Chronic Negress

Most of my time in tiny Skagway has been spent bouncing from Internet site to Internet site, but with any luck, this will work. Skagway is home to about 800 souls year-round. Add to that 400,000 cruise ship passengers, and you have a rustic town with some fine spots for coffee, food and the usual Alaska stuff – T-shirts activated by sunlight, fleece, fur, jewels, and variations on moose carvings and other stuff you need to dust. We’re lucky because only one other ship is in port with us. In Juneau, there were more people and more stores and salmon at every turn. We ate grilled salmon at an all you can eat salmon bake accompanied by a youthful string band who did a nice version of “Ashokan Farewell.” And first-rate blueberry cake and corn bread. Before that, the saltwater aquarium at the hatchery introduced the other sea life besides the edible stuff – starfish, sea cucumbers, flounder, crabs and fleshy, feathery animals that are rooted to the ocean floor. Before the hatchery, we saw the Mendenhall Glacier. I’ll post the photos later, but it’s extraordinary and is now retreating at 200 feet a year instead of 60, evidence of global warming for sure. There’s a waterfall next to the glacier, and those are pretty common here. In fact, we passed a couple and saw some on the Summit ride, which was cut short by fog. No matter, the falls and this odd, lunar-like landscape dotted with dwarf pines, small ponds and scaly rocks were worth the trip. Biggest highlight in the wildlife division was last night’s whale watch off Juneau. Besides sea lions resting on the buoy, we saw several humpbacks, including one lunge feeding (I missed that) and several flukes, or tails. The tails are three feet longer than your average compact pickup. I ended the night with a local beer in my stateroom, watching “Syriana” and a Law and Order rerun. Some things don’t change.