White Pass Railroad

Sometimes I am amazed at how much sign language I know. I think this is mostly influenced by outsiders - people who see that we are communicating, but don’t understand. I am amazed that I get through meetings and such - amazed that my clients understand me. It’s all very odd.

This morning I woke up at 6am and had breakfast on the Lido deck. I had planned to eat in the dining room but it wasn’t ready when I was. I went inside anyway and gave my dinner order to a supervisor, then left for my trip. We were docked in Haines, but our excursion left from Skagway, so we had to take a “fast ferry” across the water. It wasn’t too fast, though - it took us an hour even though the trip isn’t supposed to be more than 15 miles. (By the way, the reason we needed to dock in Haines was that the Skagway port was filled with the Serenade of the Seas, the Coral Princess, the Norwegian Star, and the Norwegian Spirit.) I saw all of my deaf clients on the ferry, but four of them got separated from me. Once we boarded the railcar, I went from car to car looking for them to no avail. So I only interpreted for six clients instead of ten. I feel bad that they missed out on the narration, but I’m an interpreter, not a babysitter! And anyway, they could have come looking for me!

The train ride was actually really cool. I took bunch of pictures, and some of them might even come out okay! We had really great weather; our bus driver (between the ferry and the train) said it was the nicest day Skagway had seen in three weeks! We passed a number of notable sights, for which I interpreted the narration - although most of the time it was goofy stories like gold-seeking gophers and gold lotion that would make gold stick to you if you rubbed it on your naked body and then rolled on the ground! And of course, the people who made the most money from the Alaskan gold rush were not the prospectors - but rather merchants who helped keep them supplied during their adventure.

The trip back down from the summit was only marginally less interesting than the way up. I managed to snap a picture of the Class VI rapids along the Skagway River, and as we pulled into the depot I finally saw some wildlife - a little squirrel. Apparently there are animals in the area, but for the most part the five trains running simultaneously scare them away from the tracks.

Back in Skagway proper (total tourist village) I only had half an hour to look around before I had to catch the bus back to the ferry. I managed to grab gifts for A and my mom. Now I’m actually on the ferry, and I am so tired.

Oh, by the way, there’s a fair bit of misogyny on this cruise. Apparently a deaf person complained that RSVP had hired straight interpreters, so I had to suffer the indignity of being asked by the terp coordinator “you guys are lesbians, right?” I have also gotten some weird looks from many other passengers, and I heard someone express outright disgust at Amy Armstrong’s song about pussy - which she does totally tongue in cheek anyway. So all the misogyny gets me down a bit, or at least annoyed.

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