Juneau

Juneau
September 10, 2010


Woke up to Jacky seeing a spout out our window. I scrambled out of my bunk, amazed I didn't knock myself out. I, too, saw a spout and the dorsal fin and back of a whale as it dove back down. Anxiously awaiting its continued action, we were sadly disappointed when it did not reappear. However, it did cause us to get moving a little quicker today. Cold cereal in the lunch court and then to the windows. Today we were traveling between mountains. They were quite close, and the water had calmed completely down. We were able to see a couple of seals as they calmly swam from one island to another. We also saw another whale. This one never did spout, I saw its dorsal fin rise out of the water and then sink, followed by the tail. You really had to watch, these animals are not engaging in fun displays but are eating and moving quietly through their day. Patience is the word around here. Wonder where I can find some of that...

We disembarked at Juneau around 11:30. Then came the wait for the shuttle (first one filled up, had to wait an additional 45 minutes). We did eventually find our Best Western Hotel. Up here, many of the hotels provide free shuttles, which is good because most of us come in on ferries or trains or buses and have no personal transportation. But of course you are at the mercy of the shuttle drivers then! We found that our time in Juneau was spent mostly waiting, waiting to be taken some where or waiting to be picked up! We did spend a good amount of time in Juneau proper visiting their tourist trap. I've rarely seen so many gift shops. There was a bit of difference here though - many of these shops were jewelery stores or fur shops.Fur is definitely big here. We all picked up a few things. Found a salmon shop too, picked up a whole bunch of their stuff! Made reservations at their restaurant for tomorrow night at 'The Twisted Fish'. Picked up the shuttle to go back (again first one was full so we had to wait for another one) and got some laundry done. Looking forward to tomorrow.