[pompeyfan]

From the Anchorage Times.

A 19 year old British queen, the Arcadia, stemmed the tide in Knik Arm this morning, 14th July 1973, and became the first ship of her type to dock in Anchorage.

On board the luxury liner were two captains, Joe L Chapman and Tony Merrick: about 800 passengers; and a crew of about 600.

On shore as the ship docked at 9am were City Mayor George M Sullivan, Anchorage Chamber of Commerce Hostess Rose Golik and Miss Anchorage, Debbie Adams.

Two tugs, the David Foss and the Pacific Wind, strained and smoked for an hour to push the 719-foot liner, against the Port of Anchorage dock.

Miss Golik and Sullivan gave short welcoming speeches to passengers and presented them with walrus pins provided by the Anchorage Chamber of Commerce. The vessel leaves at 8pm today.

Anchorage is the second port of call in Alaska for the vessel on a cruise of the Pacific Rim. The ship called in Ketchikan on 11th July, and cruised Glacier Bay and crossed the Gulf of Alaska yesterday. The cruise began in Vancouver, B.C. several days ago.

According to Captain Chapman, this is the first time a P&O vessel has sailed this far north in the Pacific.

“He said there is another old ship, sold to the Japanese and lost in the Bering Sea, probably encased in a cake of ice. We do not intend to do the same”.

About 10pm yesterday two pilots from Homer boarded the ship in Kachemak Capt William Johnson and Capt William Tingley assisted the ships officers with passage up inlet and Knik Arm.

The two pilots normally handle foreign freight and tanker ships moving in and out of south central waters.

As the Homer pilot boarded, passengers were ending one of the more important parties, the captains cocktail party.

According to a purser, about two thirds of the group are USA citizens the other third a mixture of Canadians, New Zealanders, Australians and Orientals.

Some passengers like Annette and Harry Joyce and their two daughters are immigrating to New Zealand or Australia. The Joyce’s are from Ontario, came originally from Scotland and plan to settle for a while, at least in Australia.

There are about 100 children aboard this cruise, and unusual number for a mode of travel that usually appeals to the 50 to 70 age group, a purser explains.

Many passengers said they were enthralled with the mountains along Kachemak Bay and Cook Inlet. The moon rose above the Kenai Mountains and the moonlight reflected on the ship, lending a little bit of class to the silty, turbulent inlet waters.

From Anchorage the ship will travel through the Bering Sea along the Aleutian chain. The next scheduled stop on the seven week cruise will be Yokohama, Japan.

About 56 persons disembarked here, most will tour the state more extensively.

I joined her in June 1973 in San Francisco. The cruise actually began there, then LA, then Vancouver on July 9th. The cruise was called the Summertime Great Circle Pacific Cruise. Shore excursions began in Vancouver. The ship visited Los Angeles, Vancouver, Ketchikan, Anchorage(cruising in Glacier Bay before that), Yokohama, Kobe, Kagoshima, Hong Kong, Guam, Rabaul, Sydney, Noumea, Pago Pago, Suva, Papeete, Nuku Hiva, LA, and arriving back in San Francisco on 3rd September 1973 than back to Vancouver. I did a few Circle Pacific Cruises aboard Arcadia from the west coast as well as to the Caribbean via the Panama Canal. We did two of those over Christmas and New Year 1973/74. On the Circle Pacific Cruises, we always stopped off at Niuafo'ou Island, one of the outlying islands of the Kingdom of Tonga, also known as “Tin Can Island” because letters were posted in a sealed tin can thrown overboard. Two or three natives either swam or paddled out in rickety looking boats. There was no good anchorage, so we were quite a long way out. Once ashore, the mail was picked up by the next passing ship who took the letters to Nuku'alofa, the capital of Tonga for onward posting. It was a novelty that letters were posted on a Desert Island. They became collectors items taking many months to reach their destination. In this case, our letters were picked up by the Royal Viking Sky, known today as the cruise ship Boudicca of Fred Olsen Lines. We stopped at other ports on Circle Pacific Cruises including Bali, Singapore, Honiara and many others.

On the Summertime Great Circle Pacific Cruise, passengers had the chance to visit Thailand, Malaya, Singapore and Bali picking the ship up in Sydney or six days in New Zealand from Sydney picking the ship up in Suva.

More to come charting her first 21 years.