INSIDE PASSAGE
At 6:00 pm on June 15th the Alaska Marine Highway ferry left Bellingham, WA, near the Canadian boarder. Similar to 1988, the next morning was drizzly with low overcast; perfect to capture the feeling of SE Alaska, though we were still between Vancouver Island and mainland BC. However, this time we did not camp on the deck, we had a cabin.
A large Holland America cruise ship was docked and had disgorged hordes of overweight, camera snapping, multi-ethnic tourists. There were plenty of plaques describing Ketchikan's history and culture, but hardly any shore-leavers stopped to read them. The boardwalk was lined with sweatshirt, bubble ice-tea, and fish and chip shops. There were also beautiful local arts and crafts by the indigenous peoples. When I came here for work in 1997 at the end of the tourist season, I was told shop owners left to winter in Arizona. Ketchikan gets twelve FEET of rain a year while Seattle gets just over 36 inches. A lovely town, but pretty one dimensional. Eye candy, not a meal.
Our next stop was Wrangle at 3:30 pm. While I couldn't live here, it seemed delightfully real. Kids bicycling gravel roads, grocery store, and houses in various states of repair. The only thing for tourists, and the locals, was an ice cream cum sushi shop. Only in Wrangle would you combine those two.
We didn't get off at the last stop of the day, Petersburg, as it was dinner time. But Petersburg is of note because of its strong Norwegian heritage which still lives on. Ironic, since it was founded by the Russians and thus named.
We arrived in Juneau on the third morning at 4:30 am. Being north now, and close to the solstice, it was already daylight. The ferry dock is six miles from the town center, and the airport is between the two. We had a 9:00 am flight on a small puddle jumper so we killed time with breakfast at Donna's Restaurant near the airport where I dined on reindeer sausage with biscuits and gravy. Excellent! We boarded our flight for the 20 minute hop to Gustavus, the gateway to Glacier National Park, and from sunny skies to drizzle.
We were picked up at the gravel runway in Gustavus by a pleasant chatty woman. As she went over the details of our stay she informed us there was no alcohol at the Inn, but she'd be glad to buy us what we wanted in "town" which, we discovered, consists of three buildings. Used to working with hoteliers, it seemed odd for a lodge to miss out on this revenue stream, but we didn't think much about it. We arrived at Glacier Bay Inn, an oddly shaped, owner design/built, series of cabins, lodge/restaurant, and out-buildings near an abandoned and overgrown airstrip. Clearly, no building permits for this project. The logs were felled and milled on site, interior walls were half finished, and the design seemed very ad hoc.
That afternoon went to the marina and walked the shoreline to a Tlingit tribal house. We had an informative tour of the art work and local culture by a member of one of the four main Tlingit tribes. Later, the lodge owner complained about how much the Federal Government spent on the construction. But we thought it beautiful and minor compensation in the scheme of buying all Alaska in 1867 from Russia for $7 million - without consulting the inhabitants for thousands of years.
During dinner at the lodge overlooking the former airstrip we met many other staff; all young and from Arizona. They were very nice with innocent beatific smiles. As we looked around we realized we were the only ones with wine for dinner. Bantering with one of the girls stumbling with the wine, she said something like "Oh, I don't know anything about this - I don't drink".
Not unusual, but slowly we connected the dots and realized the owners, the staff, and most guests were Mormon. Later, the pleasant chatty woman who picked us up confirmed our suspicions. It turned out the small community of Gustavus is a predominantly Mormon with strong connections to Arizona. As the only non-Mormon staff, she was the designated enabler for the gentiles. Mormons historically gravitate to remote areas without much government oversight in UT, AZ, ID, and BC, so it's fitting they'd settle off the grid Alaska. (Read "Under the Banner of Heaven" by Jon Krakauer for a true murder mystery, and a contemporary and historic view of this religion.)
Our next day was an eight hour round trip boat tour of Glacier Bay N.P. What's quite remarkable about reaching my late 60s is to see Geologic Time happen in our life-time. Meaning things that have taken tens of thousands of years or even millions, happen in several hundred - or a mere sixty eight. I first visited Glacier Nat'l Park in MT in 1973 and on our drive trip last year we saw that many glaciers have drastically shrunk since then; expected to be gone before I am. I remember in the 70s seeing Nat Geo articles of the shrinking Aral Sea off the Caspian, and it is now almost entirely dried up. And Glacier Bay shows what glacier retreat will look like shortly for Mt Rainier and the Cascades where we live, not to mention the Alps, Andes, and Himalaya where they've closed climbing routes due to avalanche danger. It's compressed time for us all to ponder.
The day following the boat tour we returned to Juneau; our friends continued on to Anchorage for their trip to Denali and the Kenai Peninsula. We stayed one night in the hotel I remodeled thirty-eight years before. "You can never go back" makes sense only if you expect things be the same. I don't, and therefore find it life-affirming. The hotel is still there along with many of the design creations we implemented. But it also changed. The operator changed. The uses changed. The lovely elegant lounge and piano bar we designed is now just a haphazard assemblage of furniture without a soul.
The town is pretty much the same but more geared toward tourism. But our tour of the capital was rewarding with unique history and lovely Alaska art.
Next Post: Coming into the Country - North of the Arctic Circle
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