This is an odd numbered year, so  we stayed in Haines this year for the Holidays with Holly’s folks.  We did take a little trip up to Whitehorse, which was pretty fun.  I neglected to make any reservations at any of the hotels, but it turns out that Whitehorse is not very crowded around Christmas time, at –21 degrees F, go figure.

We decided it would be best to drive during the daylight hours to reduce the amount of boredom and fidgetiness along the way. As you can see from the clip below, sometimes this doesn’t not ensure an interesting drive.

On the way home, we did see three elk and two moose. Here are the two moose.

When we travel, especially, Holly likes to dress the boys in matching clothes.  This is getting harder to do ever since Mark passed the size 5 rack.  Often boys clothes of a certain type can be found from size 1 up to 5 that vary only in size, so it used to be really easy to get matching clothes for them.

The main attraction at Whitehorse is the Games Center: CLICK HERE!! We like mostly for the pool and the playground area, but what we mostly saw the locals using it for was hockey.  There seemed to be an endless stream of skaters coming and going until late at night carrying all their skating gear and pads in large rolling bags.  Better them than me.

My favorite area is the family swimming area.  There’s a three story waterslide, a huge family wading pool, a 20 person hot tub, a steam room, and a sauna.  The swimming area is about 1/3 of the size of H2Oasis, I’d say. One of our favorite new features is the Subway food stand which is right outside the swimming area.

Sitka filmmaker Ellen Frankenstein, center, of Frankenstein Productions, greets fans after the Sitka premiere of her film "Eating Alaska" in October 2008

The Alaska Public Health Association (ALPHA) honored two programs with ties to the Sitka Local Foods Network during the Alaska Health Summit banquet on Dec. 9. Sitka filmmaker Ellen Frankenstein and Frankenstein Productions and the SouthEast Alaska Regional Health Consortium (SEARHC) Steps to a Healthier SE Alaska program both won the Alaska Community Service Award. According to ALPHA, the Alaska Community Service Award “recognizes an organization, business or group making a significant contribution to improving the health of Alaskans. It is ALPHA’s intent that nominees outside the public health tradition be considered for this award. A nominee does not need to be an ALPHA member.”

Frankenstein has produced several documentary films over the years, including “Eating Alaska,” target=”new” which focuses on how we choose the food we eat. Eating Alaska debuted in the fall of 2008, and Frankenstein has taken it to film festivals all over the state and country. Some of her other films include “No Loitering,” “Carved from the Heart,” “A Matter of Respect,” and “Miles from the Border.” She currently is working on a documentary film project with Haida weaver Dolores Churchill.

“As someone who fills in the occupation blank on forms with ‘filmmaker/artist,’ this award represents the fact that labels and lines don’t matter when it comes to social change and to making our lives healthier,” Frankenstein wrote from Austin, Texas, where she was attending a screening of Eating Alaska. “It not only validates my work, but represents your open-mindedness to the potential of working collaboratively and creatively with kids and adults, using art, media and storytelling to influence well-being and healthy communities.”

Frankenstein also sent this note to her e-mail group:

EATING ALASKA: ART AND HEALTH!
We just got the news the project has been awarded The Alaska Public Health Association’s 2009 Community Service Award for Health. In the process of making this film and in its use we’ve worked with nutritionists, health educators, medical and public health practitioners to add to the conversation about what we can do to make our homes, workplaces, schools and communities healthier and more sustainable. We appreciate the help everyone has given to the project to help us “contribute to improving the health of Alaskans” and others far beyond.

The SEARHC Steps to a Healthier SE Alaska program, which closes this month, was honored for the work it did over the life of its five-year grant (the national Steps to a Healthier US grant has ended, so that means all of the local grants that were part of the national grant also are ending). The Steps program funded 77 projects worth just over $1.1 million in 12 Southeast Alaska communities. Steps was one of the major funders and organizers of the Sitka Health Summit, which is where the Sitka Local Foods Network originated, and the Steps program also helped fund “Eating Alaska.”

The Steps program’s goals were to increase opportunities for physical activity, improve nutrition and reduce the impact of tobacco in Southeast Alaska. The program also worked to reduce diabetes, obesity and asthma in Southeast communities. To accomplish its goals, Steps developed partnerships with schools, worksites, tribes and other community groups so they could change social norms and policies, and make evidence-based and culturally relevant interventions. In addition to the projects, Steps also hosted conferences and workshops to help programs learn how to work in collaboration.

The Steps program used the socio-ecological model, which emphasizes that an individual’s health status is influenced not only by his or her attitudes and practices, but also by personal relationships and community and societal factors. Nearly half of the 77 Steps grants (37) went to community projects, with the others geared toward schools and worksites. More than three-quarters of the grants (60) focused on improving nutrition and/or increasing physical activity. Together, the projects reached 128,000 people (with many people reached by multiple projects) in the communities of Angoon, Craig, Haines, Hoonah, Hydaburg, Juneau, Kake, Kasaan, Klawock, Klukwan, Sitka and Wrangell.

“Overall, the Steps initiative helped build capacity within communities, worksites and schools to work collaboratively, to plan evidence-based programs, and to monitor and evaluate program success,” said Grace Brooks, Steps Grant Manager. “Steps also contributed to an overall increased understanding of the importance of policy in supporting community, school and workplace health.”

In other local foods news from around the state this past week, the Alaska Dispatch ran an article about an indoors farmers market this winter at Anchorage’s Northway Mall.

Capital City Weekly featured a story by Carla Petersen about how the search for elusive cranberries is worth the challenge.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced last week that it is encouraging the use of catch shares to preserve the remaining stocks of halibut (the article features a photo from Sitka).

The Anchorage Daily News featured a story about Gov. Sean Parnell proposing to spend $1.3 million to research declining Yukon River salmon runs.

The Juneau Empire had a story about how an arts advocacy group in Juneau, Arts for Kids, has teamed up with Sitka-based Theobroma Chocolate Co. to offer SmART bars as a fundraiser for art scholarships for graduating seniors in Juneau.

The publicity poster for the movie Eating Alaska

Credits:  Papers – Grand Intentions Kit Stripe paper; Cre8 Mini Kit Blue Solid paper, both by Jessica Sprague;  Overlay – J Crowley Beautiful Evidence Overlay 2

In a town where eagles sometimes outnumber people, it was no surprise to me that there was only 1 restaurant serving lunch that day and it had to be Mexican.  As much as I like experiencing local fares wherever I am, I had to grant A this favor.  He had Mexican (burritos, tacos…) perhaps 15 out of the 17 days he spent on the Colorado River rafting the Grand Canyon, pure torture if you don’t like Mexican all that much.  So he refused to enter no matter how hard I tried luring him with the wonderful smell of carnitas, which I love.  No amount of sweet talk worked so after walking around town looking for another restaurant, I gave in a trekked back to the ship, which in truth had far more choices anyway.  All’s well that ends well.  We spent the rest of the day enjoying the ships amenities… the heated lounge bed at the spa.  

Our journey continues on to Haines.

And here we went around with a naturalist bringing us through the “Valley of the Eagles” to view Haines’ most popular wildlife, the bald eagle hence the christening.

Powerful spotting scopes afford up close views of the eagle and other wildlife.  One can also take photo through the scope.

Year round resident eagles total approximately 400 but the population swells to at least 4,000 in the fall months of October – December.  More than the 2,400 locals residing in this small town.

We then stopped along the shore of a picturesque mountain lake before walking through an ancient muskeg beneath hemlock and spruce trees.  Coming from the Philippines, I’ve trekked many a tropical rainforest and experiencing the sights, sounds and scents of a temperate rainforest was a morning well spent.

Temperate rainforests are less humid, cooler and has more sunlight coming through making it more pleasant to walk through, to compare with the rainforest I know.

I noticed though that moss and algae covers more grounds and trunks in a temperate forest.

Some wildflower shots around Haines.

Firewood

Nootka Lupine

Chocolate Lily

Do´nt forget the proper gear in the backcountry and train your skills for beeing prepared in the wild nature!

Join the Palmer Arts Council for its inaugural “Local Harvest, Local Food” film fest from Thursday, Nov. 19, through Sunday, Nov. 22, at the Strangebird Consulting Office in downtown Palmer. “Good Food” screens at 7 p.m. on Thursday, Nov. 19; “Fresh” shows at 7 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 20; “Eating Alaska” by Sitka filmmaker Ellen Frankenstein screens at 7 p.m. on Saturday, Nov. 21; and “Ingredients” shows at 3 p.m. on Sunday, Nov. 22. After the Sunday showing there will be a discussion about women in agriculture with Cynthia Vignetti. Suggested donations are $10-15 for all films except for Sunday, which is free.

A Sitka restaurant, the Larkspur Café, was featured in Capital City Weekly last week. The article talks about the origins of the restaurant, which is located in the same building as KCAW-Raven Radio. It also discusses the restaurant’s use of local foods, including owners Amelia Budd and Amy Kane purchasing produce from the Sitka Farmers Market during the summer.

In other local foods news from around the state, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) recently announced an expansion to the state’s subsistence halibut fishery to include more rural residents (this includes the Sitka area). The new rules, which take effect on Dec. 4, redefine who qualifies as a rural resident. The previous rules defined rural residents as people living in a rural community or people belonging to a Native tribe with customary and traditional uses of halibut, and the news rules try to catch subsistence halibut users who fell outside the previous definition. Click this link for more information about subsistence halibut regulations and applications.

The Daily Sitka Sentinel has been running a brief announcement from the Sitka Tribe of Alaska’s Kayaaní Commission, which is selling 2010 calendars, CDRoms and field guides about traditional uses of native plants. Here is the information:

Kayaaní Native Plant Publications Available: 2010 Kayaaní Harvest Calendars featuring native plants and their traditional and cultural uses ($16, $2 postage per address); Interactive Ethnobotanical CDRoms with native species, their Tlingít, scientific and common names, and interviews with Elders on the traditional and medicinal uses of plants ($15, $1 postage per address); Ethnobotanical Field Guides ($16, $1 postage per address). We will mail to the addresses of your choice. Order by Dec. 18 for guaranteed delivery before Christmas. Call or e-mail with your order: 907-747-7178, pbass@sitkatribe.org, STA Kayaaní Commission, 456 Katlian. All proceeds will assist the nonprofit Kayaaní Commission in protecting, perpetuating and preserving knowledge of native plants.

The Chilkat Valley News weekly newspaper from Haines featured an article about sixth-graders at Haines School learning how to compost their leftover food (including leftover meat) so it can be used for gardening. The school is working with the Takshanuk Watershed Council to teach the students about composting. The students call their compost project “Marvin” because it’s a living organism.

The Alaska Dispatch recently ran a feature called “Growing Season” that discusses some of the farms in the Matanuska-Susitna valleys that grow local food. The feature includes video clips of harvest time at a couple of the farms featured.

The Mat-Su Frontiersman had a feature called “Chicken U,” which is about raising chickens in Alaska and getting them to produce eggs during the winter months.

The Anchorage Daily News also mentioned Chicken University, which will be one of several presentations at the Alaska Farm Bureau annual meeting on Friday, Nov. 13, at the Millennium Hotel in Anchorage. Other presentations are on growing apples in Alaska and preserving your harvest.

The Anchorage Daily News also had an article about how to get local produce in Anchorage during the winter, either through the Glacier Valley CSA produce boxes from Palmer or the indoor farmers market at the Northway Mall.

Anchorage Daily News garden columnist Jeff Lowenfels wrote a column about how hydroponic gardening is easier and cheaper than ever. The column includes lots of links for people who want to try this method of growing food without soil (by the way, there is a hydroponic garden at McMurdo Station in Antarctica that keeps the scientists there stocked in fresh produce in a land of ice).

Fran Durner’s “Talk Dirt To Me” blog on the Anchorage Daily News site includes a post about how snow can act as mulch for the garden.

The Ester Republic, a monthly publication for the community near Fairbanks, runs periodic articles about sustainability and local food security issues. Some of the articles are linked in the archives, and the editors are working to get more of the past articles on these topics online so more people can enjoy them.

´

Metric - Fantasies

Artist: Metric
Album: FANTASIES
Release Date: April 7th, 2009

Track Listing:

Musique Review Rating:

_______________________________________

It’s been almost 3 years since Metric has produced a studio album and Fantasies readily makes up for everything. Metric has yet again made yet another amazing album that exemplifies why this band is still around. This slightly different from their previous albums offering more pop, and catchy toons. “Help I’m Alive” is a great single which they used as their first single but it does not do this album justice. With Gimme Sympathy as a second single, the sales of this album have sky-rocketted to number one on the Canadian iTunes store because it’s catchy toon and infectious feeling.

“Gold Guns Girls,” “Satallite Mind,” and “Stadium Love,” are among our personal favourites of this album. Stadium Love is a great song that will make any crowd go crazy. Don’t take our word for it however, see for yourself from one of insiders recordings from one of Metric amazing venues:

Bravo Metric… Bravo, MR gives you a 9/10 on Fantasies!

If there’s one guy whose music video links I don’t ignore, it’s my ex-colleague Tay. Emily Haines’ voice is like an angel’s.

Well this would have to be the most painful 8 minutes of viewing ever. A skier who set off an avalanche while skiing in Haines , Alaska captured his burial and eventual rescue on his video camera. If it wasn’t for his glove falling off and acting as a marker, before he was buried he would probably still be under there. Just another reason not to ski!

Our first view of the Tsirku River

Mom and I are geared up to go

And we're off

Sylvia checks conditions

Sylvia rows us down the Tsirku River

When we arrived at the bank of the Tsirku River, I was loaned standard-issue rubber boots and a wool hat (since my Tilley hat blew off on the catamaran ride over), and our busload of travelers was divided into four or five rafts.  Mom and I chose to join Sylvia, a thin but strong young woman who guided us skillfully down the very shallow waterway.

We passengers didn’t get paddles—Sylvia was perched atop the center divider of the raft with an oar rig—but we did have a job.  Probably half a dozen times, our raft got stuck on the river bed, and we all did the “Chilkat bounce” in an attempt to get moving again.  Twice, I think, Sylvia had to get out and push.  (That aspect of the trip—if not the scenery—was reminiscent of fall “canoe drags” with friends in Indiana.)

You wouldn’t necessarily guess it to look at her, but Sylvia is hard core.  Unlike C.P. and most of the other guides we met over the course of our trip, she lives in Alaska year round.  (C.P. works in Hawaii and Oregon during the winter, and other guides I met later were college students and recent grads there for the summer only).  In addition to the difficulty of enduring winter weather and limited daylight in Alaska, there simply aren’t a lot of jobs available for the people who are hired to handle the summer tourist rush.)

Sylvia is soft spoken compared to C.P., but not shy.  She willingly answered many questions about life in Haines and what keeps her there.   She didn’t grow up in Alaska—but moved around the country with her opera singer mother, living in an artist’s collective for a time—which prepared her to like the supportive, small-town environment of Haines.  She had a career as an oboist before coming to Alaska and now makes her living through a combination of guiding, music, jewelry making, and subsistence.  “You really have to want to be here to live here in the winter,” Sylvia said.  “I wouldn’t want to live anywhere else.”

We passed Sylvia’s boss, who was stationary in a canoe as we floated downstream, and Sylvia explained that she was setting up a net for fishing purposes.  Tourists sometimes tell her that fishing with a net “’is cheating,’” Sylvia commented, but she doesn’t see it that way.  People like Sylvia and her boss fish to live—not for sport.

Sylvia commented a couple of times about her struggle to earn respect among her peers in this environment: “I’m always one of the few women around here, and always one of the youngest.”  The male:female ratio in Alaska is 8:1.  Sylvia is a volunteer firefighter, and, the day before we came, some of the new volunteers were learning to install IVs by practicing on her.  One of them accidentally hit a nerve, and Sylvia passed out from the pain.  “That was really embarrassing,” she said.  She doesn’t want to be thought of as the girl who passed out.

We had four passengers on each side of our raft, with Sylvia in the middle.  On my side, my Mom and I sat with two undertakers from L.A. (Seriously.)  I offered to take a picture of the two of them on their camera as we set out, and Undertaker #1 handed the camera over, saying something like, “you can do that, if we live.”  His body language suggested that he was genuinely afraid, which, I confess, amused me, given the warnings we had received about the likelihood of frequently scraping the bottom.  He relaxed eventually.

In the meantime, his traveling companion asked Sylvia about life in the area.  “What would you say is the biggest problem in Haines?

“You mean the weather?” she asked.

“No – the biggest social problem.”

Sylvia struggled to think of one.  “There are a lot of poor people here, but it’s not like the lower 48, where there’s a big gap between rich and poor,” she said.  “The problems that have hit the rest of the country from the financial crisis haven’t really affected us. Now the rest of the country is more like us.  We were already living subsistence.”

When Undertaker #2 specifically asked about alcoholism, which apparently was what he was thinking about all along, Sylvia rejected the suggestion:  “Not more than anywhere else.”

Finally, she settled on a different answer: “Gossip.  It’s a small town.  Everyone knows what you’re doing.”

We saw more than 20 bald eagles as we floated/bounced down the Tsirku—most of them perched in Sitka spruce trees but a few flying around.  I had trouble seeing them in the trees at first, until I was told to look for white spots that look like golf balls, which were really their “bald” heads. 

The day was partly cloudy, but beautiful, and Sylvia had a tendency to sing “Blue Skies,” when a lull in the conversation occurred.  When our trip was over, I asked Sylvia if there was a good place to go camping in Haines for a week and if there were outfitters who would rent us the gear to do so.  She said yes—that we should come to the town campground and befriend some locals to learn about the area. 

Mom and I were lucky, ultimately, that we hadn’t managed to follow through on our original attempts to wander the town of Haines as our activity for the day.  We drove through on the way back, and, as with Ketchikan and Juneau, everything about town seemed smaller than I had imagined from reading about it.   Lesson learned.  You may want to visit cultural institutions in Alaska when the weather is bad, but, given a choice, never pass up an opportunity to explore the out-of-doors instead.

Now that I’ve found it, I’m loving the Chilkat Valley News. 

C.P. didn’t mention the Library as we drove quickly through town, but check out this article about the recent unveiling of the Haines Library Totem, carved from an 800-year-old cedar tree, and featuring traditional figures such as a raven and an eagle, plus one of a woman holding a book titled “Totem Carving for Dummies.”

I’m absolutely not kidding!

I just did a quick Google search on “Haines Alaska CP” and found an article in the Chilkat Valley News  about a brown bear that was shot, declawed, and abandoned in the Chilkat River. It’s a good illustration of local attitudes about subsistence living.

Incidentally, I love the fact that the other people in the story are identified by first and last name, but C.P. is just “C.P.”

The New York Times on Saturday ran a lengthy article by former Fairbanks Daily News-Miner reporter Stefan Milkowski about how weak runs of king salmon are hurting Yukon River communities. The article is datelined from the village of Marshall, near the mouth of the Yukon River, where villagers already are feeling the pinch of no salmon to fill their freezers for the winter.

This is a region where heating oil costs $7 a gallon and a can of condensed milk goes for nearly $4. It also is a region that last year faced critical food shortages last year, with many faith groups from around the country sending food to help tide the residents through the winter. Click here to read accounts from “Anonymous Bloggers” about last year’s airlift and what villagers are doing to prepare for this winter.

The food shortages resulted in some July protest fisheries, which resulted in the arrest of the only police officer in Marshall, Jason Isaac, who joined other villagers in claiming state and federal fish and wildlife officials were more concerned with a Canadian fish treaty than they were about rural Alaskans. The Tundra Drums reports that 67,000 Yukon kings reached Canada, about 10,000 to 13,000 more than the treaty called for.

In relatively close-by Bethel, Tim Meyers and his wife Lisa have helped their communities food security with Meyer’s Farm, which is growing enough fruits and vegetables that Bethel residents can buy weekly boxes of locally grown produce for $30. This shows that local produce can be grown in rural Alaska to reduce our dependency on store-bought food.

Food security also hits closer to home, where state Sen. Albert Kookesh of Angoon faces a trial over subsistence fishing practices near his home village.

Not all of the local foods news in Alaska is gloom and doom this week. The Fairbanks Daily News-Miner featured a story on Monday about the growth of the Delta Meat and Sausage plant in Delta Junction, which processes locally raised Galloway cattle and game meat shot by local hunters.

Also, this week’s Chilkat Valley News (Haines weekly) included a brief item about a Haines moose hunter who was the beneficiary of a snow goose dropped by a hawk that didn’t have the strength to carry its prey.

Finally, the Alaska Dispatch site includes an update on the inaugural Alaska Local Food Film Festival, which runs from Oct. 2-8 at the Beartooth Theatrepub and Grill in Anchorage. Sitka filmmaker Ellen Frankenstein presented her movie “Eating Alaska” on Sunday, Oct. 4.

When we got off the catamaran at Haines we were met by our guide, C.P.—a hunky, boisterous, bearded guy with great comic timing. 

We had just traveled down the deepest fiord in North America, and were on our way to see the largest collection of bald eagles in North America, but what C.P. talked about most was salmon. He told us far more about salmon than I can possibly remember, but here’s what I’ve got. 

There’s a five-finger mnemonic for remembering the five kinds of Alaskan salmon: (1) thumb is for chum, (2) pointer is for sockeye (make the motion of socking yourself in the eye), (3) middle finger is for king; (4) ring finger is for silver, and (5) pinkie is for pink.  (Hey, it worked!)  Salmon are born in freshwater, travel to saltwater, and then return to freshwater to spawn and die (almost immediately). 

“Salmon are everything” to the people of Alaska, C.P. insisted, because they feed the eagles, the bears, the whales, and the people.  Their decomposing bodies feed other fish. 

If a bald eagle sees a salmon in the water, it can swoop down from a great height, a la the Nature Channel, but in the Alaska Chilkat Bald Eagle Preserve, that rarely happens.  The water is a green, milky color, so full of silt that C.P. said you cannot see more than a millimeter below the surface.   So there’s no diving from a great height to grab salmon. 

Still the river provides the eagles with a different type of advantage. The water is so low that many salmon end up running aground on a rock, at which point an eagle will grab the convenient feast before it can get away.  Or, even better, an eagle will grab a salmon from another eagle that has already picked it up — even when other salmon are available on the ground.  Why bend down when you don’t have to?

All the rafting guides I encountered along the way made reference to “subsistence” in Alaska.  C.P. began to fill in some of the details.  “Subsistence” refers to all the things you’re probably already thinking of (living on exactly what you need without extraneous belongings or unnecessary income; living on food you acquire yourself), but it also has some specific local meanings.  Alaskan law allows certain residents to catch and eat a specific quantity of various fish and animals annually (I remember that you’re allowed one moose, but I’ve forgotten the other species and counts). 

Not everyone gets this free lunch.  Only people living in very small communities benefit.  Urbanites in Anchorage, obviously, are excluded—but even little Sitka recently got big enough that its residents lost their subsistence rights.  When we repeated this to the guide in our raft, Sylvia, she said that she hadn’t been aware of that, and hoped Sitka residents would get their rights back soon because so many people rely on them. (More on Sylvia and the rafting trip in the next post.)

The river we floated down that day was chosen over others in the area so that we wouldn’t get in the way of a salmon run.  To make our trip complete, on the way back to the catamaran, we pulled off the road, and C.P. showed us a salmon spawning area just a few yards away.  Sure enough, we saw dead and dying fish that had recently done the deed.  (Not as pretty as the live ones in the video above.) 

We made a second stop to see a salmon catcher (a revolving Ferris-wheel-type device with its top half above the water line) that the Department of Fish and Wildlife uses to catch the fish so it can tag them, release them, track them, and estimate their numbers that year.  People who later catch a tagged fish are supposed to return the tag to the scientists at Fish and Wildlife, where they get a cap for their effort.  C.P. said that everyone who lives and works in the area is happy to do so.  They rely on the data for their livelihood.  (“Salmon is everything.”)

A typical C.P. joke:  We pass a sign that reads “State Troopers,” and he asks, “What’s wrong with that sign?”

[Perfect comic pause.]

“It’s plural.”

 [Laughter from the crowd.]

 “There is only one trooper – Trooper Otis.” 

Tidbits about Trooper Otis and his lifestyle followed. 

Yeah, I know.  You had to be there.

C.P. has some great short videos on YouTube that can give you a wonderful (if overly sunny) feel for the area.  In addition to the one at the top of this post—which he took of a salmon run shortly before we arrived—he has a great one of rafting under a glacier . . .

. . . and another that shows you a spectacular view of the mountains around Haines: . . .

I believe you can see some of these same mountains in my previous post—and in the next one — but C.P. shows them on a much sunnier day. 

Don’t be fooled.  Clouds, fog, and rain are the real southeast Alaska.

When we docked at Skagway, I thought the scenery was beginning to live up to my expectations of Alaska. 

The excursion to the Alaska Chilkat Eagle Preserve began with a very short bus ride to another dock.  There we boarded a catamaran (I think that’s what it was) that took us from Skagway to Haines via the Lynn Canal -the deepest fiord in North America, and one of the deepest and longest in the world.  A fiord (or fyord) is a long, narrow inlet with steep sides, created in a valley carved by glacial activity.

Although the tour description had promised/threatened heated interiors on the boat, it also had a large, unenclosed deck in the back where I got to take unobstructed photos and experience the dry, windy day.

It was a beautiful ride. 

A single sad note about this trip: my recently acquired Tilley hat (which kept me shaded on Lake Harriet Hunt and dry in Juneau) blew off my head the minute the catamaran picked up speed on an already windy day.  (Ack!)

This is sad not only because it was the most perfect hat ever designed for outdoor pursuits but also because it was given to me by Eff after its original owner (Ben’s mom) passed away.  It floats, so I’m hoping that it quickly arrived on shore and is being enjoyed by someone else now.  (Turns out there was a way to tighten the chin strap after all, but I learned it too late.)  I’m planning to get another one.

Somewhere between Skagway and Haines on a dry, windy August morning

Our excursion from Skagway to Haines and the Alaska Chilkat Bald Eagle Preserve was definitely the single best day of our trip.  But we almost didn’t get there, and the story about my numerous foiled attempts to make arrangements tells you something about the difficulties of traveling in Alaska – especially if you’re on a tight schedule.

Uncle Rocky made the initial suggestion that we go to Haines on the day the cruise ship docked in Skagway.  He had done so in the past and thought we shouldn’t miss the Chilkat Dancers (scroll all the way down this page to see some great pictures of Haines as well as the dancers). 

Skagway is only 13 nautical miles from Haines.  Maybe 6 months before we left, Rocky pointed us to the Fast Ferry, which covers the distance in only 45 minutes.  He also recommended a historical museum in Haines with an exhibit on 19^th-century pioneering civil engineer-cum-artist-cum-schoolteacher-cum-business owner-cum mayor-cum-commissioner Solomon Ripinsky—a Jewish immigrant from Rypin, Poland, who had the gift of gab and a big impact on the community.  (Apparently, one could identify his former students years later by their Polish-inflected English.)  Mom was enthused.  It seemed like a good idea.  So I figured we had Skagway covered and focused my attention on what we would do at other stops along the way. 

Fast forward 5 months.  I asked Mom to talk to Rocky about all these details again.  (I was having trouble finding out how we make arrangements to see the Chilkat Dancers and not in the mood to dig up the transportation details.)  He made some phone calls and found out the Dancers no longer do their thing in Haines.

In the meantime, I had read just enough about Haines to think it sounded beautiful, less touristy than the other places we were visiting in Southeast Alaska, and well worth going to.  I said we should go anyway. 

As a Chicagoan who is used to a robust public transportation system, and who has sometimes traveled on other ferries without much difficult, I figured we would just show up and get on the ferry.  (It’s not like we were taking a car with us.)  Turns out, I was wrong.  When I went back to the Fast Ferry site about two weeks before the cruise departed to check on the details, I saw that they recommended reservations.  And when I called, I learned that the two morning ferries were fully booked, as was the 5 p.m. return ferry we would have wanted.  I was invited to call back the week of the trip to see if there were cancellations.

Never mind, I thought.  I’ll take the slow ferry service—the Alaska Marine Highway, operated by the Department of Transportation.  It takes an hour—only slightly longer than the “Fast Ferry.” No big deal – right?

Wrong again.  The Alaska Marine Highway operates a limited number of ferries over a very long route—from Bellingham, Washington, up the panhandle and west across the Aleutian chain all the way to the Bering Sea.

Here’s the mileage for the southeastern part of the trip, which gives you distances for several legs of the trip I took:

And here’s a map:

Southern part of the Alaska Marine Highway

Then the route crosses the Gulf of Alaska and travels 1,000 miles along the Aleutian Chain.

Only one ferry travels to and from Skagway and Haines on any given day – and neither one worked with the arrival and departure times of the cruise ship on the day we would be there. 

What about going over land, you may be wondering?  The good news: there actually is a road that goes from Skagway to Haines—in contrast to most towns around Alaska’s inside passage.  The bad news: it’s 350 miles one way.  (It seems there’s water water everywhere in this region, so you have to go a long distance, into Canada and back, to find enough solid ground for a roadway that goes through.) As a day trip, it doesn’t work.

“So isn’t there any way I can get there?” I begged the woman who answered the phone at the Alaska Marine Highway.

“Well – you could fly,” she said.  “Call Wings of Alaska.”

So I did.  Turns out they had good hours for flying out and back that worked with the cruise ship schedule.  The flight time was 15 minutes.  And the cost was $56 each way – only around $20 more than it would have cost for the Fast Ferry. The Skagway airport was 1 mile from the Skagway cruise ship dock (we could walk there), and the Haines airport was 3 miles from town—with taxis available.   I’m not used to taking 15 minute flights to get where I’m going, but I was willing to adjust my thinking. 

I thought I had found the solution and bought the tickets, but then a niggling concern cropped up.

What if a thunderstorm delayed our return flight?  We had 2 hours between our scheduled landing time and the final boarding for the cruise ship.  What if it stormed for 2 hours and the plane was grounded?

I checked the Wings of Alaska site to see whether it was possible fly to the cruise ship’s next port of call (Icy Strait/Hoonah).  It was (via Juneau).  It would cost us money, but not a super-exorbitant amount. 

Then I called the cruise ship company to see what they had to say about it—figuring there must be a procedure for this kind of thing. Surely, passengers missing the ship must be a fairly regular occurrence.

“If you miss the ship, your cruise tour is over,” a company representative told me. 

It seemed strange to me, but I was told there was some sort of law applying to cruises that didn’t return to their original destination which prohibited passengers from rejoining the ship at a later port.  Fall out from our paranoia about homeland security?  I didn’t think to ask at the time.

“What about the land part of the tour?” I asked.  “Could I rejoin there?”  Maybe, I was told.  It would depend on the precise timing. 

Well, clearly it wasn’t worth running the risk of missing half my trip just to go to Haines.

And I was pleasantly surprised to find that Wings of Alaska would refund my airfare in full with only 24 hours notice.

But I was still disappointed. I had not been all that interested in Skagway because it seemed to be primarily a gold rush town, and I just couldn’t summon up any interest in gold rush history, or panning for gold, or supposedly “period” bars with women in cheesy, “vintage” prostitute costumes. 

There was a railroad tour that went high into the mountains and was supposed to provide a spectacular view that I thought we might end up taking.  But my mother wasn’t enthused about that, and I didn’t want to spend the day in a fully enclosed vehicle. 

Then, four days before we left town, I found an excursion the cruise ship offered to the Haines area – labeled not as a trip to Haines, but as a trip to the Chilkat Eagle Preserve. 

Mom had said that she didn’t want to go on any excursions longer than four hours, and this one lasted six, but most of the time was in enclosed, heated moving vehicles (buses and catamarans)—with only a relatively small portion of the time on a rafting trip (sans whitewater).  She thought it looked good.

I was glad that we would get to see the Eagle Preserve and the area around Haines, but I hardly thought it would be the most enjoyable excursion of the trip. 

 I was wrong about that, too.

I have found when researching my family, it is helpful to make a Family Timeline with all of the events and sources that I have gathered. As I find more sources and events, I add them to the timeline. This way, it is easier for me to see if there are any gaps that need to be researched and filled in.

For example, I am researching my Loyalist Haines family at the moment and have made a timeline for them. Since my two Loyalist ancestors are father and son, I have included both of them and included only my direct line. Joseph Haines, Sr. is proven to have descendants in the Loyalist Directory, but Nathaniel Haines hasn’t had any descendants proven yet, although his children are listed in The Loyalists in Ontario: The Sons and Daughters of the American Loyalists of Upper Canada. I guess I will be the first in the Nathaniel Haines family to prove descendancy.

Haines Family Timeline:

1750’s – Joseph Haines immigrated from Germany to Johnstown, New York. 28

>1783 – Joseph Haines, Sr. married and had seven children. 1

>1783 – Joseph Haines, Sr. and family lived in Johnstown, New York. 1, 28

>1783 – Joseph Haines, Sr. served in the Butler’s Rangers and went to Lachine, P.Q. with the rangers. 1

>1783 – Nathaniel Haines served in the Butler’s Rangers and went to Lachine, P.Q. with the rangers. 1

1784 – Joseph Haines, Sr. family was in Niagara, U.C. 35

1784 – Nathaniel Haines was in Niagara, U.C. 35

1786 – Joseph Haines, Sr. family was in Niagara, U.C. 1. 2

1786 – Nathaniel Haines was married in in Niagara, Upper Canada and received rations there. 1, 2

1792 – Nathaniel and Lydia Haines’ son, Andrew, was baptised at St. Mark’s Church, Niagara. 3

1796 -Joseph Haines, Sr. was granted a patent of land in Grantham Twp. in the Home district of U.C. 4

1796 – Nathaniel Haines was granted a patent of land in Grantham Twp. in the Home district. 4

1801 – Joseph Haines, Sr. and Peter Whitney purchased mill. 5

1811 – Nathaniel Haines died?

1818 – Philip Haines died in fire in York, U.C. 5, 6

1818 – Joseph Haines, Sr. deeded the mill to grandson, James Haines after his father, Philip Haines, died in a fire. 5

1818 – Joseph Haines, Sr. died.?

1835 – Benjamin Haines and Sarah Freisman were married in Niagara, U.C.?

1836 – Nathaniel’s son, Benjamin, is listed in the book, Sons and Daughters of American Loyalists and had an Order in Council as a SUE on Nov.3, 1836. 7

1837 – Benjamin Haines was granted land in Middlesex Cty.? 8

1844 – Feb. 23rd – Benjamin Haines’ son, John, was born in Niagara. 9, 24

1851- Benjamin Haines was living in Niagara Twp. with his wife and family. 9

1851- John Haines was in the 1851 census of the family. 9

1871 -Benjamin Haines was living in Aldborough Twp. Elgin Cty. 10

1872 – John Haines married Harriet Fernetta Doan in Welland, Ontario. 11

1881 – John Haines family was in the census of Welland. 12

1891 – Benjamin’s widow, Sarah Haines was in the census of Aldborough Twp., Elgin Cty. 13

1891 – John Hines family was in the census for Aldborough Twp., Elgin Cty. 14

1892 – Sarah Haines died in Rodney, Elgin Cty. 15

1894 – William Edgar Hines, was born in Aldborough Twp., Elgin Cty. 16

1897 – John Hines’ family moved to Essex County and were in Rochester. 17

1901 – John Hines family was in the census for Rochester, Essex County. 18

1906 – John Hines family were in Gosfield North Twp. in 1906 when their youngest daughter
died. 19, 20, 24

1911 – John Hines family were in Maidstone Twp. in the 1911 census. 21

1917 – Oct. 6 – William Edgar Hines married Josephine Desbiens and lived in Essex, Ontario. 22, 27
1926 – Aug. 14th -Earl Douglas Hines was born on Arthur Ave. in Essex. 23

1932 – March. 13th -John Hines died in Essex, Ontario. 24, 25

1935 – Dec. 2oth-Harriet Doan Hines died in Essex, Ontario. 25

1957 – Apr. 20th – Earl Hines married Marian Neil in Essex County, Ontario. 26

1958 -Sept. 30th – Earline Hines was born in Windsor, Ontario. 29

1964 – Earl Hines purchased property in Cottam, Ontario. 34

1976 – May 28th – Earline Hines was married to A. Morrison in Comber, Ontario. 30

1975 – Earl Hines sold property in Cottam and relocated to Leamington, Ontario.34

1977 – Mar. 29th – William Edgar Hines died in Essex, Ontario. 25, 32, 33

1977 – July 29th – B. Morrison was born in Leamington, Ontario. 29, 34

1979 – Jan. 22nd – K. Morrison was born in Leamington, Ontario. 29, 34

1983 – Earl Hines was divorced. 31

1984 – Earline Hines was divorced. 31

1985 – Mar. 9th – Earl Hines was married to R. Watkins Harris in Windsor, Ont. 34

1994 – July 4th – Josephine Hines died in Leamington, Ontario. 25, 32, 33

1996 – Feb. 7th – Earl Hines died in Windsor, Ontario. 25, 32, 33

2001 – June 2nd. – Earline Hines was married to R. P. Bradt in Leamington, Ontario. 30

2008 – Aug. 15th – Marian Neil Hines died in Leamington, Ontario. 32, 33, 34

Sources -
1. The Annotated Nominal Roll of the Butler’s Rangers 1777-1784 with Documentary Sources – Lieutenant Colonel William A. Smy, OMM, CD, UE
2. The Butler’s Rangers in the Revolutionary War – muster roll – E. Cruikshank
3. Baptisms at St. Mark’s Church transcribed by Bill Martin
4. Ontario People 1796-1803 – E. Keith Fitzgerald
5. The Economy of Upper Canada -Merchant Millers of the Humber Valley – Sydney Thomas Fisher
6. obituary – Death Notices of Ontario – W.D.Reid
7. The Loyalists in Ontario: The Sons and Daughters of the American Loyalists of Upper Canada-W.D.Reid
8. Canadian Digital Atlas Project
9. 1851 census Canada West, Niagara Twp, U.C.
10. 1871 census Aldborough Twp., Elgin Cty., Ontario
11. Ontario Marriage Records 1869-73- Ancestry
12. 1881 census Canada, Welland County, Ontario
13. 1891 Census Canada, Aldborough Twp., Elgin Cty.
14. 1891 Census Canada, Aldborough Twp., Elgin Cty.
15. Ontario Death Records – Ancestry
16. Ontario Birth Records
17. Ontario Birth Records – Fleming W. Hines – Jan. 18, 1897
18. 1901 Census Canada – Rochester Twp.
19. Ontario Death Records – Ancestry
20. Article in Essex Times 1906
21. 1911 Canada census Essex North
22. Ontario Marriage Records 1869-1924 – Ancestry
23. personal knowledge
24. Ontario Death records – Ancestry
25. Gravestone at Woodslee United Church Cemetery
26. Personal knowledge
27. Article in Essex Free Press, Oct. 1967 – 50th Wedding Anniversary
28. Loyalists Claims For Losses
29. Birth Certificate
30. Marriage License
31. Divorce Decree
32. Obituary
33. Funeral Card
34. present at event
35. The Centennial of the Settlement of Upper Canada by the United Empire Loyalists 1784-1884. – E.Ryerson

Now, it will be easier to find the documents that I need to copy and include in my certification application(s).

The triangular park located opposite the Tea Tree Gully Hotel is celebrating 100 years as a community park.

The Haines Memorial Park was opened by the Govenor,  Sir Day Hart Bosanquet in 1909. It was also decided that it was to be the first public Arbor Day in Tea Tree Gully. Palms were planted by the vice-regal party and English oaks and plane trees were planted by children along Perseverance Road.
William Haines junior, local land owner, left two pieces of land to the community, this one and Memorial Oval. He stipulated that the park had to be for community use and remain unfenced.

We are celebrating this milestone with a birthday bash on the park on Sunday, 27 September from 9:30 to 11:00am. There will be free children’s games, bbq breakfast and much more. Come along early, watch the Bay to Birdwood as it drives past this location and then come celebrate with us.