Pursuits: Uncruising to Alaska: Short on Frills, Long on Thrills

Written By Unknown on Rabu, 21 Agustus 2013 | 17.35

Matthew Ryan Williams for The New York Times

Some of the accommodations on board the Columbia, one of the boats in Alaska's Marine Highway System.

The thrum of the engines churning north through the Inside Passage to Alaska sounded soothing enough, rumbling up from below somewhere around 3 a.m. Outside, I knew, the dense forests and rocky islands of British Columbia would already be visible from the rail in the early dawn of northern summer. But the words that came to mind as I lay in my tent, trying to get back to sleep, were these: I am going to need more duct tape.

My two-man pack tent, taped down to the steel rear outdoor deck of the Motor Vessel Columbia — side by side with my co-campers on the Alaska Marine Highway's ferry run from Bellingham, Wash., to Juneau, Alaska — had seemed well anchored when I'd gone to bed. In the immediate and casual camaraderie of deck campers, those with tape shared with those unprepared (I'd brought one tiny roll, quickly used up). But ferocious winds struck during our first night aboard, and now one aluminum-post corner of my tent frame had come loose and was banging me in the head and clunking loudly on the deck with each powerful gust.

A cruise to Alaska with any of a number of competing luxury liner companies can be cushy and plush, a floating smorgasbord of sunset cocktails, plank salmon, jaw-dropping vistas, glaciers and wildlife.

An "uncruise," as I came to call my three-night journey on the ferry, run by the State of Alaska's Marine Highway System, offered some of those same charms, especially the Pacific Northwest scenery — gorgeous from a deck chair, however you go. But a continually surprising basket of differences came with my passage as well. Robert Frost suggested the road less traveled; uncruising to Alaska is the marine counterpart.

"This is the highlight, if I live to tell the tale," said Francine Verzi, 40, laughing as she and her husband, Tony, 47, put up their green cabin tent before the ferry left the dock. The tent was big enough for six: the two of them and their four children, ages 6 to 13. The Verzis, from Thiells, N.Y., in Rockland County, had been on the road for three weeks by the time they boarded the Columbia, tent camping their way west, and now north.

Their plan, in leaving home, was to have no plan at all except to find sights unseen. Booking a passage in a tent, on a ship, fit right in. "Our families think we're crazy," Ms. Verzi said. "We're going by the seat of our pants."

Uncruising is not for everyone: most traditional cruise ships have elaborate exercise areas, for example, and often a running track. On the Columbia, the crackly loudspeaker voice from the purser's office was stern and official-sounding in telling a jogger to stop his exercise regimen on the boat deck. "There is no running on the ship," she said. The same stentorian tone was echoed in the snack bar, where a curt, handwritten sign read: "No Decaf." Aboard the Columbia, you could have your coffee Alaskan strong, or not at all.

Reservations are made on an Alaska State government Web site, dot.state.ak.us/amhs. But once you have a reservation and a ticket, the camping and all the other spaces that people park themselves are first come first served.

The biggest difference of all is that not everyone gets an actual bed, or wants one. On a ship with a capacity of 600 people — about 400 were aboard on my mid-July trip — there were berths for only about 300, with most of those inside four-bed staterooms. That fact creates the crucial dynamic of everything on board — all revolving around the question of where to sleep and, by extension, which of the ship's subcultures to join.

Some uncruisers stake out the front observation lounges, rolling out sleeping bags or cots between the rows of seats by night, keeping the tables as base camps by day for cards, reading and meals they brought from home or bought on board. Others claim the reclining deck chairs, which, over the course of several days, can become entwined neighborhoods of books, guitars and backpacks. Others sleep in the movie theater.

I threw in my lot with the tenters.


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