Alaska & the Marine Highway.

*Mallee Boy* · 07-21-2008, 10:00 PM

This one is a year or two away, but it never hurts to start the planning well in advance.

Does anyone have any experience with the "Marine Highway"? Ideally what I would like to do is sail from either Bellingham or Vancouver up through the Inside Passage and then back down to Prince Rupert and depart there.( I have a cousin in Terrace,thus the Prince Rupert jump off, and would catch the train back to Sakatchewan to catch up with an old friend....hopefully this time the ferry wont sink and the VIA Rail will put fuel in their train

).

How far North do you have to go? Is Juneau far enough? Thinking Mid September.

As for lenses, I would imagine wide (say 14mm) and tele (say 135-400) are going to be in for a lot of use, and that two bodies would be the go.

Very interested to hear from anyone who has done this trip.

Many Thanks
Grant

*Canada_Rockies* · 07-21-2008, 11:19 PM

My wife and I did an Alaska/Inside passage cruise on the Star Princess for our 25th wedding anniversary. (43rd is this week). It was wonderful. I used my M 400 (the one I still have) and have a very grainy shot of a humpback whale jumping taken off the fantail in pouring rain. Lousy picture but IT'S MY WHALE SHOT!. <G> The rest of the trip used the M 28/3.5 mostly with some K 55/1.8 use. I never did use the A 70-210.

So, to answer the specific question, the 14 is good (a bit wider than the 28, but usable). The 135-400 on digital will work even better than the M 400 because it is a zoom. I understand the 135-400 is quite a bit better than the 170-500 I bought and resold at a loss, keeping the M 400 for IQ reasons.

You might want to drop a 35 in there for the normal shot range. Given a super budget, the new 35 macro would be perfect.

Whatever you do or do not take, you will love the trip, rain or shine. We did.