After finding a campsite in Skagway I made a bee line with the kids to the Alaska Fudge Company. The kids each got a thing I believe was called "heaven on a stick". I was marshmallows covered in caramel all dipped in chocolate. I was surprised how good they were. I normally don't like marshmallow treats. I think having fresh marshmallows helps a lot. After treats and dinner, yes in that order, we decided to go through with an earlier plan and add a little color to Kathy's rabbits prior to delivery. I was pleased with the result how ever the rabbits seemed to think they would look better in white and went to work grooming out the colored spots.
The kids enjoyed treats from the Alaska Fudge Company, I enjoyed that they didn't finish them!
The bunnies seemed kind of plain in white.
Kylie had nothing to do with this. Oh wait maybe she did.
The ferry in Skagway Alaska
I was pleased with how easy it was to get on the suburban and trailer on the ferry.
I was pretty worked up about getting the trailer onto the ferry in as much as having been charged by the linear foot for my ticket I expected parking on the boat to be quite tight. I was right the parking on the boat was tight but as far as the difficulty went I found it much easier to park on the boat than it had been to park in many of the campgrounds we had visited.
The kids enjoyed a little play room on the ferry.
We were delighted to see some whales.
Once on the boat we were delighted to see whales almost immediately. There were three whales spraying right in the Skagway harbor. On board the boat we found a little play room which the kids loved. I was surprised how much I enjoyed the ferry ride. The kids also had a lot of fun. At some point I would like to do a longer boat ride. I am not sure if I am ready to do a cruise but taking the ferry from Bellingham to Juneau sounds like fun. My favorite thing to do on that particular boat ride was to lay on beach chair in the solarium (an outdoor heated and covered section on the top of the boat).
Dallin enjoying himself on the solarium.
David showing more of why it's a good thing to be David.
After getting the Auke Bay harbor in sight it seemed to take forever to actually get to it. We were all very excited about finally arriving in Juneau. Once in town I went straight to the Mendenhall loop campground in as much as I knew there were only 9 full hookup sites available and that all of my competition for those sites that day was on the boat. I thought myself to have a slight advantage over what some might in that I knew the exact location of the campground. We were delighted when arriving to find the quality of the camp site. It was by far my favorite campsite on the trip. The kids called it a close second to the state park we stayed in next to St. George.
Our campsite by Mendenhall Lake
The kids enjoyed having the bikes out again.
My cousins Mariann and Kathy met us at the campsite. I got a good laugh because through out the trip Kylie would mention at least once a day how much she missed her mom. After a good hug and possibly 5 minutes of time elapsing after meeting up with Mariann and Kathy Kylie had disappeared with her cousin Jessica. I guess that is the way things work, it is sometimes just nice to see people and know they are there. Any concern I had about upsetting Kathy by taking the liberty of coloring her rabbits was quickly dissipated when I saw her great reaction to them and also saw her dog. Just the week before she had shaved all but a mohawk like strip off of the dog and then dyed the mohawk purple. The dog was quite a sight.
Thursday we did our best at getting a day of work and a day of school in. I don't think either was very effective but sometimes just doing something is the most important thing.
We had a wonderful marshmallow roast (2 slides)
Friday morning Mariann and Kathy invited me out to go king salmon fishing with one of Kathy's friends. The weather was absolutely perfect and the fishing in terms of productivity was absolutely lousy. I think that is the way fishing works the catch is inversely related to the quality of the weather. Especially when I am not the one paying for the gas I chose good weather over productive fishing as what makes for a good fishing trip. It was great to be out on the water and I had a great time getting views of the several bald eagles. I was amazed at how many there were. At one point I think I saw 15 of them flying together. Something that drives me nuts about my camera is that one needs to be all but riding an animal to get a decent wild life photo. These eagles proved no exception. Despite amazing views of the birds all of the pictures came out making them look like sparrows. My frustration became a joke on the boat as in "Hey Dan there's another eagle why don't you get a picture of it".
There are about 15 eagles in this photo, trust me.
My cousins Mariann and Kathy
Saturday (May 24th) was the day of the memorial. Being Kim and Barb's sort of 5th child I was invited on the helicopter ride to spread her ashes over what they call the "Grand Child Peaks". There is a wonderful mountain range behind Mt. McGinnis and Mt. Stroller White with several unnamed peaks. While in the Juneau Alpine Club Kim and Barb unofficially named the peaks after their eight grand children. Now several of the local climbers refer to the peaks by their grandchildren's names. Once again we had perfect weather and unlike fishing where there may be room for opinions a helicopter ride is all about weather. The emotion of the ride was mixed. The distraction of being out in a helicopter on such a beautiful day in such a beautiful place blocked much of the emotion related to the reason we were out. Every now and then I would get ambushed by a wave of hollow sad feeling but for the most part I was just delighted to be out. I haven't climbed any of the grandchild peaks. At some point I will need to change that. It was easy to see from the helicopter why Kim and Barb liked them so well. As the last part of our helicopter ride we did a quick look for mountain goats and were pleased to find a few.
From left clockwise: Kim,Kathy,Laura,me,John,Mariann
Kim dropping ashes
We got some great views from the helicopter (13 slides)
The service at the Mendenhall Glacier Visitor Center was very nice. The people from Barb's church brought an amazing amount of high quality food. I had fun meeting up with people that I hadn't seen in over 10 years. On the way out of the visitor's center some people saw a bear but we didn't.
On Sunday Kathy had been given permission to borrow one of the boats from the whale watching company she works for. About 30 people, friends and family went in the boat to Sawmill Creek in Berners Bay, another Turley family favorite place for camping to spread more ashes. On the way out we were delighted to get great views of sea lions and also a pod of orcas. On yet again another wonderful weather day it seemed all to soon that we were getting back into the boat to leave.
Ty on the whale watch boat.
We got a great look at some sea lions.
This is a picture of the boat we took to Sawmill Creek.
Lexie, Natalyn and David exploring the beach.
The kids had a lot of fun with their cousin Jackie.
Monday we took as a casual play day. Juneau has built up a wonderful park by Twin Lakes a community project. We started the day letting the kids play there and then moved over to the Mendenhall Lake in the afternoon. Almost as a ritual I took it on myself to dunk myself under water in the Mendenhall Lake. The lake is literally ice cold in as much as its major tributary is ice melt from the Mendenhall Glacier.
We played at the park by Twin Lakes.
That is every bit as cold as it looks.
I raced the dog after a stick and won.
David entertained himself by throwing his show in the water and letting it float back.
This is a picture of me underwater and Jessica just coming up from the water.
After Monday most of the people who didn't live in Juneau had headed home and things had wound down around the funeral services.
Lexie reading to the kids.
We were able to get into a pretty decent rhythm of school and work. I was pleased to find that Juneau has a disc golf course. I have played several times and am having a lot of fun getting back into the game. The course is in an old growth spruce forest. The trees are gorgeous except of course when they get in the path of a disc at which time one gets thinking about chain saws rather quickly. Something I give this course credit for is that between the muskeg and the devil's club it is the most punishing course I have played on when it comes to retrieving a poorly thrown disc. Fortunately I haven't had too many throws go foul.
I absolutely love running on West Glacier trail next to the Mendenhall Lake. It took getting back on the trail trail to remember how much I love it. It is a little bit frustrating in that I can remember how fast and far I used to run the trail and unfortunately that is faster and farther than I am running it now. With that said my running is a lot better than it was a year ago and I am happy for that.
On the 31st of May we took a hike as a family to the face of the Mendenhall Glacier. My cousin Laura's kids Alan (18) and Darwin (7) accompanied us. The hike is about 2 miles each way and involves a bit of rock scrambling. I carried David the whole way and let him out to play at the glacier. Natalyn was able to hike the entire thing. I was very pleased at how well the kids did on the rock. If anything they were a little to eager to climb. I was also pleased with their reaction to the glacier. I it a great feeling to share something special to yourself and have someone else appreciate it. Especially one of your children. We let all of the kids on the glacier so that they could stand on it. We didn't have crampons so we couldn't really do anything more than that safely.
The kids did really well and had a great time on trail.
There were a lot of neat things at the face of the glacier.
I love the West Glacier Trail.
To be honest I really hated being at church on Sunday. It was very difficult in as much as the church building is a place I have strongly associated with Barb. Also talking to everyone there would bring up the reason I came to Juneau which would remind me of the loss.
The next week was another week of school and work. Wednesday had a very low tide so we went out with Kathy and "the girls" to look for creatures on the beach. We were able to find all sorts of things. There was a very odd worm that neither Kim nor Kathy recognized. I had fun digging up clams just for the challenge of getting them. The local butter clams have a neuro toxin in them that will kill you eat it. If I understood Kim correctly a single clam can have enough to be fatal. In World War II the spies would carry some of the toxin gathered from Icy Straits in case they were captured so they could use it to commit suicide. Tyrell was delighted to see several starfish. My favorite animals were the little crabs that look like dungeneos crabs but are much smaller.
Looking for critters at low tide.
Saturday we split between Sandy Beach and Cope Park. We bought some smoked salmon and pilot bread as a way to enjoy a taste of Alaska. The kids absolutely loved it. After the beach and the park we went over to Kathy's house she and Tim are remodeling. Remodel might give one the wrong idea in that it is really more of a rebuilding project they are doing. She had a large slash fire she was using to burn debris which we took advantage of to roast hot dogs and smores. Most of the time when I go to someone's house I am relieved I don't have a house because I see all of the little fix up projects that need to be done and get exhausted thinking about all the time effort and money it would take to get them done. Oddly enough Kathy's frame of a house didn't have this effect on me but rather got me kind of excited to think about building a house. I guess that says something about my personality. I am much more into building something new than maintaining something. With that said I am far from ready to give up the wheels on my house.
The kids got in some great play time after a hard week of school.
I was pleased to see Cope Park added a disc catcher. There is only one however the full course is over by the ferry terminal.
The kids made a friend named Christian. We built a network of sand castles.
We took advantage of Kathy's debris fire to roast hot dogs and smores.
This photo doesn't really fit anywhere but I am throwing it in because it is so cool. You get the feeling this person can and does go just about where ever they want.
No comments:
Post a Comment