Wrangell, Alaska

The day never ended from yesterday...one long slog. We didn't attempt to go to sleep until almost 11:00 Tue. night. Even with the cell phone alarm set and the clock alarm set, I did not really ever go to sleep. Don was successful and slept away until the alarm went off at 1 am, Wed, June 23. We get the trailer buttoned up and we are off to the ferry terminal. We had checked things out yesterday, so we knew where to get in line at. There we sat...once you get there on time, you just sit and wait. Cat-napped a little then got the signal that it was our time to board. Once on the ferry we got coffee and sat there in the cafeteria... It was very warm in there.

We did not know how fortunate we were on the first ferry ride with it being sunny. Today was the typical rainy, overcast weather, so we were inside the entire way. We took advantage of the "mess hall" and had breakfast. It was pretty good.

I went outside in the wind, cold and light rain to get pictures of our coming into Wrangell. Wrangell is not a cruise ship stop. It is a quaint little town undisturbed from the craziness of the cruise ship ports. Only a few of us get off to stay here. The only other trailer getting off is Bob. We got aquainted with Bob back at the port in Prince Rupert. He is hauling a little Scamp trailer. This is a lot like our Casita. So naturally we got to chatting. Bob travels alone...his wife no longer travels with him. After 45 years of marriage, she told him that she is was done traveling and was staying home to do her volunteer work and enjoy her great-grandchildren. So, Bob has been going on his own for over 5 years now...guess it works. :) We ate breakfast with him on the ferry. He was going to stay in a different campground than we were planning on being at so we don't know when we will see him again.

We have this awesome campsite!!!! We are staying in Nemo Point Recreational Area Campground. Our site has a great view of the Zimovia Straight, when we can see it! It is still raining. Our campground hosts are Dusty and Cathy...They are believers and great people! They host a potluck every Friday and we plan on being there. They said a lot of the locals come to it. Should be fun. We love this island already. This is more our style. This is not a tourist place. There is a lot of hiking to do, and a lot of dirt roads to check out, which we hope to do.

After getting settled, we took off to go find water. On the way back toward town, we decided to check out a short hike up to Rainbow Falls. You walk on a boardwalk trail. When we get to the falls, we decide to continue following the trail up. The entire next 2 1/2 miles or so is all boardwalk stairs (lots and lots of stairs, almost 4 miles of stairs total) that take us to Shoemaker Bay overlook. We enjoyed very scenic views. We had not planned on doing this kind of hike when we set out so we were both wearing jeans and we didn't have any water with us. Hiking in jeans is no good, and then when they get wet, they really are no good!! Oh well, it was worth it!!! We were very fatigued once we got done going back down all those stairs.

We drove through the tiny downtown area and ran into Bob again and chatted a little. He was only staying overnight then would be going on, so we said good-bye.

Filled our water container and went back to the campsite, ate a little dinner and crashed.

Hoping to get tickets for the jet boat up the Stikine, we got into town a little after 8:00. No one was there, so we waited. The lady working at the desk for the Inn was very friendly and we talked with her for a while and she even tried calling the people who run the tours but was unable to get anyone. So, we left a note on the door and decided to check out Chief Shakes house then go back to the museum and hope that we would get a call from Alaska Waters.

A wooden walkway leads to Shakes Island. Dating from 1840 to1940, the island's Tlingit tribal house and totems are maintained by the Wrangell Cooperative Assoc. This is only open at times when the small cruise ships come in. We hitch hiked on a tour given for a group from the ship. Nobody seemed to mind. This is an excellent example of the Tlingit clan house. A lady addresses the group and told about the significance of this structure. She is the great granddaughter of Chief Shakes VII... The last of the chief guys. She gave a very good presentation and we were even able to talk with her some after the cruise people left. She was getting ready to meet with the governor of Alaska shortly after this talk. Off to the museum...

On Saturday mornings in the lobby of the museum is a small "craft fair" type thing. Don gravitated to a woman selling baskets and I went over to admire wooden handmade bowls. Her name is Maryann, and her husband carves these bowls using the native trees that only grow here in Southeast Alaska. They are beautiful. We spent quite a bit of time talking with these two women and throughly enjoyed learning about what they do. Then we went through the museum. I was very interested in Maryann's bowls...I have been wanting something like that for salads, but I didn't want to spend as much as she was asking for the bowl. So we left. We were on our way to do something when the call came from Alaska Water's and yes, they still had space on their afternoon jet boat tour up the Stikine. After securing the tickets, we drove back to the museum to talk to Maryann again. She was packing up and her husband, Ed, was there waiting for her giving us the opportunity to talk to him. They work with the wood in the way the Natives did. I decided to go for it...my very meaningful memento from Wrangell. We made arrangements to go to their house Sat. morning because she thought she had a bowl like what I wanted there. These bowls are beautifully made with loving hands. Maryann and Ed are very nice people and every time I use this bowl I will think of the sweet couple in Wrangell. :)

That done, we have some time to kill before our jet boat tour, so we decide to take the Mt. Dewey trail located right behind the downtown. This is a large tree covered hill with a quick hike up for a fine view of Wrangell and Zomavia Strait. It took us a little while to find it, but after asking some young men at the baseball park for directions, we found the trailhead. (Side note...we found it funny that these young men could not give us street names, even though they have lived here all their lives. Our daughter's are the same way...they don't know street names at all even though they have been in Atascadero all their lives. We found this funny!) And, despite the clouds and rain, we had a very nice view of Wrangell.
Now, off to the Stikine boat tour.

The Stiline River is the fastest-flowing navigable river in North America, and one of the few remaining freeflowing rivers. It runs 330 miles through British Columbia and the Alaska mainland to its delta, just a few miles NW of Wrangell. Our driver was Jim, and our "guide" was Ivan. Ivan is a local photographer and he enjoyed giving tips on camera use and picture taking. He uses Canon cameras and said we had made a very good choice for the camera we bought. Ivan is from the Chech Republic, but came with his wife right before the communist takover to the USA. He has been here for 40 years or so. He has a heavy accent so you have to listen hard to understand him. He was a lot of fun and very knowledgeable. We had a great time. We saw lots of bald eagles, lots of wildflowers, and a hurt moose hiding in the grass. Jim has been watching this moose for several days. He thinks it was attacked by a bear and has a broken shoulder...she probably won't survive. That was sad. Later we came zooming around a corner a surprised a mama moose with two little ones. Scared them to death and they ran for cover as fast as they could...no good moose pics today! We stopped along the way and talked with a biologist for the forest service doing king salmon counts on the Stikine. Every so often, Jim would put the boat close to shore so we could get out and stretch our legs and take pics if we wanted. Ivan would tell us about the plants that were around there, and other interesting facts that he could share. The grand finale was when we came to the ice fields at the mouth of a glacier. Huge chunks of glacier floating around. Pretty cool...literally, it was cold up in that canyon. This was a 5 hour tour and we enjoyed every minute of it. Of course, Jim entertained us with his fast manuveurs in the water...I think Don enjoyed this part the best!!! If you can't hike, this was definetly a good alternative!!

I shared that Dusty and Kathy back at the campground host a potluck every Friday night. We thought it began at 5 and we didn't get back from the tour until 6. We were very hungry so we again had dinner at the Srikine Inn...we split halibut steaks this time. After we were done, we went back to camp and joined the people at the potluck. They actually begin at 6, so we should of just gotten there as soon after the tour as we could...oh well. Most of the people there are locals and we enjoyed talking with them. The lady selling the baskets attends these and was there with her husband. An older lady that was a doctor in the area was interesting. She and her husband spent a year in Mongolia teaching English...I never found out if it was for missionary work or not. It was right after the fall of communism there. The last character we talked to is the harbor master here. He is hillarious!!! He could tell stories and had us cracking up. He needs to write a book! We talked a little with Dusty and Kathy and went back to the trailer and crashed. End of a very big day!!!

The weather is funky again today so we got a slow start to our day. That hike to the Shoemaker Overlook really wiped us out and we are enjoying a lazy morning. We are coming to the conclusion that hiking in this weather really is no fun, so we will play "tourist" and go see what we can see.

As we have all along Southeast Alaska, the Totem poles play a huge role in the lives of the tNative people. There are many here in Wrangell that we have been taking pictures of. These poles are replications of the many totems that stood here when the Native villages thrived in the 1800's.

We went onto town and found the Java Junky...good capuccinos and free wi-fi that really works!!!! The young lady working there was very friendly. We did some computer stuff. This coffee shop is also the home of one of many tour guide businesses in Wrangell. We asked the young barista about the tours and I got to thinking that since hiking was not working out for us, maybe we could go up the Stikine (pronounced "Stick EEN," meaning "great river" in Tlingit) on a jet boat tour. But they had no openings for Friday. So, after leaving we went to another tour place but they had no openings either. Oh well...off to the museum.

The museum is housed in the beautiful James and Elsie Nolan Center. This is also where you find the Wrangell Visitor's Center, Convention Center and Castle Mountain Theater. We spent quite a bit of time here. This was a very interesting and well done museum. It features a chronological history of Wrangell and the Stikine River. Exhibits feature the natural environment, Native culture, the fur trade, military presence, the gold rushes and mining, churches and schools, fishing, logging and a little on 20th Century history. We came away with a good understanding of this entire area including Ketchikan and Petersburg. I enjoyed learning about the Native people of Southeast Alaska, the Tlingit (sounds like klink it). There was so much to see we did not get through it all before they closed...we would have to go back.

We decided to go eat at the Stikine Inn for dinner. we sat at a little table overlooking the docks. Don got salmon cakes which he liked very much. I ordered a stir-fry dish which was also very good. We would recommend eating here. This building also houses another jet boat tour place. No one was in the store, but they had a sign posted that a tour was available the next morning. We would be back.

Today was a full day enjoying the people and learning about Wrangell...still raining.

Our day started with going out to Maryann and Ed's house to buy one of their bowls. They welcomed us into their home and were very gracious hosts. They spent a great deal of their lives (at least 30 years) living in this fishing village that had a population of 12 people...no elecricity or running water...Meyer Chuck. She referred to living "on the chuck". We have tried to find it on a map but we have not been able to find it. She doesn't like living in Wrangell much... She misses the Chuck, but they moved to civilization to be close to a doctor for their old age. We enjoyed spending time with them.

Then we did a small hike in the rain...it was raining harder today than it had rained the whole time we were in Wrangell. The hike was up a boardwalk to Pat's Lake. There is a forest service row boat for anyone to use if you want to. We did not go out wiry the boat since it was raining so much. We enjoyed the hike and the drive along the way.

We stopped by to say good bye to Dusty and Kathy at their trailer. Our time spent together was way too short. We enjoyed our fellowship with them tremendously!!!

Back at the Casita. Get it ready to go in the pouring rain. Don was very wet, and I was trying not to be...I loved Wrangell but I don't know if I could ever get used to this weather...I miss the sun!

We got to the ferry terminal at 2:00 pm and boarded the ferry for Petersburg. We will be arriving in Petersburg at 12:30am Sunday morning.

Our visit to Wrangell was wonderful. We both really like this place.