Tuesday, August 1st, 2006
We arrive in Juneau. Here's the surreal view out Uncle Tom's back
window. The hillside remained enshrouded in fog for our visit. It
might be back there.
Wednesday, August 2nd, 2006
Willow is ready to go for a drive around town. She lets Uncle Tom use
her truck.
First stop is the hatchery. Proof that there are indeed some fish
in the waters here.
Good sized ones at that.
All those ripples are fish.
Time to head off to the marina to check up on the Nimrod.
The fish are jumping right inside the marina while an eagle looks on.
One or two cruise ships arrive in Juneau every day it seems.
Darlene, Jasmine and Uncle Tom travel across the tide flats to check
out the spawning salmon.
Jasmine rarely takes a bad photo.
They're easy to catch here, but once they enter the fresh
water they're no longer premium.
But that doesn't stop everyone.
The seagulls seems to enjoy them as well.
The ones that are still alive in this pool may survive
until high tide lets them continue their journey upstream.
Cow parsnips.
Every trip to Juneau includes the obligatory visit to Mendenhall Glacier.
Before global warming this whole valley was filled with the glacier.
Ten thousand years later and look where it is now. Here we see some
more pieces that have broken off.
But the flora is better off for it.
Darlene, Jasmine and Aunt Carolyn fit into the back of Willow's truck.
Thursday, August 3rd.
Time to go fishin'. Uncle Tom sold the Nimrod, but since his boat is
on the trailer in the front yard, the new owner let us take it out on
Thursday and Friday.
Ken, Jasmine and Aunt Carolyn watch on as Uncle Tom pilots the Nimrod
to Doty Cove.
We passed a number of other fishing rigs on the way out.
Here's Darlene pulling in a fish.
And it's a whopper!!
Ken catches a slightly larger one.
Rerigged and ready to catch another.
And there he is.
Luckily we didn't hook this orca or his three pod mates.
The little one in the center is a Humpy (aka "Pink"). If it hadn't
been my first fish caught we probably would have thrown it back as
only the tourists keep them. The other two are Silver (aka "Coho").
We also caught two King salmon but we had to throw them back as they
were under the 29 inch limit.
Uncle Tom takes care of the icky part.
Friday, August 4th.
Darlene reels in another one of her whoppers.
This time it's a little larger.
This King is 32 inches. Uncle Tom says he'll smoke it up and might
even send us some of it.
Time to head back to the marina. Lots of rain.
Jasmine's upset as she didn't catch anything.
But she's first up on the next excursion.
And she gets to pose with Darlene's King. We'll say she caught it
someday. The Silver I caught today sits on the cleaning table.
Sunday, August 6th.
Took the fast ferry to Sitka on Saturday and then headed out to
Salisbury Sound to catch our limit. Unfortunately we found a
bunch of commercial seiners got there first.
We make a fast retreat lest we end up caught in their nets with the
salmon.
We found a quieter bay with cascading waterfalls (not quite sure where
that water's coming from as that's the top of the hill here).
And lots of stingy looking jelly fish.
Jasmine caught her silver today. And I
caught three. And a couple pinks that got thrown back along
with a red rockfish and a brown one. Not quite the limit we were
hoping for.
Keith and his pappy discuss bears and deer and various species of fish
while we putter around the bay.
Monday, August 7th.
We head out from Sitka to fish, just for the Halibut.
Along the way we pass a lighthouse...
And a cruise ship full of tourists.
KC makes one of his rare appearances.
With the GPS on the fritz we find Keith consulting a chart to
find good halibut feeding grounds.
We anchor off Fred's creek where the halibut should be waiting
for the dead salmon to come floating back down.
Unfortunately the halibut didn't cooperate. We did find a puffin
who thought it would be sweet if we'd toss some of that pink salmon
we were using for bait over the side.
After giving up on the halibut we decide to go trolling. Darlene
catches a couple more silvers.
KC spent the rest of the morning and afternoon here in the
forward berth. More true to form.
Tuesday, August 8th.
KC is more interested in four-wheeling.
And Jasmine turns out to be a little
terror on one.
The others line up getting ready to take their turns.
Some of these funny looking trees were growing outside the
historical museum in Sitka.
Back at the ranch, Keith's Panabode house gave me flashbacks.
Cheetos,
Patch,
and Mickey greeted us when we got there.
Later in the evening we drove up to the top of Harbor Mountain.
Although mostly socked in, it did clear up a bit to see the sunset.
Wednesday, August 9th.
Back at the fast ferry we bid our farewell to Keith and head back
to Juneau.
Where we met up with Ian.
and Tracy.
Jasmine, Tracy, Ian and Darlene.