Guns and glaciers

Juneau Alaska is considered one of the most liberal and progressive parts of Alaska, however that does not mean that everyone is not still pretty much obsessed with killing things.

Downtown is composed almost entirely of jewellery and souvenirs shops for the cruise ship passengers - despite the fact all the cruise ships have jewellery shops on board!

Fi bought this lovely fur bikini, but only after haggling over the price for a good half hour

It's hard to argue with their logic - Harry I nearly got you this but the postage was prohibitive

The town is full of Ravens, they give the place real atmosphere with their great noises

Banksy eat your heart out

A print from Alaska state museum - This is supposed to be a sea otter 

Yes that is bacon on a doughnut - quite uncharacteristically Ralph didn't actually eat one

A nice dude called Dave, a construction worker staying at our hotel, gave us a lift to one of the nearby glaciers.

Mendenhall glacier

Icebergs in the water

nice waterfall

Signs that the bears had been about

Junea is a pretty groovy town, one of the more liberal in Alaska, and despite the title of my last post not a place where Sarah Palin is particularly popular. I had it in mind that finding some right wing bumper stickers would make a great present as they are about the only thing that can fit into our overloaded bags.

Mmm, I have to say I don't look that comfortable holding this

That's better - Bonnie and Clyde eat your heart out

 A poster in the gun shop

Into the the wild (well 7.5miles in)

We booked a forest service cabin at Eagle glacier 30 miles from Juneau, the cabin was at the end of a 7.5 mile long trail. We had been told that hitching in Alaska was not easy but we had a new found confidence given our extensive training on San Juan island.  After around 20 mins a guy in a jeep gave us a lift, he had moved from Los Angeles to get away from people and said he got his job at the hospital by accident. When going to the hospital to register, the day he arrived on Juneau, he was meet by a man at the desk who said he was currently too drunk to do his job, the hospital employee pleaded with him to cover the responsibility of patient suicide watch that evening - after much convincing he agreed and got a job at the hospital as a result. 

Our vain attempt to do something "Wild" is nothing on this guy, check out this http://www.dickproenneke.com/alone_in_the_wilderness.html it's amazing and was recommended to us by a nice chap called Dave we met at the driftwood hotel in Juneau.

Hitching to the trail head, Fi would lure them in and then I would jump out of the bushes once they had stopped

Skunk cabbage (the thing on the left) not to be confused with the stink produced by the one on the right

A load of salmon, these one were humpies or pink salmon. They were so big that we thought the noise they made was bears hunting them rather just them splashing about 

porcupine - we also saw a black bear and cub on this trail

They move pretty fast

Man with wearable mosquito net that we met on the trail (they were the only people we met all day and had been in the cabin the day before us)

pretty swamp/lake

The trail was quite varied and had a lot of board walk

Bear spray practice

The trail had lots of marshy bits

nearly there

The cabin in all its glory

Manly wood chopping for the wood stove

Chopping in the twilight is not advisable

Porcupine poop - he had been making the most of the wood store in the winter

The glacial lake in fronnt of the cabin. We saw a large adult beaver swim across here at night, I had put too much wood on the stove (no we are in america resources no longer seem finite) and went to cool off on the porch in my pants (are you enjoying the mental imagery?) and there it was happily swimming along.

We started the fire with someone's left over rabbit targets

A selection of cool looking fungus from the trail.

(Hump) back on the water

We felt quite at home on board the MV Kennicott, nice to be back at sea!  The Alaska Marine Highway is a state run ferry system which is the only way you can reach many parts of Alaska without flying.  If you don't manage to get a cabin you can pitch your tent on the deck or sleep on the sun loungers.  It got quite competitive at the beginning with people bagsying tent space or sun loungers.  We slept in the Solarium with some cool people.  Susie was on her way up to live and teach in Homer, Desi was visiting friends in Juneau and the two guys next to us, old school friends on their annual boys holiday were really excited about their 6 week sea kayaking trip.  It was a really nice atmosphere and people were really friendly.

Ralph hard at work as ever

Between Ketchikan and Juneau is an area called Frederick Sound, home to lots of humpback whales.  We saw at least 12, first the water spout,then they roll forward so we saw the fin and then they lift their tail.  They weren't very close to the boat but quite near the coast, we could see and hear the spout from a long way away.  It was amazing, we never expected to see so many from the ferry.

Russ - here's Ralph modelling his eye mask!

The ferry goes along the Inside Passage really close to Vancouver Island and lots of other islands and through really narrow channels such as Seymour Narrows once home to Ripple Rock and described as one of the vilest stretches of water in the world.  See link for clip about explosion that removed the top of Ripple Rock.  We went through here in the middle of the night.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xOh20xpFmZI&feature=related 

The lights were on all night (and day) so Ralph fashioned this highly advanced lampshade so we could sleep.

This shows how narrow some of the channels were.

At the ballet bar

Ralph met an enhanced mermaid in Ketchikan.  Our ferry stopped for 4 hours at the skeggy end of Ketchikan, all the massive cruise ships dock right at the end of the main street.

D'Andre with his cute puppy.  It was like being with a celebrity, as we walked round town everyone was stopping him to have a pat of the pup as it was so cute.  

Poop pup looks a bit concerned!

Luckily we got a chance to meet Alaskas first lady, the lovely Sarah P.....thankfully just a cardboard cut out.  Scarily a fellow passenger said he'd forgive her horrible policies as she's got nice legs!

Creek Street Ketchikan, Ralph waits for Fiona outside the brothel...its not how it sounds, I went on a tour of the historic red light district.  During the prohibition alcohol was smuggled from boats in the creek up through a trapdoor under the brothel built on pilings.

Floatplanes were taking off and landing right by the ferry while we were docked in Ketchikan, it sounded like the battle of Britain.