2019 Alaska - Juneau

Today we are in Juneau. It's 9:30 PM, sunny and 76 degrees. I'm sitting on a deck chair in short sleeves. Not bad for Alaska. However, I read today that the near record temperatures in Skagway (a bit north, where we stop tomorrow) are causing so much glacier melt that the river and part of the Chilkoot Trail are flooding. As much as I love weather karma, this is not good.

Like Ketchikan, Juneau is surrounded by the Tongass National Forest, at 16.7 acres the largest national forest in the United States. This encompasses the world's largest temperate rain forest, with 100 inches of snow and 90 of rain annually.

Surrounded by icefields 50 x 100 miles long, Juneau is, like Ketchikan, accessible only by sea and air. Ketchikan owes its existence to fishing; Juneau to gold.

The US bought Alaska from Crimean War strapped Russia in 1867 for $7.2 million dollars. Russia was happier to see the territory in American hands than those of their then foes, the British. After gold was discovered in 1880 and then the oil boom in the 1970s, I bet they wish they'd have hung on to it a bit longer.

While Russian territory, the capital of Alaska was nearby Sitka, then called New Archangel. In 1906 during gold mining days, the capital moved to Juneau. At that time there was no Anchorage (founded in 1915) or Fairbanks.  There were several campaigns over the last 50 years to move the capital, but at this point, it seems unlikely to change. It would be expensive, and many of the previous arguments for a move have become moot with the advent of the internet and electronic access to the state government.

Today Juneau has about 33,000 year round residents. The primary business in the capital is government, followed by tourism and then fishing.

We had a 4 hour excursion today that was included in our travel package. We traveled by coach to a city viewpoint that, conveniently, had a geocache. 

Next stop was the Mendenhall Glacier, located within the Tongass National Forest.

Greg and I walked a mile out the trail to Nugget Falls, which 30 years ago was behind the glacier instead of before it. The glacier has retreated almost two miles since it first became a tourist destination in the late 1800s, and a third of a mile just since 2007.

Nugget Falls, with the glacier to the left.

Mendenhall Glacier, from the visitors center. Nugget Falls on right.

Along the trail

Our final stop was the Macaulay Salmon Hatchery, a non-profit hatchery that was started as a home project in a children's wading pool after record low salmon counts in 1974. The current location opened in 1984 and now releases just over 130 million chum, king and coho salmon annually. 

Incubation tanks, teeming with salmon fry about 3 inches long.

Outside is a fish ladder from which the fry will be released into Juneau's Gastineau Channel when they are about a year old, and to which they will return several years later. The adult fish spawn in large tanks beyond the top of the ladder. The eggs are harvested, hatched into fry and the cycle begins again. A few weeks from now the fish ladder will become a frenzy of salmon striving to get home, but today we didn't see a single returning fish.

Fish ladder

In case we don't see another one, here is a breaching humpback whale in the Gastineau Channel.

After dinner we went to a BBC film on Alaska that was co-produced with Holland America to commemorate their 70 years of Alaska cruises. (They were the first cruiseline to come here.) Accompanied by live music including the string quintet that plays in Lincoln Center Stage, it followed a year's cycle of Alaskan wildlife. Nicely done, beautifully photographed.