

Soon she came abeam of me, and I caught a profile view;

As the Nieuw Amsterdam sailed farther up the channel, I hustled along the Coastal Trail to a new vantage point.  As I hurried along, I caught another lucky shot of the ship framed by the forest:

Finally, the great lady came alongside the wharf just north of the downtown area, right on time for her scheduled 7:00am arrival:

Twelve hours later, we went on a family outing to the docks and Steven found the Nieuw Amsterdam moored in an industrial neighborhood backed by mountains, a somewhat incongruous setting:

Late on Saturday afternoon, May 9, the Nieuw Amsterdam set sail and departed from Anchorage.  Watching from Point Woronzof, I took this port bow view as she approached us:

A few minutes later, with the ship at her closest point of approach to us, Steven caught this profile view of her:

He also recorded my granddaughter Miss Katie watching in rapt attention as the great ship sailed in front of her:

She did not remain in front of us very long, however, as this port quarter view from just a few minutes later can attest:

Finally, with the Nieuw Amsterdam fading into the distance, it was time to bid her a fond farewell with wishes for a fair wind and a following sea:

Just as the Nieuw Amsterdam’s two-day visit to Anchorage went by too quickly, so did my three-and-a-half week vacation there also pass much too quickly.  It was a precious time.  My purpose in going to Anchorage had been to visit family; visiting the waterfront and watching the merchant fleet came as an added bonus.  While I am thankful for this bonus, I appreciate my children and grandchildren much more deeply.  They are truly “an heritage of the Lord” (Ps. 127:3), and any time spent with them is precious, much more so than the time spent watching a ship arrive and depart.  Indeed, the Nieuw Amsterdam is special to the family only because of the voyage we made aboard her together fourteen years ago.  Without this family connection, she would be just another cruise ship.   

I will leave the closing thought to Steven.  When I was blissfully unaware of what he was doing, he took this photograph of a tired, old, and indigent merchant seaman wandering aimlessly along the water’s edge with the Nieuw Amsterdam in the background.  For some of us, no matter how long it’s been since we went to sea, we just can’t stay away from it.  Now we even drag our families along with us to the waterfront!

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[1] Information from marinetraffic.com.

Commuting to Alaska

With two of my grandchildren resident in Alaska, I must endure an uncomfortable imprisonment in the middle seat of an airplane for seemingly endless hours in order to visit them.  Actually, two middle seats aboard two airplanes, first from Boston to Seattle, and then from Seattle to Anchorage.  Miss Patty occupies the window seat; a stranger sits by the aisle.  Thus confined through the long and dark night, I sleep intermittently and occasionally study the on-screen navigational map.  Despite the discomfort, I realize what a blessing it is to be able to travel so far so quickly.  More importantly, I know that the reasons for this travel, our granddaughters Miss Katie and Miss Abby, are themselves the most sublime and supernal of all blessings.  It is always an honor to visit with them.

This point became all the more clear in church one Sunday morning.  As the speaker held forth on the importance of family, the two girls took turns climbing on laps, alternating between me and their Oma.  Their sweet innocence, unfeigned affection, and complete trust spoke volumes, “for of such is the kingdom of God” (Mark 10:14).

Our visits to the Alaskan grandchildren often involved opportunities to visit the Alaskan coastline as well.  The majestic beauty of Nature showed forth in a grand confluence of geology and oceanography as the snow-capped Chugach and Kenai Mountains intermingled with cold North Pacific waterways.  Far-flung seaport villages dotted this sparsely settled coast.  Two of them, Seward and Whittier, lay near enough to Anchorage to make day trips feasible.

On Monday, October 4, 2021, then, we drove to Seward on the Kenai Peninsula and visited the Alaska Sea Life Center.  This marvelous facility consisted of an aquarium, an aviary, a museum, and a research laboratory.  Birds, fish, and marine mammals abounded.  One sea lion in particular took a liking to Miss Katie and Miss Abby and put on an impromptu demonstration of diving, jumping, splashing, and making faces at them through the glass wall of the tank.  Naturally, the two girls loved the attention.

The back porch of the Sea Life Center overlooked Resurrection Bay.  This view was magnificent with the snow-capped Kenai Mountains nearly surrounding an expansive and placid fjord of Pacific seawater.  Local lore held that Captain James Cook of the Royal Navy discovered Resurrection Bay on Easter Sunday and named it in honor of the occasion.  The historical record indicated otherwise, however. This showed that it was actually named by Alexander Baranov, a Russian colonist and the first governor of Russian America.  His ship took refuge in the bay during a severe North Pacific storm and then emerged in calm weather on Easter Sunday.[1]  He also founded the port of Voskresenskii, which was later renamed Seward, on the bay’s western shore in 1793.[2]

The discrepancies between fact and folklore notwithstanding, our visit to the Alaska Sea Life Center and Resurrection Bay was a fascinating and unforgettable experience filled with breathtaking natural beauty evocative of “the works of the Lord, and his wonders in the deep” (Ps. 107:24).

On Sunday afternoon, May 15, 2022, we drove to Whittier and visited the commercial shipping docks.  Two grand vessels were in port that day, the cruise ship Nieuw Amsterdam of the Holland America Line, and the ferry Aurora of the Alaska Marine Highway.  Both of these ships were part of our family history, and it was good to see them again.  Our family, then lacking grandchildren, had sailed aboard the Nieuw Amsterdam in the Caribbean in February of 2012, and I had seen the Aurora at her dock in Whittier on my first visit to Alaska in October of 2015.

Whittier stood on the south side of the Passage Canal, which was not a canal at all but an alcove adjoining the larger Prince William Sound.  Captain James Cook discovered this body of water in 1778, and it was subsequently named after the third son of King George III.[3]  In time, Whittier developed into a busy commercial, military, and fishing port with highway and railroad links to Anchorage.  The Nieuw Amsterdam docked there so passengers could make a convenient connection to the Alaska Railroad.  The Aurora docked there to load and discharge passengers and their private automobiles.  Surrounding both ships was a pristine oblong fjord nearly encapsulated by tall and jagged snow-covered mountains.  It was truly a view of the majesty of Creation, one that “let the beauty of the Lord be upon us” (Ps. 90:17).

The two granddaughters watched in rapt attention as the diminutive but elegant Aurora made her approach.  She passed directly in front of us as she turned and then backed down to her dock.  After the stern ramp was lowered the traffic started off the ship, and this, too, held the girls’ attention.  With her business concluded after only half an hour in port, the Aurora took in her mooring lines and got underway again.

The Nieuw Amsterdam, by comparison, was much larger and more stationary.  She would sail late in the evening, long after our return to Anchorage.  Meanwhile, she dominated the waterfront with her immense size and graceful lines, and yet she was dwarfed by the surrounding mountains that towered over her.  We found a small floating dock and attached gangway near her bow to be the best vantage point for viewing, photographing, and reminiscing.

On Thursday, May 19, 2022, I set out alone and on foot from the house during the granddaughters’ naptime.  Fifteen minutes of walking brought me away from the activity of the city to a pedestrian and bicycle trail paralleling the Cook Inlet.  This stretch of water extended from the open Pacific northeastward to the Anchorage International Airport and thence to downtown Anchorage.  The trail connected these two areas, covering a distance of several miles.  Scenic lookout spots, where one could sit quietly and imbibe the view, dotted the path.

My favorite of these lookout spots gave me unobstructed views in several directions.  To the northeast stood the modern skyscrapers of downtown with the Chugach Mountains behind them.  To the northwest and across the inlet from the city the Panamanian cargo ship Bunun Wisdom of the Wisdom Line[4] lay anchored near the opposite shore.  To southwest the airport occupied a peninsula from which every ten minutes or so an airplane took off into the northerly breeze.  Surprisingly, the distant roar of the jet engines did not seem intrusive, nor did the occasional sounds of locomotive horns from the freight trains on the nearby railroad tracks.  More quietly, though, spread out directly in front of me were the extensive low tide mud flats of the Cook Inlet backed by a much larger expanse of blue water.  It was a truly magnificent vista.  I could have stayed there all afternoon, but the granddaughters’ nap time would not last that long!

Of course, these granddaughters, along with our sons and daughters-in-law, were the reasons why Miss Patty and I had traveled to Alaska in the first place.  All the sightseeing was a nice bonus and an uplifting spiritual experience.  The family, however, was paramount.  With this family we had wonderful vacations, times that went by much too quickly, but also times that reminded us of how fortunate we were to have both children and grandchildren, as well as good children-in-law.

Two great spiritual events took place during these family reunions.  The first was Miss Katie’s baby blessing on Sunday, March 4, 2018.  Following the family tradition, she wore the christening gown which her great-great-grandparents, Robert Burns and Julia Murphy, had purchased in 1949 for their first grandson, and which has now been used by three generations of our family.

The second, and the true spiritual summit of our visits, took place in the evening of Wednesday, October 6, 2021, in the Anchorage Temple.  Miss Patty and I gathered in the sealing room with our two sons and daughters-in-law and carried out the requisite sealings for my deceased parents.  First they were sealed to their parents, then to each other, and finally to me.  Afterwards, we retired to the celestial room for an interval of quiet contemplation before leaving.

While one need not fly to Alaska in order to enjoy a happy family gathering and a meaningful religious experience, the investment of time, effort, and discomfort in traveling makes the trek seem like a pilgrimage, and thus it enhances the intensity of the occasion.  Such were my thoughts during my confinement in the awkward middle seats of the airplanes on the long nocturnal flights home.  Now, I look forward to going back and doing it all again!

Next, let’s look at some pictures:

At the Alaska Sea Life Center in Seward, a sea lion meets one of our granddaughters on Tuesday, October, 4, 2021.

 

 

 

 

 

A view of Resurrection Bay from the rear balcony of the Sea Life Center on the same day.

The ferry Aurora of the Alaska Marine Highway arrives in Whittier on Sunday, May 15, 2022.

Same day; same ship.  The Aurora discharges passengers and their vehicles at the dock in Whittier.

Same day; different ship.  The Nieuw Amsterdam reposes quietly at the main commercial dock in Whittier.  She is a large vessel, but the mountains easily outsize her.

 

A view of the Cook Inlet in Anchorage on Thursday, May 19, 2022, with the anchored cargo ship Bunun Wisdom.

"And the light shineth in darkness" (John 1:5).  The steeple of the Anchorage Temple on Wednesday, October 6, 2021, following the completion of my parents' sealing ordinances.

Some lights shine just as well in the daytime.  The steeple of the meetinghouse of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints on West 40th Avenue in Anchorage, where my sons and their families attend church, on Sunday, May 15, 2022.

Neighbors.  Across the street stands Our Lady of Guadalupe Cathedral.  Built in the Spanish Mission Revival style, the cathedral has twin belfries, each topped with a Mediterranean-style red tile roof surmounted by a Latin cross.  A traditional symbol of Christianity, the cross reminds us of the brutality and suffering involved in the Atonement, a point we should always remember and appreciate.

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[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resurrection_Bay. 

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Andreyevich_Baranov.

[3] https://wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_William_Sound.

[4] Information from marinetraffic.com.

A Broader Canvas

Since childhood, I’ve collected pictures of ships.  Mostly postcards, these portraits were easily affordable and portable during travels.  The collection started with the passenger liners on which my grandparents sailed, and then continued with whatever seemed relevant to the family or historically noteworthy.  The result is an eclectic assortment, a little of this and a little of that, with a little from here and a little from there.

Each image has its own story, and in several instances, its own connection to our family.  With no further ado, then, let me present a dozen or so of what I think are the best and most interesting photographs:

The place where it all started.  An aerial view of the passenger piers on the West Side of Manhattan.  Shown at left are three Cunard ships, including the Queen Elizabeth in the center.  At right are the America of United States Lines and one of the twins Constitution and Independence of American Export Lines.  Note the overhanging fantail tern on the American Export ship.  This is a long gone aspect of the shipbuilder's art, a lovely finishing touch on a very attractive vessel.

The Constitution and the Independence were my grandparents' favorite ships.  They made unhurried voyages between New York and several Mediterranean ports, and while certainly first class operations, they did not engage in the movie star sophistication of some of the more famous liners.  This is my favorite portrait of the Constitution, one of a half-dozen that my grandparents collected.  She appears to be at anchor, probably off a Mediterranean port, judging by the shadows cast by a high summer sun.

  

Twice my grandparents sailed aboard the Cristoforo Colombo of the Italian Line in the late 1950s.  They mailed this portrait of the ship home from Italy following a voyage from New York to Napoli in October of 1959.

When the Cristoforo Colombo arrived in Napoli, she docked here at the Stazione Maritima.  Monte Vesuvio looms in the background across the bay.  The American Export ships also docked here.  Note the multi-colored twin stacks of either the Constitution or the Independence rising above the building.  Many years after my grandparents' travels, the Rigel docked here during my time aboard here in 1979.  More recently, the Nieuw Amsterdam, on which my oldest son got married, has docked here while on her summer cruises.

During my transatlantic travels of the 1970s, I happened across this souvenir log of the United States, which I gave to my grandfather.  He and my grandmother had made one voyage on this ship in 1955, and I thought he would find this item interesting.  He did.  He told me, however, that the United States went too fast--New York to England in three days--and he preferred a slower, longer, and more leisurely crossing.  The voyage data on the back of this card brag about speed, speed, and speed.  I've come to agree with my grandfather.  The ships I later sailed on typically took ten days to reach Europe.

The troop transport Upshur is about to sail under the Golden Gate Bridge, most likely after departing from the Military Ocean Terminal in Oakland, California.  For years this vessel carried American military personnel, their families, and their belongings between the West Coast and the Far East.  She also carried South Korean troops during the Korean War.  Long afterwards, as the school ship State of Maine, notices stenciled in Korean remained on the bulkheads in the troop compartments.  I made two summer voyages on this ship as a teenager in the mid 1970s.  I also sailed under the Golden Gate Bridge several times, not on the State of Maine, but while aboard the Mercury and the Comet in the 1980s.

The ferry R. S. Sterling of the Texas Highway Department.  I rode this ferry on Monday, May 30, 1977, during the time of my apprenticeship aboard the tanker New Jersey Sun.  While she was drydocked at the Todd Shipyard in Galveston, I wandered around town on Memorial Day and found entertainment in free ferry rides between Galveston and Port Bolivar, Texas.

The aircraft carrier Lexington moored in her home port of Pensacola, Florida.  On another side trip during my time aboard the New Jersey Sun, my brother and I took a tour of this ship on Saturday, May 21, 1977.  Years earlier, as a student pilot, he had landed on and taken off from the Lexington at sea in the Gulf of Mexico.  I remember him remarking that the flight deck seemed pretty small.

A winter view of the first Queen Elizabeth at the Ocean Terminal in Southampton, England.  While such snow is unusual in southern England, the Queen Elizabeth and her sister the Queen Mary called at this spot regularly for decades.  Years after they reached the end of their careers, the oceanographic survey ship Wilkes docked at this same berth several times with me on board in the winter of 1980 and 1981.

Cunard's new flagship Queen Elizabeth 2 leaves Southampton for the first time in 1967.  The QE2 and I have followed each other along the American East Coast.  I saw her a few times in Fort Lauderdale when I was posted on the Bartlett and the two ships tied up across the pier from each other.  Years later, I took the children to see the Queen several times in New York and once in Portland, Maine.

An aerial view of the passenger ship piers in San Juan, Puerto Rico, in the 1970s.  I acquired this postcard in Roosevelt Roads, Puerto Rico, in early November of 1979 when I was sailing aboard the General Hoyt S. Vandenburg.  I wanted very much to visit San Juan and see the old colonial city, but that would have to wait a few years.

The nearly identical twin sisters Caribou and Joseph and Clara Smallwood of Marine Atlantic.  These were two of the four vessels that connected North Sydney, Nova Scotia, with Argentia and Port-aux-Basques, Newfoundland.  We sailed aboard the Joseph and Clara Smallwood from North Sydney to Argentia on Monday, June 21, 2004.  At the time, it was the longest voyage the children had made--fourteen hours--and they loved every minute of it.  I did, too.  I remember that it felt absolutely wonderful to sail out of sight of land and onto the open Atlantic again!

The cruise ship Nieuw Amsterdam of the Holland-America Line appears in a computer-generated image.  While the line of foam alongside the ship would lead us to believe she is underway and making way through the water, there is no bow wave, no side wave, no stern wave, and no wake.  There are also no passengers or crew out on deck.  My guess is that this is an artist's rendering made while the vessel was under construction in 2010.  Still it's a good likeness of a fine ship.  Our oldest son, James, was married aboard the Nieuw Amsterdam in Fort Lauderdale on Sunday afternoon, February 5, 2012.  Three days later, with the whole family aboard, the Nieuw Amsterdam docked at the cruise ship piers in San Juan.  A dream come true, I happily spent the day exploring this beautiful city.  In one further family history connection, my grandparents' final voyage was a winter cruise to the Caribbean in January and February of 1968.  Sailing one last time aboard the Constitution, they visited San Juan and docked at the same piers as the Nieuw Amsterdam.

Since my childhood, then, ships have been important means of transportation as well as the centerpieces at family gatherings on many occasions.  From the bon voyage celebrations at the West Side piers to the wedding aboard the Nieuw Amsterdam and numerous voyages in between, these vessels have have served us very well.  Now, even though most of these ships are long gone, they live on in the photographic arts and in the family archives, and they bring back many happy memories.  The family and the ships thus form a dual blessing, and we are expected to “receive it from the hand of the Lord, with a thankful heart” (D&C 62:7).  In looking back on these happy times aboard these great ships, how could anyone not feel thankful?