I am so interested in the American tour that Sarah Palin will be promoting this week for her book Going Rogue: An American Life. I think there is something we all can learn from this. If anything, it is a media spectacle unlike anything ever seen before: Sarah Palin, the former Governor of Alaska, who makes history as the first female Vice Presidential candidate for the Republican Party, dishes her perspective on the inside story behind the McCain campaign. While I haven’t read the book myself, (I plan on buying a copy soon,) it will be interesting to see how this all plays out in the end and how it will bode for the future of national and global politics, if at all.

City number 8 on my top ten list of vacation destinations is Oranjestad, Aruba.  Known for its nightlife, Aruba is a very fascinating island even during the daytime.  Having come to Aruba via cruise ship and only spending one day, our options for travel revolved around tour buses or taxi.  As soon as you leave the cruise terminal, the taxi stand has all of the most popular destinations and how much the taxi fare is, so the drivers can’t gouge tourists.  We took the island tour, seeing an aloe vera facility, the Casabari Rock formation (very cool, it is also one of the highest places on the island and you can see for miles),  and a natural bridge spanning one of Aruba’s river mouths.  After our tour, we still had several hours on the island, we decided to hire a cab and go to Our Lady of Alta Vista chapel.  This picturesque chapel sits near a precipice overlooking the Caribbean Sea.  They hold services outside with pews set up for this purpose.  The most exciting portion of this side trip was the cab ride.  Being fans of “The Amazing Race”, this cabbie made us think we were on the race.  He could have been race driver and we came through unscathed, but we did say an extra prayer while we were at the chapel.

Juneau, Alaska is my seventh favorite destination and it was very difficult to place it this low.  On our honeymoon cruise, my wife and I took an Alaskan cruise.  Being novice travellers at that point, we had no clue about excursions or travel in general.  Once on the ship, the cruise line held a program to explain the various excursions and side trips.  The activity that caught our attention the most was the Mendenhall Glacier Helicopter tour.  We signed up for the tour immediately, even though it was very expensive.  As we were cruising into Juneau, the ship announced that we were sailing through a whale migration route and it was possible that we could see a whale.  So, we got up at 5:00 in the morning and tried to see one. Unfortunately, another ship had preceded us into the area and scared away any whales that might have been there.  When we finally docked in Juneau, we boarded our helicopter for one of the most exciting trips of our lives. We flew over the glacier field and our pilot set us down on a plateau and we got out and walked around on the glacier.  Definitely, one of the major highlights of our honeymoon, and an experience I will never forget.

After a year of discussion, the Juneau Assembly on Nov. 2 passed an updated nonmotorized transportation plan that includes 18 priority infrastructure projects and 12 recommended policy changes to improve biking and walking around Alaska’s capital city.

Click here for an article about the plan from the Juneau Empire, which lists all 18 priority projects and some of the 12 policy recommendations. A link to the complete plan is with the article.

Living on tropical islands for three years, this Midwestern girl really missed snow.  When I found out that we were moving to Alaska last year, I was excited because we were guaranteed to get some snow.

Did we ever!  In January 2009 alone, we got just over 75 inches of the white stuff.  Thankfully, I am not in charge of the shoveling, DH does that.  And he refuses to buy a snowblower (imagine that).

Conn and I have been watching our mountains out back for the snow to be coming down the mountain…as each day passes, the snow gets a little bit lower and lower.  So very exciting to an almost 3 year old and his snow loving Mama.

Imagine our surprise when we woke up on Saturday to a nice dusting of snow on the ground!!  Yippee!  It was a booo-tiful way to start our Halloween day.  Too bad it all melted by the end of the day.

Oh well, there is more on the way, that is for certain.

Peace.

Photo from the IndieAKFilms.com site for the "Fat Bike" movie

Living in Alaska means we have months of winter when snow and/or ice covers the roads and we don’t have a lot of daylight. For some people, winter becomes a time for hibernation. But many folks enjoy riding their bikes in winter, and in the right conditions some people find they can ride their bikes in places during the winter where it’s impossible to ride in the summer. During the winter, mountain bikers can ride on frozen rivers and lakes, and they can ride through frozen muskeg swamps. If they can ride over swamps, then winter bike commuting on snow-covered pavement also is a possibility.

Last week, Carl Battreall of Indie Ak Films took his short film, “Fat Bike,” about winter mountain biking in Alaska, to the Boston Bike Film Festival and won first prize. Congratulations, Carl. Tim Woody, who writes the Bicycles and Icicles blog, saw an early screening of the film and wrote this review.

Alaskans have a long history of winter bicycling, dating back to 1900 when a couple of prospectors, Max Hirschfield and Ed Jesson, in separate journeys, used bikes to ride the frozen Yukon River during the dead of winter from Dawson City, Yukon Territory, to the gold rush fields in Nome.

Over the years, there have been several adventure treks and races inspired by the journeys of Hirschfield and Jesson. Kevin Vallely, Andy Sterns and Frank Wolf recreated Hirschfield and Jesson’s journey a century later for their Bikes On Ice project. For many years, there was a race called the Iditasport (formerly the Iditabike) that took mountain bikers over parts of the Iditarod Trail. The 350-mile Iditarod Trail Invitational Winter Ultra Race from Knik Lake to McGrath has replaced the now-defunct Iditasport, and it also offers an option for riders to continue on to Nome. The Susitna 100 offers racers shorter 100-mile and 50-kilometer options in the Susitna Valley north of Anchorage. Juneau journalist Jill Homer wrote a book, “Ghost Trails,” about her attempt to race in the 2008 Iditarod Trail Invitational. Many winter mountain bikers ride “fat bikes” during the winter that have extra-wide tires to help distribute their weight over the snow, especially when the riders are on trails that haven’t been maintained.

For the city rider, the “fat bike” isn’t necessary in most cases. But a good set of studded tires is helpful, especially in Southeast Alaska where winter cyclists encounter more glare ice than those riding up north. A good tune-up also is recommended before winter riding, because the cold can affect lubricants and the extra grime on the road can wear down brake pads. There are more winter bicyclists than ever in Alaska, and it’s not uncommon to see people riding in the winter no matter if it’s minus-20 with ice fog in Fairbanks or 35-above with glare ice and hail in Sitka. For Alaskans wanting to learn more about winter bicycling, the Bicycle Commuters of Anchorage have a page of winter biking tips on its site, the Fairbanks Cycle Club has a winter biking page on its site, and the Fairbanks bike shop All Weather Sports has a page of winter biking tips on its page.

Here are a few safety tips for the winter (besides the studded tires and winter tune-up):
* Wear clothing in layers, including a hat and gloves (this makes it easy to adjust your body’s core temperature when you ride),
* Stay hydrated (in extremely cold weather, water bottles may freeze and some people find a Camelback-style rig works better to keep water flowing, a wrap of foam insulation may be needed on the nozzle),
* Wear a helmet (this applies to both summer and winter riding),
* Have a strong, bright white headlight and a flashing red taillight on your bike and wear reflective arm or leg bands, vests and other bright clothes (winter is dark and many drivers don’t clean their windows like they should, so cyclists should do their best to make sure they are visible, the Anchorage Daily News recently ran this article on bike lights and reflectives),
* Ride in a safe, predictable manner when you are near traffic (if you can’t maintain your balance in the snow, then you might need to park the bike until the roads have been plowed),
* Have fun and enjoy the ride.

Every year, the Associated Students of the University of Alaska Fairbanks plans a lobbying trip to Juneau for interested students. ASUAF organizes the event in conjunction with other student governments from around the state, so students from all over Alaska spend a long weekend learning about Alaska’s legislature and lobbying for University funding.

This year the trip will be held from February 19 to 24. Because students traveling will have to do some work gathering student input beforehand, and to give ASUAF plenty of time to choose participants, applications are due at 5 p.m. on November 13. According to the ASUAF website, selected students will be notified by November 27.

For students looking for travel funding for places other than Juneau, ASUAF also offers travel grants for academic/University-related trips. Those applications are also due at 5 p.m. on November 13.

Image from Caribou Crossings Cabins and Adventures

Go ahead and admit it! When you were younger you thought Alaska was one big sheet of ice with nothing but igloos and Eskimos. Well with time, a few episodes of Northern Exposure, and the help of the cruise industries; Alaska is not as much of an enigma as it once was. However, you still might not know what’s cookin’ in the land of the white nights.

Believe it or not Alaska has a huge selection of wild berries from the wilderness regions of the state. They are in limited supply and are a very important part of the brown and black bear’s summer diet. Locations like: Anchorage, Kodiak Island, Juneau, Fairbanks, and the Kenai Peninsula contain these berries (commonly used for jams and jellies). Berries include:

• wild blueberries                        wild blackberries

• wild salmonberries                   rhubarb

• wild ligonberries                       wild black and red currants

• wild rosehips                              wild high bush cranberries

• wild mossberries                        wild fireweeds

But it’s not all about the berries, although they are berry, berry delicious (Just a little berry humor…berry little!). Alaska is known for its cold water seafood. What don’t they have is the question? There’s halibut and trout, but Alaskan Salmon rules, and it is often served as smoked salmon, cured salmon, salmon jerky and indian salmon candy. In other words, salmon is king, but the throne is usually presumed to belong to Alaskan King Crab. Alaskan King Crab differs from dungeness crabs, or the blue crabs found in the other states because of the sheer mass of this crustacean. Alaskan King Crab can easily feed a whole family. Now that’s a meal fit for royalty!

Here’s where it gets interesting! So let the game begin, and the hunters in Alaska enjoy game like: moose, caribou, elk, and bear. It’s not just a delicacy; it’s a major part of many Alaskan’s daily protein, especially those who live outside of the main cities. There are not a lot of fresh, fruit and vegetables available in the winter.

Reindeer, although not native to Alaska, is also enjoyed in the form of commercially available sausage. It was brought to Alaska from Siberia in 1892 because the whale’s, which were a major part of native Alaskans diets, were becoming less and less available.

Now if you happen to go to Alaska and you happen to hear somebody call someone “sourdough” –  don’t incite a riot. They are simply using slang for a person who lives in Alaska! The explanation comes from the Klondike Gold Rush. At that time, everyone kept a pot of sourdough starter in their kitchens. By feeding the starter with a little new flour every few days, the wild yeast was kept alive and they could bake bread at any time. That bread is called sourdough bread.

So, now that you know what’s cooking in Alaska, click here for an authentic Alaskan recipe called Bouillabaisse-Alaska. Try this recipe at home!

Information about Alaskan food was taken from the Alaska Wild Berry Products website: Click here to visit their site!”

Other sites: Caribou Crossing Cabins and Adventures

Disney Cruise Line in 2011 will start Alaska sailings aboard the 2,400 passenger Disney Wonder, which will operate out of Vancouver, B.C. The ship will offer seven night roundtrip itineraries that call in the Alaskan port towns of Juneau, Ketchikan and Skagway and visit the beautifully scenic Tracy Arm. With this new itinerary, families will be able to enjoy all that Alaska has to offer them.

The first of 18 cruises the Disney Cruise Line plans for 2011 will  from Vancouver on May 3, 2011 with the last cruise of the season scheduled for Aug. 30, 2011.

Disney’s move into Alaska comes as several other cruise lines pull ships from the region due to what they have called a difficult environment to work in. Carnival C ruise Line owned Princess and Holland America, as well as Royal Caribbean, and Norwegian Cruise Line have all announced cutbacks in their capacity for 2010.

In anticipation of the new Alaska sailings, Disney says it will add a new venue called Outlook Café atop the Disney Wonder during a dry dock this month.  Located on deck 10, the 2,500 square foot indoor lounge will offer a place for passengers to watch for wildlife, such as scouting for whales as the ship sails along Alaska’s scenic Inside Passage. The venue will have floor to ceiling, curved glass windows.

The Alaska cruise announcement is for the 2011 cruise season only. Disney has said nothing has been determined  for the cruise line’s schedule beyond that year.

Also, check out Disney’s new itineraries for 2011 for the Mexican Riviera Cruises and Mediterranean cruises.

Check out our Disney 2009 & 2010 Cruises Today ->

October is turning into a busy month for Twitter meetups in Alaska. Here’s the lineup so far:

• Fri, Oct 16 – Marian Call in concert at the Tap Root starting at 8:00 p.m.
• Tue, Oct 20 – Lunch Tweetup at Kaladi Brothers downtown at 12:30 p.m.
• Thu, Oct 22 – Juneau Tweetup at 6:00 p.m. (the first Tweetup outside Anchorage!)
• Sat, Oct 24 – Roller Derby Tweetup at 6:00 p.m.
• Wed, Oct 28 – Library Tweetup at 7:00 p.m. (limited to 25 people)

Click the links for more details on each one. And we hope to see you everywhere!

Now we just need a Recover from the Tweetups Tweetup.

Cat Tatiano reminds me, with soggy fur and a sudden liking to my lap, that it’s cold and rainy out there. As if I needed a reminder. My bones—the Russian-Polish-Ukrainian parts—know what they need: It’s dumpling time.

Borrowed this 2006 shot from yulinkacooks.blogspot.com for its exactitude in depicting a beer-goggled view of pel'meni.

So I thought.

A Juneau friend has just inquired about a Madison-area Pel’Meni. Alas, I report. It was on student-infested State Street. It was owned by the same person as the Juneau location (last I checked, that was David and Jeannine Bonk), and apparently it inspired similar loyalty. It closed in scandal, reopened, and I think closed again. Last year the tubes were still clogged with wistful remembrances: Yelp laments, a Facebook page: “Bring Pelmeni Back to Madison.” A recipe (starting with frozen dumplings). But now it seems the only place for pel’meni is Arbat (3000 Cahill, Madison), which, judging from the menu’s vodka and caviar, sounds like more of a well-rounded dining experience, as opposed to a one-dish Siberian Hangover Helper.

Hell, I’ve got potatoes. I’ll make my own damn dumplings. Fillings? Internet experts suggest everything from brains to blueberries, neither of which I have in my fridge. I do of course have mushrooms.

Alaska

me aboard a Holland America cruise ship

My mom and I took a Holland America cruise in August 2001 along Alaska’s southeastern coast. It was the most pleasant time of year to visit America’s coldest state. The views were breathtaking in the daytime. One night, we ventured out onto the dock… big mistake. It was freezing cold, terrifyingly windy (howling), and as dark as dark could be out in the middle of the pitch-black waters. We scurried back inside immediately.

MUST-SEE

view of Juneau from helicopter

1. Ketchikan. The salmon hatchery at Deer Mountain offers a good learning experience, since Alaska is famous for its salmon industry. The best fried fish I’ve ever had was at Halibut Hole along the dock. It was heavenly — smooth, fresh, white fish from cold waters.

dog sledding with a lady from our cruise

2. Juneau. Go on a salmon bake, if you want to watch a cook make your Alaskan meal in the wilderness and eat it in the same rustic surroundings. Take a helicopter ride over the beautiful, snow-capped mountains, land on a glacier, and go mushing (dog sledding) — we got to experience the speed of retired Iditarod dogs, an exhilarating ride. Seeing Alaska from the air, barely above the mountain peaks, is like watching one of those nature videos that shows sweeping shots from an aircraft, but you’re actually doing it and seeing it firsthand. Breathtaking.

Sitka Pier

3. Sitka. Kayak in Wilderness Sea — what a peaceful adventure in crisp, refreshing air. The Sitka pier is picturesque, like a postcard. From there, cruise on through Disenchantment Bay, Glacier Bay, and see Hubbard Glacier. Our ship was so close to the glaciers, I had a Titanic moment; I felt like we could almost touch the glaciers.
4. Valdez. Famous for the big Exxon oil spill but also a nice place for whitewater rafting. The waters are frigid and choppy, which made for a bad combination for me, when the water splashed into my whitewater rafting “warm” suit and ran down my back. Brrr…

Disenchantment Bay

5. Anchorage. Visit the Alaska Zoo, where you can see animals that roam the Alaskan wilderness, like bears. Of course, you can pay a lot more money for shore excursions that take you on bear-watching expeditions but don’t guarantee you’ll see any bears. From our cruise ship, we did see whales in the waters around us.

Our friends in the Northwest recommended a seasoned Realtor in Juneau, Alaska. We met with John Williams, who founded Juneau Real Estate in 2001. His company represents the real estate needs of residential and commercial clients in Juneau and beyond. Their offices are located in the Jordan Creek Center and directions can be found on their website.

Unlike so many “big box” real estate offices, John’s aim is to be friendly, as well as professional during his transactions. Getting to know his clients is an important and necessary part of the process. John and his small staff have resided in the Juneau area for a vary long time.

We found his website very helpful from the beginning of our search until we closed on our house. John and his staff were always available to help via email and over the phone. Much Thanks.

Pure brilliance. Meanwhile, folks who do not own guns did not do this, as it is impossible to do without a gun.

We took a walk last night to the edge of the Gastineau Channel to wave goodbye to the last cruise ship of the season, the Zaandam from Holland America Cruise Lines.

It was on its way to the Inside Passage by the time we got to the channel.

So long!

Farewell!

Conveniently, just around the time the last ship left, Mt. Roberts saw its first fresh snowfall of the season.

Goodbye, fall.  Winter is on its way!

Juneau is a city surrounded by mountains–well, mountains, ice fields, and the Gastineau Channel, an inlet of the Inside Passage which is an inlet of the Pacific Ocean.   Mount Roberts towers over Downtown Juneau, a sort of geographical Big Brother minus the creepy controlling bit.  We’ve been wanting to climb it for over a year now, and last weekend was The Big Day.  We climbed the 2.5 miles up to the treeline and then another mile up into the summit trail.  It was too windy to get up to the summit, but we did get to see some amazing views of Juneau!

The “conditions can and have been fatal” bit was a little intimidating…

A teeny tiny Kip, the Gastineau Channel, and the Mendenhall Valley beyond.

They really like to be intimidating with their signs, eh?

“DEATH FROM EXPOSURE HAS OCCURRED!!!!!”

…Kip wasn’t afraid.

After my rafting trip on Mendenhall Lake and River, Mom and I reconnoitered and spent the afternoon on dry land in Juneau. (Well—they tell me it was dry land.  I could feel the earth moving under my feet after so much time on the Pacific Ocean.  And it rained hard enough to soak through the outer layer of my raincoat.)

We had a taste of  local seafood at a restaurant next to the dock called the Twisted Fish.  The lunch crowd was a mix of tourists and locals.   I loved the name of the place and enjoyed the clam chowder but found the crab burger kind of bland.  Mom, who appreciates white fish, liked the halibut in berry sauce.

The Alaska State Museum was the top attraction on both of our lists for the afternoon, and we weren’t disappointed.  Most of the museum is devoted to the cultures of the Aleuts, Eskimos, Athabascans, and Northwest Coast peoples.  Highlights for me were bent boxes (wood is heated and bent, so that boxes have only one seam), a detailed explanation of formline drawings, and a fair amount of information about the history of my newest recreational sport (or do you say “essential tool for subsistence living”?)—kayaking.  They had a wonderful wooden kayak on view (uncovered—so you could see how it was constructed) and a map that showed which types of kayaks were traditionally used around the globe in different subarctic regions. 

One thing I liked about the museum was that the exhibits made at least a bit of an attempt to depict the culture of native peoples moving into the present—not simply frozen in the past.  In some cases, they did this by showing work by contemporary Native American artists that integrated “traditional” and “contemporary American” cultural influences, often using new media.  Other times, the artists seemed to take entirely contemporary approaches to dealing with a political issue.  Okay – I confess that I don’t think I’d have found some of those pieces compelling as art if I’d seen them out of that particular museum context, and the trajectory that they were trying to point to felt incomplete, but I appreciated the fact that they weren’t representing these cultures as dead or frozen in time. 

The museum also had smaller exhibits on Russians in Alaska, the American purchase of Alaska, and so on. It was big enough to be satisfying and small enough so that we were able to see most of it in a few hours.

If the Alaska State Museum lived up to my expectations, the other sights we visited in Juneau did not.  Most were a lot smaller and less impressive than they sounded in the guide books, quite frankly.  One gets the impression that the inhabitants of Juneau were investing everything in survival and had little left over for things like architecture, for example.  And who can blame them, when the landscape is so beautiful and the climate so punishing.  I’d feel churlish if I mentioned the disappointing places by name.

Instead, I’ll end this post by describing my second unexpected Alaskan library encounter. 

Upon leaving the Alaska State Museum, we were given directions on how to walk to another destination, which involved “going into the state building that looks like a parking lot,” taking the elevator up to the 8^th floor, exiting the building on that level (so we didn’t have to climb the hill ourselves), and continuing up the street.

The directions were good.  The building did look very much like the parking structure next to it (but taller), and taking the elevator up to the 8^th floor saved us most of an uphill climb.  And what did we see when we reached the 8^th floor but . . .

 . . . the offices of the State Library . . .

and the State archives and museums, which had . . .

. . . a few small photo displays hanging in their windows.  (Sorry for the crumby quality of the photo.)

So, not to be outdone by Ketchikan (which recognized its librarians through the naming of a lake), Juneau gave its librarians the penthouse.  (I think this was the tallest building in town, actually.)

I’ve just noticed that the Alaska State Library blog has a post about interesting maps of Alaska.  I’ll have to check this out in more detail later.

Guest Blog: This blog entry was contributed by the Developmental Disabilities Association’s Holiday Options program.

The Alaskan Cruise like always, did not disappoint. We indulged in buffet breakfast and lunches, and were treated to a 5-course meal at the Manhattan Restaurant every night for dinner. The entertainment on and off the ship kept us very busy the entire time, whether it was magic and singing performances on the ship or whale watching in Juneau, everyone was having the time of their lives. The staff were extremely helpful and friendly, helping us find events to do every night. There was always something going on at night, such as disco parties in the club, karaoke, live performances, etc…whatever night it was there is always something fun for us to do. Everyone became very close by the end of the trip, and the only thing we wish we could have changed about the trip is to have made it a 14-day cruise.

Disney Cruise Line has announced the itineraries for its ships in 2011, with cruises in the Mexican Riviera, Europe and Alaskan cruises for the first time. The Disney Wonder will sail 18 voyages during its 4-month deployment to Alaska, while sister ship Disney Magic will spend the summer in Europe cruising the Mediterranean.

Disney Wonder To Sail Alaska, Mexican Riviera

from 3 May 2011 to 30 August 2011, the 83,000-GRT Disney Wonder will be homeported in Vancouver and offer 7-night cruises to Alaska, marking Disney Cruise Line’s debut in the largest state of the USA. 

The new itinerary takes guests to experience the breathtaking vistas of majestic glaciers and fjords in Juneau, catching a glimpse of brown bears, bald eagles and other abundant wildlife. In Ketchikan, guests can also learn more about the rich history and customs of Alaska’s native culture through hand-carved totem poles and fish for some of the largest wild salmon in the world, while Skagway offers the opportunity to pan for gold like the miners from the famous Klondike gold rush.

Prior to repositioning to Alaska, Disney Wonder will sail 7-night voyages out of Los Angeles to the Mexican Riviera, including a special 10-night cruise with a stop at Manzanillo. The ship will resume cruising voyages from Los Angeles to the Mexican Riviera after its Alaskan deployment, calling at Cabo San Lucas, Mazatlan and Puerto Vallarta.

Disney Magic Returns To The Mediterranean

Departing out of Barcelona, Disney Magic will sail 10- and 11-night Mediterranean cruises for the 2011 summer season, taking guests to popular ports in France, Italy and Spain to explore the cultures of Europe.

Beginning 28 September 2011, the vessel offer 10 cruises calling at Civitavecchia, La Spezia, Naples and Villafranche, with 2 or 3 days at sea. Disney Magic will also visit Ajaccio in Corsica, the birthplace of Napoleon Bonaparte, as well as the island nation of Malta and explore the Arab influences of Tunis in North Africa.

For the majority of 2011, Disney Magic will sail out of Port Canaveral on alternating 7-night Eastern and Western Caribbean cruises, with both itineraries calling at Disney’s private island Castaway Cay. The vessel will also sail 2 repositioning 14-night transatlantic voyages.

For more information, visit disneycruise.disney.go.com.

As we docked in Juneau, we were greeted by rain, clouds over the mountains, and the same types of tourist shops we had seen surrounding the docks in Ketchikan.  (“That’s the real Alaska,” I heard over and over again, every time it rained, from everyone who worked in the tourist industry.)  In general, people don’t let rain slow them down (although I heard that the “flightseeing” helicopter rides were canceled). 

But the rain didn’t disrupt anything I had planned (other than photography).  My first order of business was to get on a bus that took me roughly 17 miles north of town for a rafting trip in Mendenhall Lake and Mendenhall River.  The primary point of the trip was to see Mendenhall Glacier, which was clearly in view as the raft trip began.  The weather conditions at the Glacier were halfway between what you see in these two photos, and you can find more photos on the Tongass Web site. Parts of the glacier did look light blue–due to the compression of the ice caused by higher parts of the ice field on lower sections, I was told.  I was also told that glaciers look blue on cloudy days but white on sunny ones.

The excursion description that I read before signing up indicated that this was a “float” and likely would be quite tame—although there was a vague comment about water conditions being weather dependent.  I ended up lucking out in that regard.  It had rained hard the preceding night, and the continuing precipitation helped the river achieve its highest level of the summer: 13 inches—officially an inch above the flood level. We occasionally passed $500K – $1M houses scattered along the shores of the river—although none of them appeared to be flooded.  We also ran into a few patches of class III and IV rapids. 

A fun time was had by me (although some of my fellow passengers were not too pleased).  We all had paddles, but our guide had oars and did all of the steering and most of the work.   We ended up with a lot of water in our raft and spent quite some time bailing with a large bucket.  The lake and river were fed by Mendenhall Glacier—so the water temperature was just a few degrees above freezing.  But we had been provided with knee high rubber boots and waders—so we were dry—if not 100% warm. 

So this trip was nothing like the first whitewater rafting trip I took 10 years ago on the Youghiogheny River in West Virginia—where the guides were in kayaks, leaving us to steer and paddle on our own—and where getting dumped into the river (4 times in my case) was just part of the fun.  Here, the guides were determined to keep us in the boat. They weren’t playing around with hypothermia.

We do love our bald eagles and I could tell you so may stories about our personal experience with them.  We were fortunate to have a cabin just a few miles from  the Chikat Bald Eagle Preserve in Haines  http://dnr.alaska.gov/parks/units/eagleprv.htm  

 Eagles were everywhere in the fall, and most everywhere during the summer.  We could fly in through the narrows of the two lakes at tree-top level and eagles would be perched at the highest point and would not bulge.  On the winter solstice one year, we stopped in to see a friend of ours who lived remotely near Baranoff Warm Springs.  An immature eagle had gone after the bait in one of his traps and was injured.  We volunteered to take it back with us to Juneau to the Raptor Center to be taken care of.   No pictures of this experience, but try to picture this.  In a small 4-seater airplane, there is a dog in the back seat and I am sitting in the co-pilots seat with an eagle in my lap.  Its feet were tied together, but other than that – I was just hold it in my arms.  For such a huge bird, they are very light.  A float plane in the ocean can make very rough sounds upon take-off and I could feel the eagle tense up and actually felt his heart beat faster.  Once we were flying, it calmed down.  What was fascinating was that it would track with it eyes, any other eagles (or planes) we would by chance fly by.  It is an hour flight and sometime during it, “solstice”  (that is what we named him because we picked him up on the solstice), decided to take a look at me.  I didn’t know it at the time, but eagles can pivot their heads 180 degrees, which means his beak was within an inch or two of my face. Whoooo!  I just kept talking to him in a calm voice – and praying.   When we got him/her to the raptor center, the caretaker said that he had never heard of an eagle being transported not in a cage – and we were very lucky.  We were.  If he had decided to try to get away, it definitely could have interfered with Bill’s ability to fly the plane.  OK, we were stupid to do it.   http://baldeagles.org/eagleinfo.html 

 But Solstice was rehabilitated and eventually shipped somewhere in the lower 48.   We like to feed the eagles from our deck in the winter when other food is hard to get.  We use either deer scraps, or salmon carcasses we have saved for this purpose – or ask the butcher for any meat scraps they might have.  Eagles don’t go for bread, like the ravens will do.  We can throw the meat on the beach and seemingly out of no-where an eagle will appear.  And another. And another.  They appear to have a pecking order of authority or maybe just the biggest ones get what they want.  They will catch meat in mid-air, almost hovering sometimes.   Awesome to watch.  What always has amazed me is that their chatter is not as majestic as their appearance  –  squeaky most of the time http://www.kwic.com/~pagodavista/haliaetus.au

Juneau Airport - Near our Plane

Off the deck of our house

Look at the beak

Maybe 20 feet from the house

Juneau

Lousy, rainy weather. We’ve been to Juneau several times so we went to the library so Scott could work because he needed Internet access. Internet on the ship costs a lot, they charge per minute for a slow connection. I went back to the ship and did laundry by hand for 45 minutes and then went to lunch. Ran into Gary in his robe, he was looking for another hot tub, because the one we were in last night was too hot. Then went to a presentation by Libby Riddle, the first woman to win the Iditarod in 1985. She was a very good speaker and had a great slide show. Her inspiring message was that you can do something very difficult if you put your mind to it. Today I just keep wishing I were really interested and passionate about something. Hopefully I’ll find it soon. Then we sat in the hot tub for about an hour as the ship pulled out of Juneau. Met another neat couple from Montana (Walter and Crystal). Walter told us about a smart method for building log cabins. Use shorter logs and make walls in sections with angle iron holding the logs in place. That way you can pull them out at will. He mentioned using a fiberglass barrier between logs and then cutting ¼ rounds to fill the notches. Need to look into different log cabin building methods and be genius about it. When we got out of the hot tub there was a full double rainbow, it was so vibrant! Watched My Big Fat Greek Wedding and toasted tumblers of Vodka to going to Greece (Helenika) with my sweetie and maybe Dicker and Casey next year!

Skagway

The next morning we arrived in Skagway and boarded the White Pass & Yukon Railroad. That was an incredible train ride through some of the most amazing scenery. Again, the weather was perfect and we got to see every hanging glacier on top of the mountains. The train briefly crossed into Canada before heading back to the ship.

White Pass Yukon Railroad

Then we walked around Skagway and found the brewery. The IPA and barley wine were delicious. A woman sitting next to us at the bar admired Scott’s wedding band and invited us to stay at her house in California if we needed a place to shower.

We didn’t see much point in roaming around town since we didn’t need to buy anything, so we headed into the hills and found a hiking trail up to Reid Falls. That was a nice long hike that re-invigorated our bodies. We came back to the ship to have dinner and then sat in the hot tub, where we met a very cool couple Gary and Amy from Austin, TX. He’s a composer for Disney and she is a clinical psychiatrist. They are the most interesting couple we’ve met on the ship. We weren’t surprised to see mostly older people on this boat. Most of them seem to think we’re a bit crazy when we tell them that I just quit my job and that Scott is an artist and we’re going to travel for a while. Some are jealous and wish they had done something like that, and the rest probably think we’re bums and should be buying a house and having kids. So we’re not really getting a lot of encouragement from the older generation, but we feel that we’re doing the right thing by living outside the box. Life is short and I get the feeling that most of these people are a bit bitter because they got around to traveling when they’re bodies protest such adventurous behavior. I can’t believe how many unhealthy people are on this ship stuffing their faces at the buffet.

Reid Falls in Skagway