Juneau – State Capitol of Alaska

Rosie and The Operator are in Juneau Alaska, the state with more wildlife than people, more miles of trails than roads and more glaciers than you can ever see in a lifetime.  Juneau is not only Alaska’s State Capitol but is also Alaska’s Nature Capital! (so dubbed by Rosie)

Let me tell you a little more about this natural wonder in the middle of nowhere, the stats are impressive.  Did Juneau?  That’s a little local humor…good eh?  Did Juneau….that 32,000 people live in this town that has no road access to it.  Serious, you can only get to Juneau by either plane or boat, impenetrable mountains and forest enclose the town on all sides, see, look at the pic below.

Juneau the State Capitol of Alaska has a land area of 5227 square kms.  A quarter of that land is ice cap, another quarter is rivers and lakes and get this, the urbanised area is only 425 square kms with the rest of the land being forest!  Making Juneau the largest capital city in the United States by land area.

Rain falls an average here 230 days a year with the coldest day ever recorded being -31c in 1972 whilst the hottest was 32c in 1975.  My final fact, the longest road, the Glacier Highway, is 67km long, serious!  Roads branch off it but most lead to dead ends or loop back to the highway.  For a town that you cannot drive in and out of, or very much around….there sure are a hell of a lot of cars here!

We arrived at 0600am on the Alaskan Marine Highway Passenger Ferry which is the local public transport option to get from A to B in these here far flung parts.  The ferry terminal was about 20kms out of the town of Juneau so we caught a taxi and went straight to our apartment.  Lucky for us the previous tenants had already shifted out on an early flight and we were able to open up and leave our bags there for the day.

The first images of the town we saw was from the deck of our ferry as the sun rose.  Mountains and forested hills rose from the bay before us and the Mendenhall Glacier gleamed in the early morning light.  The town sits on a narrow sliver of land right on the bayside and houses are built right up to the sheer forested mountainsides. The air is slightly colder here and there is a hint of rain in the sky today.

First order of the day was to get some information on the town and surrounds and then digest it over a coffee….which Rosie desperately needed.  The good thing about tourist towns…there were already two cruise ships which docked about the same time as we arrived so everything was open.  I kid you not, it was just before 7am, the thousands of passengers were spilling out the boats in droves and town was open and ready for business.  Rosie thinks the lovely information center ladies may have needed a coffee at that hour of the morning themselves…they were so exuberant in their job but didn’t really know a lot and could hardly answer any of Rosie’s questions…we left them rifling through drawers pondering about rental cars and where we can collect them from.

It had just started to rain, yay, Rosie and The Operator had especially bought new down jackets and raincoats for this holiday and have been a little disappointed we haven’t had to bust them out as the weather has been so warm and dry.  Zipping up her coat one hundred meters from the information booth Rosie paused and turned as someone was calling out up the street.  The elderly information booth lady was running towards us in the rain, triumphantly waving the information paper on rental cars she had eventually found for us.  Yip, that’s how nice everyone is here in this part of the world.

The town is similar in build and construction to ours back home.  Single Story weatherboard shops with verandas to protect from the weather and a high wide fascia above the veranda with the shops name proudly emblazoned on it.  Alot of the old town is original as Juneau was one of those rare turn of the century towns that was never destroyed by fire.  Towering above and sandwiching these low rise storefronts are the mountainous hills…and the cruise ships.

We are spending 6 nights here in Juneau, its a long stop for such a small town but there is so much to see and do outwith the town on day trips that we decided to extend our stay, plus we also took into account the high rainfall and accompanying fog and gave a couple of extra days so we could be abit more flexible with our excursions which would be perfect on a fine day, fingers crossed.

So coffeed up, plan made, maps marked, Rosie and The Operator are ready to push out.  We first went and booked the couple of excursions we wanted to do after checking the weather forecast and then we walked along the waterfront to the Mt Roberts Tramway.

Rosie did a double take as she walked past this shop….these are the most amazing collection of gumboots she has ever seen….all on sale with a huge wall of them instore….come to think of it, Rosie has noticed gumboots seem to be the footwear of choice around town by the locals…so much nicer than red bands.

Float planes use the narrow bay as a landing strip and the hum and roar of these planes are constant during the day with their coming and going. They are like the taxis of the skies and carry between six and ten passengers.  They line up and park on the harbor front wharf and are a sight to behold taking off and landing.

We are heading to wards the Mt Roberts Tramway, a gondola which is going to whisk us up the hill in a near vertical 1800 foot ascent to the top of the mountain where we will catch the great view over the town and then go for a wee hike.

The ride was ear popping and the aerial view of Juneau was incredible.  Looking down the mountainside along the fjord like Gastineau Channel that Juneau sits in was incredible.  We were doubly lucky as they do not get many clear days as good as today at this time of the year!

Native artists were busy carving totem poles in a space right by the viewpoint, they had the best office view in the world and their work was pretty impressive.

Rosie and The Operator are off for a little walk on the top of Mt Roberts, it’s a short 2.5 km hike and The Operator is hopeful that he will see a bear, our first bear ever….after all, these signs are everywhere, and look, down the bottom, it says the population is 50,000+.  I doubt it said Rosie there are too many loud cruise ship visitors around….the bears are cleverer than them.

The hike was fun, on actual muddy tracks, with actual tree roots running naturally over them and rocks to use as steps in some places.  It was still pretty tame and easy going but it felt like the real deal to Rosie especially as we were up so high and the view was spectacular!

These trees have been warped as youngsters by snow.  The snow falls and accumulates on the young saplings and the weight bends the trees over winter deforming the tree forever.  So many were like that in this particular area where the snow slides down a large bank and accumulates naturally at the bottom.  Why all the selfies?  Sadly along the trail were designated ‘selfie stops’….we have never seen this before anywhere and, well, we just had to oblige for fun.

The views along the way were stunning!  Sheer drop offs and tall bluffs where you could see the white pinpricks of mountain goats high above us.

Cut into the living trees on the way around the track was native art and the only wildlife we saw was a soaring Alaskan Eagle and a couple of red squirrels.  No bears.

The ride down the tramway was just as fun and a short walk back to town took us straight to the swinging saloon doors of the local institution that is The Red Dog Saloon.

Push through them doors, you first hear the clattering piano as your eyes adjust to the deep gloom inside.  Then you actually laugh out loud at the sight before you.  Its like stepping back in time to the wild west!  Sawdust is piled onto the floor, the serving girls are dressed like western hookers and the room is a riot of kitsch.

Rosie and The Operator sat at the bar to soak it all in.  From the huge bear head mounted over the bar looking over the saloon to the gun of Wyatt Earp….that he apparently signed into the Marshall’s Office upon arriving in Juneau in 1900 as per the rules of the town.  The gun was left here as he couldn’t collect it when he was leaving town because the Marshalls Office wasn’t open when his boat left the next morning.  Guess there was no freight forward in those days.

Welcome to the Red Dog Saloon, the oldest bar in town and it was pumping at lunchtime…with the oldest patrons Rosie and The Operator have ever come across.  Maybe they were the oldies from the cruise ships….maybe they were aged fans of the Piano Man, he was very good and singing all the golden oldies.  We have never seen so many zimmer frames shuffling through the sawdust and a mobility scooter leaving wheel tracks in it as the old timer driving navigated around the bar…..true!

The waterfront area of the town is the dock for the cruise ships.  Up to four huge boats park here per day and disgorge sometimes upwards of 10,000 into the town.  It is getting near the end of the cruise season and sometimes there are only two boats in the harbor.  All of the shop owners, food carts, information and ticket booths seem to know the daily schedules because if there is not a ship parked at the wharf…which was once while we were there, none of the shops are open.  Everyone gives themselves a well earned lie in.  No cruise ships, no customers.

The boardwalk stretches along the front of the town from the cruise ship docks and is home to a few statues commemorating the mining industry from which this town is built on.

There is also a statue of a beloved town dog from the 1920s who used to have an uncanny knack of knowing when a ship was coming into dock and go out and sit on the wharf to greet all of the new comers, everyday.

During our stay The Operator decided to trek the sea walk further around the bay  on his own while Rosie stayed at home catching up on her writing.    Half an hour into his walk he sent me a message saying he had seen a bear!  Rosie answered that she would only believe him if there was photographic evidence. Beep beep….a photo pinged in…very funny, haha.

Another 10 minutes later The Operator messaged me again saying I had just missed out on a pod of whales frolicking in the harbor and he had got some great pics!

No, no no no swore Rosie…I cant believe I missed out on this…The Operator isn’t even very good at taking pics!  Rosie would have so nailed these pictures!  What a once in a life time sight to see!  Then again, Rosie looked a little harder at The Operators pics and Rosie does not think that she could have done a better job herself.  They are pretty spectacular!

The Operator came home looking rather smug, Rosie was still bummed she had missed out on seeing the whales…..then, The Operator confessed!

The picture was of a statue, a pretty, hyper realistic statue that sprays water around the whale as if it were….well, jumping out of the harbor!  The Operator had totally fooled Rosie!  It doesn’t happen very often but we also had fun fooling a lot of others too.

Seafood is a way of life here with the staple being salmon, followed by cod and halibut….then there’s the King, King Crab to be precise!  This delicacy is fished straight from the cold, deep , stormy Bering Sea over a three month fishing period.  These giants from the deep are sold in their thousands from Tracy’s Crab Shack and we had to give them a go as we have never tried this delicacy before.

Watching the guy out front of the shack who was steaming the legs and claws in giant pots of water to order was fun.  Giant clouds of fragrant crab scented steam blew warmly into your face when the lids were lifted and the boxes of legs were just amazing!

Rosie and The Operator opted for a crabby combo of crab cakes, crab bisque, plus a leg and a claw.  Wow! The claws were so big and the leg was so long!  We unpeeled the prize at the table and felt so satisfied having to work for your dinner by breaking into the tough spiny shell.  They had snipped up the leg for us but it was still a challenge getting to the prize with the flimsy plastic tool they supplied to help us out.   Once that white and blush coloured meat as thick as two of your fingers together was released, well we were in succulent juicy moist crabby heaven.   As you can see, we stripped the shell and literally licked them clean!

We spent some leisurely days in Juneau exploring the small town and looking for the haunts where the locals hung out.  We found a great outdoor food caravan and bar area for when the sun was shining, we were told that just yesterday a bear had come and was wandering in the grassy area above the umbrellas…well, we had to come back every day for a beer according to The Operator, just in case we saw The Bear.

We also discovered the local Gin Distillery – Juneauper Gin – it was a great place with heaps of gin cocktails and the big copper distilling machine ticking away up front of house.   Rosie couldn’t stay long unfortunately…The Night of The Mini Gins was still too fresh.

A couple of doors down we found another local dive bar and ventured into the dark interior…the duke box was going, a gang of Brit tourists were dancing to rock classics, a group of Asians were nodding their heads in time to the beat from another table and a few guys were sitting at the bar heads bowed over their pints.  The Brits finally coaxed the Asians up to dance…Rosie and The Operator kindly declined but ended up taking pics for the Asians on request, to prove how ‘wild’ they had been on holiday….it was only 3.00pm in the afternoon.

One of the long haired, cap and gumboot wearing locals slithered along the bar and chatted with us.  Mitch was from Colarado, he worked on a fishing boat and the season had just finished, he had been on his boat for the last three months solid working…he had just been paid today for the last three months and he also had three days in town before he went home to his family.

Mitch was chatting to The Operator about life on the boats as the Asians waved, bowed and left the pub, the Brits kept dancing and then Mitch looked around… and said, ‘Time to get this party started!’  Up he got from his seat, strode over to the big brass bell and rang that sucker until our ears were reverberating as much as the bell….’A round for the bar’….he roared.  The barmaid was already lining up shot glasses and as per the tradition, when the bell is rung, everyone in the bar is shouted a shot by the ringer….OK, it was well played, there was only nine of us!  The Brits were stoked, the dudes at the bar nodded, the barmaid knocked one back and Rosie and The Operator looked at one another and groaned….down the hatch.

Well, said The Operator, I guess we have to reciprocate now, nine people isn’t to much to buy for.  As The Operator stood to head towards the bell, a group of about twenty stepped into the bar…..you can sit right down again said Rosie….you bet, said The Operator promptly sitting as Mitch roared with laughter.

Well, we only reciprocated with Mitch seeing as he was the original buyer…after another two shots each Mitch waved and left…Rosie sure hopes he will have money left to take home to his family in Colorado after three days in Juneau.

‘There are strange things done in the Midnight Sun’ as a famous poem by Robert Service quoted….well this is likely one of them….a ute, with the top crudely cut off and now made into a convertible, in one of the worlds wettest places…makes sense, not.

Talking about wet, its going to be wet on and off, for the next couple of days so whilst we are waiting for a clear day to visit the Mendenhall Glacier we are going to hire a car and drive that epic 67km of Juneaus Glacier Highway from end to end….just because!  Come and join us tomorrow!