The Cruise Ships Are Here!

Downtown Juneau

The first set of cruise ships arrived in Juneau this weekend.  With the tourists, the whole of downtown Juneau came to life.  There are people everywhere and all of the sudden there are shops I didn't even know existed.  It was a great weekend weather wise, too, for the season start.  It had been on the rainy side lately so the sun was a welcome change.

Waterfall near Mendenhall Glacier

Since my last post on Windfall Lake Trail, I had been on several hikes.  Most were my usual favorites: Boy Scout/Crow Point Trail, Airport Dike Trail, Rainforest Trail, and the Mendenhall Glacier area.  I did do a few new ones, too.  One was the Mt Roberts Trail.  I had a friend in town from Japan last week (it was Golden Week there), and since nothing was quite open yet for the tourists, most of the activities had to involve hiking.  The tram to the top wasn't open yet either, so I thought it would be nice if we could hike up there for a view.  I wasn't certain of the conditions, but we went anyways and found it to be about as bad as I thought, but not bad enough to turn around.  We got at least to where the tram was, after trudging through muddy and icy conditions.  It will be at least another month or so before the snow up there clears for better conditions to go further.  Similarly, the Perseverence Trail I did this weekend wasn't quite cleared of snow either.  It is actually a fairly level hike, but about a mile or so in, we started hitting snow.  We hiked through snow for about a mile, and some parts were thigh deep.  As we were stepping in spots we hoped was packed snow, we often sunk in.  This made the hike difficult so we turned around before reaching the end of the trail.  The trail will still be there once summer hits.

Creek along Perseverence Trail

Mt Roberts Tram

After hiking Perseverence Trail, I went up the tram since it was Juneau Appreciation Day on Saturday and the ride was only $8 (normally it's $27).  Although I had been up there already, it was nice out so I thought I'd go up there again and have something to eat after the hike. 

I'm looking forward to summer a lot.  It has been a long winter.  I can see green grass growing and flowers budding here and there.  The change in season keeps things interesting even when I do the same hikes over and over again.  With warmer weather I am also starting to see more wildlife around.   So far they are mostly birds.  I've seen a few Eagles already.  I have yet to see a bear or mountain goats though.  Shouldn't be long now though before things get more interesting. The salmon will start running, bears will be out, and maybe I'll get to see a whale or two.  Come on summer!!

Windfall Lake Trail

Windfall Lake - still a bit iced over

Up to now, I've only done the short trails but I am now eager to do longer ones.  Unfortunately I don't have the right equipment to do any 'climbing' in early Spring conditions.  Even the low elevation ones can be icy and a bit difficult to traverse.  So another easy low elevation trail here is the Windfall Lake Trail.

The trailhead is at the end of a gravel road to the right of Egan just South of Herbert River.  My Corolla didn't have enough bottom clearance to go over the snow covered road in places so instead of chancing it, we left our car at the lot on the corner of Egan and the gravel road.  The walk to the trailhead there was about .5 miles, so that added about 15 minutes to our walk each way. 

I was a little disappointed the trail was entirely through the forest.  I had hoped for some clearing to get views of the peaks you get a glimpse of towards beginning of the trail.  The whole way is shaded though and you don't get a view until you get to the lake... and it's 3.5 miles to the lake from the trailhead.  The trail is again planked and icy.  It took us an hour longer to do the hike than expected.  We saw a family of four coming back from the lake though, with their bicycles.  It can't imagine walking that trail with a bike.  Or even riding on it.  Either they thought it sucked bad too or we are just wusses. 

Parts of the trail crosses rivers so there are several foot bridges along the way.  It's still icy at parts, and silly Millie fell in as she went on the ice to get closer to water.  I think she was a bit shocked too but she managed to swim and make her way towards us at which point we helped her out.  Once at the lake, we decided to keep her on the leash since we didn't want her falling through the thin ice over the lake. 

The last little bit of the trail splits into two and one path leads to a cabin maintained by the Forest Service.  The other supposedly goes to the lake but there is also lake access at the cabin.  It was our first visit to one of these hyped cabins.  For $35/night, you can rent one of these through recreation.gov.  This one was a pretty nice cabin.  There's a bunk in there where about 4 people can probably sleep (must bring own sleeping bags).  A table inside and outside, and a propane heater.  There's a solar powered outhouse outside the cabin.  There's no running water, but there's a canoe you can use to go out on the lake.

We didn't stay the night at the cabin, but it is available as a warming hut for the public during hours of 10-5.  We had our lunch on the outside deck and turned around.  I suppose it would be very nice though in the summer to just relax out there on the canoe, away from everything. 

Lena Point Trail

The trailhead for this trail was tricky to find.  From Egan Drive, turn left towards the Lena Beach picnic area.  Maybe about a mile down, there is a sign facing the road (not down or up the road) that says "Lena Point Trail".  It's difficult to see ahead of time but you might notice it as you drive by.  If you end up at the turnoff to the radio tower or the NOAA building, both which will be on your right, you went too far.  There's a big empty parking lot used by the government right next to the trailhead. We parked by the trailhead because we weren't sure parking in the lot was allowed. 

The trail is mostly on planks through the woods.  Seems a lot of the trails here in Juneau have planks laid down.  This makes it a bit tricky because it can get slippery.  Or you could fall off it.  There is a slight (~230 ft) elevation gain on the trail, and once up top and out the woods, about a mile out, you get a fantastic view from Lena Point overlooking Lena Cove and the sea.  There's even a bench up there from which to enjoy the view. 

Most people go back the same way they came, but supposedly there's a shorter route back "along an undeveloped route, next to the fence, down to the parking area."  Btw, my husband thinks he saw a bear out near the trailhead.  I saw something too but am not sure what I saw.  It's that time when they all start coming out....

Boy Scout/Crow Point Trails

To get to the trailhead, turn left from Egan just before the Herbert River and then turn right at the T.  It's only about a mile or so away from Egan.  The trail starts off in the woods, and there are still icy patches in the early Spring time.  I've come to realize that clamp ons or some sort of traction on your boots are really necessary if you want to enjoy some of these trails in Juneau before the summer.  Once out of the woods, you come out on the meadow and you see Eagle Beach across the river.  A little further down and you hit the beach.  There are multiple ways you can get to either Crow Point or the Boy Scout Camp.  We went to neither this time around because it was raining.  The walk along the beach is really nice though, since there was no one else out there.  It sounds like a popular trail though, so I reckon it's a bit more crowded when the weather is nice.  The book I have says the trail is a 1.5 miles one way, but it seemed like it was a little longer than that.  Bit hard to tell.  There's amost no elevation gain so should be doable in the winter if it's groomed.

Shrine of St. Therese

One of the stops on the tourist route is the Shrine of St. Therese.  Since I'm not Catholic, I can't really comment on it from a religious aspect.  You can refer to their website for details on service information, etc.  It is a nice place to go by for a stroll though.  It's peaceful (when tourists aren't around), and the shrine is a beautiful structure.  There are gardens and various memorials, as well as a gift shop, on-site.  I've always liked visiting churches, temples, etc.  This is the one to visit in Juneau.

Boo Internet... Yay DVR!

Yes, Alaska is considered a remote place by many.  For the most part though, it has almost everything I need here and I had little to complain about.  Then I tried to choose an internet service provider.  Here in Juneau, and maybe all of Alaska, you  have two choices:  GCI Cable or DSL with Alaska Communications (ACS).  The choices were kinda crappy.  GCI didn't offer unlimited usage and ACS had low bandwidths.  Basically for around $52 (cheapest option) with GCI, I could get 3Mbps download with 7,500MB included usage.  For $65 (cheapest option), I get crappy 320kbps with ACS, but unlimited usage.  Initially since I planned on streaming and didn't want to worry about overages, I went for the 1Mbps bundle at ACS, which ran about $85 a month.  Pretty outranges prices I think (but again, this is Alaska) so I'm kinda rethinking my internet options... especially now that I discovered the wonders of DVR.

The house I am renting came equipped with a DirecTV dish already.  My landlord uses and raves about it.  so I looked into it and you get loads of channels for like $65/month (+ taxes/fee).  For the first year, the promotion is such that it's like $35 a month.  I think I get over 200 channels now, most of them HD.  Plus a few months of free movie channels, and a $100 referral bonus for me and my landlords.  I never had this many channels before.  In the past I always got the cheapest cable & internet bundle since I didn't really watch a lot of TV.  Most of the shows I liked, I could get online.  Well, there are a lot of rainy days here in Alaska and more channels may come in handy.  Plus... now I have a DVR for the first time ever!!  (Yes, I know I'm years behind.)  I already have plans to record every NCIS episode on USA and whatever other channels that play it so I can catch up on the show (although I would've liked to watch it in order from the start).  For $7/month, it's probably a much better deal than paying all kinds of extra $$ just so I can stream videos online.  Besides, I'm on the computer all day at work so I am going to try to minimize time spent on it in the evenings. It's so easy to waste time surfing the web.  No more.  From now on I'll waste time surfing channels.  Yes, I'm going backwards in time.  :)

Travel & People

I saw an article today that reminded me of some of the reasons why I liked traveling so much.  A week or two long vacations are nice, but it's not quite the same as taking a long chunk of time, perhaps by leaving everything behind, and traveling the world. 

I did a 6-months long backpacking trip around Southern Africa, New Zealand, and Australia.  I had given up a lot - a good job and my material belongings (save a closet sized amount of stuff I put in storage), not to mention wiping out a good chunk of my savings.  I will never regret doing the trip though, and after all I have done in my life, that trip probably ranks first in the most memorable things I have done.  (Sailing across the Atlantic on a tall-ship ranks second.)  I did the trip alone and contrary to what some would think, it doesn't get so lonely.  To the contrary, because you are alone, you make an effort to reach out and meet new people.  As the article says, these new friends you make and the experiences you make with them are what makes traveling solo great.  I don't think I put much emphasis on the people when I wrote my blog, but looking back, the trip wouldn't have been nearly as great had I not met all of these great people:  Phil & Inga from Johannesburg, Dave from Cali, Tess & Chris from Brighton, Ben from Wales, Jon & Baz from UK, Claire & Dave from UK, Mike from Wellington, Alan from Scotland & Mikael from France, Gary from NZ, the Irish contingent, the overlanders on Nina with me, Stephen & Matt from Holland, and many others.

Now that I am married, I doubt I will be doing such long trips solo again anytime soon, but I do hope that the two of us will embark on and adventure together someday.  I did meet couples on the trip, and just because you are with someone doesn't mean you don't have to meet new people.  Perhaps you get the best of both worlds this way - meeting new people but having that close someone with you the whole way.  I'm enjoying my time in Alaska, but it hasn't killed the travel bug.  Being here is simply a means of keeping things 'interesting" to keep the bug at bay until that time comes.  Brad & I have talked about traveling South America together.  It's still on my list of wanna-do's in my life.  Along with a round around China, a pilgrimage in Shikoku, and a month in Tanzania. 

Anyways, I was reminiscing a bit, so thought I'd do a little shout-out to all those people I met on that one trip almost 8 years ago.  Thanks for making that trip of a lifetime that much better by being a part of it.