– Oolong Owl’s Alaska Cruise Part 1! –
Day 7 Whittier and Anchorage
Our cruise finished in Whittier. Before I left the ship I had my last cruise meals – first the first breakfast, breakfast buffet. I like getting a cup of tea at 6am before the breakfast crowd. I had to pack my luggage the night before, in which I packed my tea tumblers so I didn’t have anything to steep my last package of tea with. I made due steeping a TGY oolong with this insane method –
1. One mug that I steeped the tea in.
2. I used a fork to hold the leaf back to pour into my drinking mug.
3. Two extra mugs full of water. This was so I wouldn’t have to get up that often to fetch more hot water.
4. One mug to put my rinse in.
5. The final mug for a Tea Owl to sit in.
After first breakfast, I had my second breakfast a few hours later. If you Princess Cruise, be sure to get this one: James Beard French Toast. It is french toast that is crusted with fine corn flakes – a texture sensation!
I got off the cruise ship at Whittier. I had a tour bus to catch that’ll drive us to Anchorage.
To my surprise, and I thought I heard of Whittier before but I didn’t make the connection until I saw the tunnel! Months ago I watched this video about Whittier and thought it was impressive. Right away I remembered the video and I wished I could of run around Whittier to take a look around. The town and tunnel is very interesting.
The drive from Whittier to Anchorage was very nice. Beautiful colour contrasts, odd looking dead forests that were killed by flooding salt water in that big 1964 earthquake, and a stretch of highway that ran along the water. I’d love to do the drive again so I could make stops to take photos, maybe catch some fish.
I saw a number of beluga whales swimming along side the road, with a good number of bald eagles chilling out in the trees.
I had until dinner time in Anchorage. I stayed mostly downtown, I ventured into the mall, ate Reindeer quesadillas, and then went into the farmers market. It was great our bus tour guide mentioned the farmers market as it was a fun spot filled with local artists. The market had lots of knife makers, carving, quilting, smoked salmon, and paintings. It was the first time we were at a place not filled with tourists.
The biggest win was a shop I found downtown – The Kobuk.
OMG THIS SHOP! While in Juneau and Skagway I saw a few shops carrying Kobuk blends, but the main Kobuk shop had them all! They have their own hand blended teas sold loose, packaged Kobuk teas, as well as other Alaska teas.
They also had a great selection of tea ware, mostly cups and English tea sets.
Besides tea ware they carried some candy, jelly, soaps, books, handmade knits, quilts, ornaments and stuff toys. There was a handsome Moose I was tempted to buy but didn’t.
After downtown Anchorage, I was trapped at Anchorage Airport for 5 hours. I discovered another Kobuk, this one attached to a nice book store.
This Kobuk had loose teas and much of their own tea blends, along with a few tea wares and lots of candy. I killed a lot of time here, while I procrastinated on buying an airport priced halibut burger for dinner.
Haul time!
I came home to California with an awful cold turned sinus nightmare, so I wasn’t able to enjoy all the teas I purchased until very recently.
Tea!
I bought the Alaska Wild Tea line through 3 different shops. Each had one or two different sets, but not the entire line up. Some of these seem your usual tea blends but with Alaska theme names…
Other sets have Alaska native herbs in it. Just what I was looking for -Fireweed tea! Fireweed grows native there and has a honey like taste.
I picked up one of Kobuk’s blends. They had a lot of really neat ones but this Winter berry tea sounded great. I drank a cup yesterday and it was quite nice.
This was a purchase at Kobuk – Alaska Botanicals Herbs & Teas. I was buying so much tea already and many came in such big tins. There were tea bag samplers, but they weren’t that good of a deal and if I can get it loose leaf I will always opt for that. That said, I bought the ones I thought I would like best. When I got home I regretted not buying the entire line. I drank the Alaska Breakfast blend and it is unique and delicious!
Here is the ingredients list for the teas I bought:
Alaska Breakfast Blend – Black tea, Bergamot, Organic Rugosa Rose Petals, Wild Alaskan Goldenrod, Chicory, Wild Picked Fireweed.
Aurora Borealis Blend – Alaska’s Wild Rose, Elder Flower, Clover Blossoms, Rose Hips, Peppermint, Lemon Grass, Orange Peel, Spearmint, Organic Rugosa Rose Petals, Wild Picked Rose Leaves, Wild Picked Fireweed, Stevia.
Here is the rest of the line that I didn’t purchase:
Seldovia Bay Blueberry Tea – Blueberry (90%), Lavender, Lemon Thyme, Orange Zest, Chicory, Stevia, Red Leaf Clover, Wild Picked Fireweed, Stevia, Organic Nettleseed and Leaf.
Yukon Yarrow Tea – Chamomile, Alder Bud, Wintergreen, Orange Zest, Yarrow Blossom, Nettle, Chicory, Wild Picked Fireweed.
I’m going to try and track down tins of Seldovia and Yukon, wish me luck!
Finally for tea hauls – Russian Samovar Tea. This stuff was EVERYWHERE. I had a tours that fed Samovar tea as part of the complimentary snack. Shops had Samovar tea for sample. Many Alaska tea sellers had a Russian tea. Most of the Russian shops carried it.
I steeped two cups of this Russian Samovar tea already – maybe it was pro-tea owl brewing or better steeping conditions, but mine tasted massively better than any I sampled in Alaska.
If you love chai or orange spice teas, Russian Samovar tea blend is a must try. This tea is STRONG and spicy. The taste is thick, punch your face clove, cinnamon and citrus, all over a malty black base. It’s not that dry or bitter as the blend flavoring is crazy potent that it’s sweet. I purchased this from a Russian shop and the shop clerk triple ziplock bagged wrapped it. I had to separate this tea away from my other tea in my luggage as it was stinking up everything.
Owl things!
I thought I would find a lot more owl things in Alaska. If you like stuff with wolves, puffins, bears and various types of whales you will find a mind-boggling amount of it in Alaska. Owls, not that much despite Alaska having a number of native owls. However, I did find some cute owls things –
They grey owl is really fluffy and sleepy looking. I got him in Juneau at an artisan shop that sold lots of hand made goods. The little brown owl and the snowy I got at 40% off in Juneau (yay for end of season sales!). The snowy owl is a puppet and his special power is he can spin his head around violently like he’s in a horror movie. Not shown, but I also got an orca and octopus stuff toy.
Owl purses! OWL MY STUFF! Right after I got that bag I used it on the cruise ship to carry all my tea tumblers and knitting instead of my camera bag.
I also got an octopus and owl native art, but I can’t find it at the moment. When I find it, I’ll post it here or my Instagram account.
At the Farmer’s Market in Anchorage I got this cool owl figure which is hand carved out of horn. A very handsome owl!
Cookbooks!
Tea-Hating Husband and I collect cookbooks and do a lot of home cooking. We found some neat Alaska cookbooks.
(Amazon affiliate links. To my surprise these are available on Amazon!)
Tutka Bay Lodge Cookbook – this one is quite chefy and recipes from a fancy cabin getaway that you can only get to by boat.
The other two cookbooks are something. The cookbooks are for the locals and First Nations of the area. There is a lot of recipes you will not find ingredients for if you like outside Alaska, but learning and entertainment value is high. If you ever have a slab of polar bear, porcupine, whale, walrus, puffin, bear, and beaver you want to cook you’ll want these cookbooks. No part of the animal is wasted, if you catch my drift. Interestingly, there are tea recipes in there!
Qaqamiigux – This book has lots of pictures and plenty of information on the culture of the people of the islands of Alaska, inspiring to get their people to eat off the land again like the old days. Among the seal recipes, this had information about Russian tea and how it became the culture of the First Nations there. There was also this tea recipe. WUT.
If any of you make it, let me know. I might try making a few tea recipes in these cookbooks.
Cooking Alaskan – This cookbook is the more rustic of the two and has the most obscure of recipes. You know, in case you caught a lynx in your backyard, you will be prepared to cook it. There is a huge section of gathering wild plants to eat as well. This one also had a number of Russian tea recipes like Qaqamiigux, but also a nice section on gathering wild herbs, a listing of herbs to use and blends with them. A passage from the book:
Crafts!
I found a really nice quilt and yarn shop in both Juneau and Skagway. All the fabrics were so gorgeous with beautiful batiks and wilderness prints. I resisted buying everything owl fabrics – there was a lot. I don’t quilt… yet.
The yarn is amazing too! I purchased hand spun and locally dyed yarn. I refused to shell on the $100 Quivit yarn though, despite how awesome a fuzzy Quivit/Muskox Tea Owl would be. By the way, along with my Oolong Owl Instagram account, I have another Instagram account – Awkward Soul Designs – which is where I post all my crafty projects.
Alaska was a neat place – great scenic views, lots of wild life, local artist made goods, excellent seafood, and unlimited amounts of ulu knives. I’m happy to of gone, though it was really cold and quite busy. Alaska is a very popular cruise route, so expect crowds of 4+ max capacity cruise ships at each port. I saw much more tea culture in Alaska that Hawaii, but only flavored blend teas.
Phew, two long blog posts. I hope you tea readers enjoyed reading them!
