Day 14

Sailing the Pacific to the ports of Ketchikan, AK; Wrangell, AK; and Petersburg, AK. 
To Somewhere Else in the Pacific, more specifically between Petersburg and Juneau.

"God is not a man, so He does not lie. He is not human, so He does not change His mind. Has He ever spoken and failed to act? Has He ever promised and not carried it through?" Numbers 23:19

Today, we swapped ships. We traded a 4-bunk room with our own bathroom with shower on the Columbia to a 2-bunk room without bath on the Malaspina.

View from the Room

Driving off the Columbia

Before Boarding the Malaspina

Car Deck

Cozy.

Almost Arriving at Wrangell, AK

Loving Life off the Ship

The Malaspina at night dock in Petersburg, AK

On the topic of this strange thing that is the military move: it is weird and difficult and not-normal. This one definitely gets the Most-Likely-To-Not-Loathe award though. (Somebody remind me I said that in about five days.) The things you do when you are told where to go and when are absurd and not relatable. Like cook bacon 8 hours before the property pick-up. Or decide to drive 5,000 miles because you just can. Like pretending to blog daily for others to follow when you are really doing it to pretend you are not leaving those people thousands of miles away and attempt to stay connected with each detail, each photo. Or leave Louisville at 1:30am just to “get down the road a little”. Or stroll your chiweenie around the Big City and die inside a little when she takes a bathroom break on Canal St or a sidewalk by the Ohio River or in a Safeway parking lot in downtown Denver or 7^th Ave in Seattle or the car deck of the Columbia or in front of the diner in Ketchikan. Or eat one bajillion peanut butter and honey sandwiches to not spend one bajillion dollars eating meals on an Alaskan Ferry. Or plan to possibly camp in Juneau and Canada in efforts to decrease spending / increase roadtrip legitimacy and by "camp" you mean using a hand-held battery-operated pump to inflate your queen-size blow-up mattress in a four-person tent.

You just make the most of opportunities and make the best of the obstacles.

God knows. He knows we need food and sleep and love and, on some days, adventurous spontaneity and, on others, stability and a shower and an actual bed. He knows we need rest for our bodies AND for our souls, and He is intent on providing every detail of what He already knows we need. He has orchestrated it, and He has planned it. He knows we need somewhere to live for the next three years. He knows, those first days in Anchorage, and apparently many before that, we will be homesick and exhausted in so very many ways. He knows all this today and is able to work for tomorrow’s good, today. I am in no way trying to imply that this trip is real hardship or anything short of one of the best decisions we may have made (again, reminders are welcome). But any move is still a struggle, and a military move is one that threatens sanity. We might be walking the line here, folks.