Travel Blog

Sue:

So, I'm waiting on this lady yesterday, and when I give her the total, she reaches into her tank-top shirt near her chestal region (fishing around somewhere between boob and armpit) and pulls out her credit card. (Keep in mind, temperatures were in the 80s yesterday...people where hot and sweaty). I'm grossed-out and look at a coworker for help, but he just smiles and rolls his eyes. So I begrudgingly take the credit card and go to swipe it and of course it's not signed. So I turn back to the lady and say, "Could you please pull your i.d. out of your shirt, too?" She took exception to that. Go figure.

Sue:

It's time for the salmon to come up and die, but before they do that, we get to watch the grizzly bears try to catch them in Dyea (a little place about 7 miles outside of Skagway). We went out last night with Jerry and Jeannie, and were lucky enough to get a little too close to a bear. He didn't look like he was seriously fishing, but we got to see him splash around a bit and eat a dead fish he had stashed in the creek. Phil tried his hand with the movie camera, and did a great job. You can see by the video that we were maybe parked too close, but at least we were standing in Jerry's truck instead of doing what about ten people next to our truck were doing, which was running towards a big grizzly bear and away from the safety of their vehicles. Luckily this bear didn't seem too interested in us.

Grizzly heading our way:

Getting in the water:

Woah, way too close:

And here's that video Phil took (you may want to turn your volume down or off because we got the nearby dogsledding dogs barking pretty loudly on this video):

Sue:

I have some sad news to share. Remember these cuties:

Well, two are dead and one's been relocated. I'm not sure about the fourth. It's been said he's somewhere around here still. Hopefully doing bear things and staying out of trouble.

Because it's been unusually warm and sunny around here, and we've not been getting the rainfall that we should be getting (at a tailend of a rainforest), all the food that usually grows plentifully for bears hasn't done so this year. So mamma got into some bad habits, namely coming into town and getting into the garbages that weren't properly bear-proofed. And then she took it one step further and pushed open someone's screen door to their house, and went inside the house. That was her death sentence. She was shot by the police.

Then one of the babies was hit by a car and was killed.

And I guess the grey one, the one we call a glacier or spirit bear, learned some bad habits from momma, so he had to be relocated.

Then there was one. We've heard that the last black cub has been doing bear things and staying away from people and all that good stuff. I hope he makes it.

And some good news about the whole thing is that the laws are going to be enforced now, hopefully, about residents in this town keeping their trash contained in proper containers that are bear-proof. Things got a bit lax around here, or so we've heard from the game commission, but now maybe that all will change. We'll see.

I’m playing hooky from work today, because I have the cold – or whatever it is – that has been making the rounds up here. Sue forbids me from going into work today, saying I would just spread it around to everyone else. So I guess this is a good chance to catch up on our blog.

This past weekend we went on a local’s excursion to Glacier Point. We did a similar trip back in ’07, so I won’t bore you with too many glacier pictures. The biggest difference between the trips was this year it was sunny. Even the seals had a chance to work on their tans.

But all this good weather is taking a toll. It has been so dry that forest fires are springing up. There is one going on north of Whitehorse, YT that has had us covered in smoke the past week. Even as far south as Haines you can see the smog the smoke has created.

The boat ride down to Glacier Point was amazing we saw four humpbacks and two porpoises along with the seals and eagles. When we got to the point this fellow was there to greet us.

After we disembarked we hopped in the all terrain safari vehicles (translation converted school busses) and went up into the woods to get outfitted for the canoe ride. For those of you who haven’t read about our last trip here, the canoes take you up to the foot of Davidson Glacier. This year we were traveling with our friends Nick and Liz, and Jay and Katrina, with Benji our guide.

And Jerry and Jeanie with Pat in the front of the boat.

Like any glacier, Davidson is still growing and part of that is calving off pieces of ice. They are all around you in the water, but this year we saw a huge piece that had come off in June.

In salt water this would be called an iceberg, but in fresh water it is a growler.

Unlike our last trip we did not get a chance to get out and walk around the glacier, but it was fun to paddle around the lagoon in front of it.

On the way back to Skagway, we had the rare opportunity to stop and watch a pod of orcas feeding on a salmon run.

There were at least five whales in the pod. The Captain said this was a mother teaching the youngster how to feed.

The rest of the trip back was spent up on deck watching the humpbacks that were still out playing in the water. We did not get to see any breaching, like Sue was hoping for, but we did have one wave goodbye to us at the end of our trip.

Sue:

It's been crazy hot around here lately. I mean, the map on our home page says it's 78 degrees right now...and it's 8:00 p.m. AccuWeather has a thing they call RealFeel, which is basically saying, "screw the thermometer...this is what it really feels like." Well, I say the RealFeel for Skagway the past couple of days has been 105. The tourists have been loving it...I have not. I'm three shades deeper red than I usually am. Needless to say, I was a puddle on my couch for my whole day off yesterday. We had two fans going, the front door open, everything we could think of to keep cool. Around 9:00 last night, I smacked myself in the forehead (and my hand stuck) for being so goshdarn stupid...we have air conditioning. AHHHHHHHHHHHHH! At least we got a good night's sleep.