DjuKnow Anything New In Juneau?

I mean besides the fact that you're not in Kansas anymore?

I was in Juneau for a couple of days that week in May that we had such lovely, warm weather in the Southeast.  You remember.  Everyone commented upon it because we were all ready for a respite from that long, drawn-out winter that just went on and on and didn't seem like it would ever be over and dragged on into eternity and just would not let go of us and kept being winter instead of spring and we were all getting tired of it.  Yeah, that one.

This wasn't my first trip to Juneau and I've written about at least one other trip there, so I don't really want to repeat myself.  I looked for something new to note and this is what I've got and it's all I've got.

Prince Of Wales Island--POW. And HOW! WOW!

Ready for another stunning geography/history lesson, kids?  POW is one of the islands of the Alexander Archipelago in the Alaskan Panhandle, the 4th largest island in the US after Hawaii, Kodiak and Puerto Rico.  Another lovely location in the Tongass Rainforest.

POW is home of the Kaigani (crabapple country) Haida and later--or earlier--Tlingit people, who named the island "Sea Lion."  Then even later around 18th Century times, Mexican, British and French explorers overnighted here, too. I think the Russians just sort of waved on their way by.  (Aren't you happy that I'm not your real history teacher?  I'm pretty shabby at this part.  But if you're really interested, you can wikipee it.)

We flew in on an unusually sunny day in May about a week ago.  By "we," I mean the pilot, a woman going home to Hydaburg from her chemo treatment in Anchorage and me in this little B-1RD:  (That means I don't know what kind of plane it is.)  Not the smallest one I've been in since I've been traveling here in Alaska, but small enough to make me smile about getting into it.  That's a big deal, because I seldom smile about flying in planes--you know, the ones with all those people and their elbows.  It's an interminable, crampy, stiff drudgery for the most part.  Ick. 

Flying in these smaller birds is a noisy experience, but this Island Air pilot had some smoothe music piping through these head sets for us to listen to on the way over from Ketchikan. 

The airport is in Klawock which is where the clinic is where I worked for a day.  I didn't take a picture of the eye clinic building at the Klawock mall because, well, BORING.  But I did take a picture of the Dream Catcher B&B where I stayed in Craig about seven miles down the road.



Let me correct myself here.  I took SEVERAL pictures of this B & B. 

Being the 4th largest island in the United States doesn't mean this little sand bar is big by any means.  And being small doesn't mean it doesn't pack a punch with it's abundance of fjords, steep-sided mountains, dense forests, Tlingit culture...bears, to name a few delights of Prince of Wales Island.

I'm still trying to learn how George Vancouver's "Prince of Wales Archipelago" became "Alexander Archipelago" and the island came to be called "Prince of Wales" island.  Something to do with the treaty discussions between Russia and Great Britain, I presume.  And who named the towns Craig and Klawock and Hollis and Thorne Bay and Hydaburg?  

Alaska has some very interesting place names-descriptive, possesive, incidental, onomastic, commemorative, -from a number of cultural sources.  I might just have to do some more research and see if I can share some of it interestingly.  With pictures.  Later.



Oopsie.  How did Pookie Pye get in here?!  You little wascal, why are you always popping up in my head space?!

If You Like Trees And Water, You'll Love A Rainforest!

Turn About Is Fair Play

My daughter and I have usually spent our birthdays together.  By that I mean, we haven't usually been living so far away from each other when our separate birthdays roll around.  Also, by birthDAY, I  mean several days, maybe even weeks.  We like treating ourselves for a few days.  It's not so much that we think the actual occurance of a birthday is some huge deal.  It's just another party.  Another series of parties, that is.  This year, in April when it was my birthday, she and her husband celebrated where they live by doing things I would love to have done had I been there to do it with them.  I can't even remember what I did myself up here in Anchorage.  I remember more easily what they did for me in Salt Lake City and Ogden. 

Katy's birthday is next week, so the fact that I'm traveling this week to one of her favorite places works out perfectly for me to begin the proxy birthday celebration.  It's also an anniversary of my arrival in Alaska!  Wow.  Dig it.  Can you say serendipity? (Remember?  Katy and Jon came with me and we traveled down here to Homer.) 

I have something to say about getting here...Hello?  Rainforest?

but I want to begin with going to the beach as I think that is probably the event that Katy likes--or would like--the most.  She was born and raised mostly in California's Bay Area where it was so easy to spend so much time at the beach.  Maybe I should write about that at some point.  If anything in our lives is significant, our love of the coast certainly is.

So, here it is Katy.  I drove down to the spit and parked by Captain Pattie's (where I might have dinner tomorrow night.  What would you like?  I like the artichoke dip appetizer the best there.  Halibut?  Salmon?  Scallops?  Not seafood? Oh wait.  You would probably get the fettucini, right?  Or maybe I should go to that place where we had fish and chips.  I think I like that place better, actually.) 

I walked out on the rocks for a while, the rocks that felt and sounded like slate or something.  Very flat and round and perfect for skipping.  I took these pictures for Jon, the rock-skipper extraordinaire. 

Then, I strolled along closer to the water where the tide made these crazy patterns in the sand.

 I lost myself in the sound of the ocean washing up on the shore.  Such reminiscing!  I saw a seal and tried to capture a picture of it, but it didn't work.  By the time I thought to just take a video, it quit cresting through the surface. 

I got so wrapped up in everything, I didn't notice that the tide had come up and surrounded me as I stood out on a sand bar!  I had to hurry and take my shoes and socks off and practically swim back up to the rocky shore.  See that sand bar there?  That's where I was just seconds before I took this picture. 

Good thing it's summer now, although who would really know that when the temperature is a mere 47 degrees?  However, it's been sunny all day and I think it was pretty close to perfect. 

I took these couple of pictures of people camping right down there on the spit, pretending it was you and Jon camping there.  I think you both would think THAT was pretty close to perfect. 

Do you think your little prince will be ready for camping by next summer?  Or at least ready to stay the night with his Grenny while you guys go?  He and I could do a bit of our own beach combing for treasures like these to put in the sandcastle-style birthday cake you will have already taught him how to make...oh wait, I think I'm getting ahead of myself...how old will he be by then?

Maybe we'll just kick around for some pretty green rocks...hmmm I wonder if there are pretty green rocks on the beach in Homer...

and come back to the hotel where I'm staying right now and set out some food for the birds (varieties of which are abundant here--and maybe we should come at the time of the shorebird festival...)

HAPPY GETTING READY FOR YOUR BIRTHDAY, MISS DID!!!