Mountains, mountains and more mountains

        Matt and I have been having a great time these past couple of days, largely because we've been stepping up our game because the weather's been gorgeous and the Oriordans are visiting. On Friday, Matt and I had off and decided to go hiking for the first time since we've been up here. One of the most popular mountain trails here is on Deer Mountain, a 3,000 ft elevation peak that has a beautifully maintained trail and great views of Ketchikan. When we set out to hike it, we neglected to realize the downsides to transportation by foot and were already exhausted by the time we made it to the trailhead, which was a mile and a half hike on its own.

Us at the trailhead, before we even started the real hike. We think we'll take the bus there next time.

      As we hiked, we both noticed that this was the first time that being in Ketchikan actually felt like being in a rainforest. All around us, the flora was thick and lush and there were sounds of weird bird calls and dripping rainwater all around us (interestingly enough, the ravens in the forest often mimic the sound of dripping water so it was hard to distinguish which was which).

The trail ahead

      
        We didn't see much wildlife on our hike, although I had been prepared to buy bear spray (until we went to the store and realized that bear spray was $70 a can). We had gone to a bird rehabilitation exhibit downtown earlier that day and had discussed fooling our readers into thinking we saw this guy in the woods:

    
     But then we discussed the ethics of misleading our blog followers and of the possibility of breaching the moral code of blogging. And then there's the fact that you can totally see that the bird is tethered to a rail. As for our hike, we didn't make it very far because we were out of shape. And when I say we, I mean mostly me. Also, there is STILL snow on the summit, making it quite difficult to hike after about 1 3/4 miles up the trail. We went to the mile mark where we'd heard that there was a great view, and sure enough, there we found one of the best views we've seen all summer!

Us at the overlook. Note scenic mountains and departing cruise ship in the background.

       The photo above was taken by Dottie, a new friend we made at the overlook. Dottie is an ambitious 60-year old woman who came up with her husband from Maryland to run the youth hostel for a month this summer. They had never been to Ketchikan before and decided to come up on a whim after seeing the position advertised online. It's pretty awesome getting to meet people like her on a daily basis here!
      On Friday night we headed out to the Asylum, our next-door bar, with the Oriordans and hung outside because it was such a nice night. Nothing like enjoying some beer with a mountain view!

       Lucky for us, we're back to our normal schedule and have Monday off- that's tomorrow, woohoo! Hopefully we'll do something awesome and crazy. Or we might just loaf around and read.

Either way, more soon!

Bridget

The Toms are in Town!

     The past few days have been exciting because Kev's father and brother, Tom Senior and Tom Junior, have come up for a visit. They arrived on Tuesday, on Tom Senior's birthday and we cooked dinner at our apartment because Kev only has two plates and two chairs at his. The Toms have been having a grand time in Ketchikan so far, and have gone on a Duck Tour AND seen the Lumberjack Show thanks to the great connections they have here. Yesterday, they took Kev, Matt and I out to dinner at the Cape Fox Lodge which is the nicest hotel and restaurant in town. What makes it extra cool is that to get up to the Lodge, you take the funicular and get a great view of the city.

The Funicular

I have no idea how the lodge manages to stay in business with such a low percentage of tourists staying overnight here, but it's a beautiful facility with a restaurant that actually serves vegetarian food (most of the restaurants around the city have seafood-based menus, shockingly enough). I actually tried crab dip for the first time and loved it, although I suspect this is mostly to do with the fact that it was mixed with a ton of cheese. Still, baby steps.

Swank City! Clearly I took this right off the webpage because I forgot my camera and didn't like the crappy phone pictures I ended up with.

Crappy phone picture of Tom and Kev at Cape Fox

Less crappy phone picture of the town at "night"- the sun doesn't set until 11 these days!

           We walked around after dinner and ended up shooting pool at the Asylum and staying up waaaaay past our bedtimes, which was fine because all three of us had the day off today. This morning, the Oriordans took a float plane tour of the town, something that Matt and I will hopefully be doing very soon through our work connections- apparently it's an awesome tour. To find out what Matt and I did on our day off today, you'll have to wait until tomorrow, when I get around to uploading the photos. Hint: they're pretty great photos. It's back to work for all three of us tomorrow but we'll have plenty of times in the evenings to hang out with the Oriordans, who will be in town until Tuesday. Lucky for Matt and I we'll have Monday off as well so our next vacation day is right around the corner.


More soon!

Bridget
                                             

The Event of the Season

          When I was packing for Ketchikan last month, I remember looking at all of my pretty dresses and saying "well, can't pack these, it's a shame I won't need them in Alaska!" Little did I know that I'd be attending a fundraising gala through work and would need to look semi-decent for it. Luckily, I used the excuse of not bringing any of my nice dresses to justify the purchase of one for the event, the "Sole-stice shoe fundraiser party. The party involved fancy finger foods and a series of auctions to raise money for a chemotherapy infusion suite at the city hospital, the PeaceHealth Medical Center. My manager Sarah and her family help run the auctions every year, so she had people from the Lumberjack Show help set up and run the event. I got to set up the displays for the shoes and bags that were up for auction and then determine the winners of the silent auction bids.

I didn't even know we had this many people in Ketchikan until the event

 
         It was fun to be at such a classy party and to meet the very motivated folks who arrange the fundraiser every year. There were three rounds of silent auctions and a live auction event as well- over four hundred items were bid on. I was pretty tired by the end of setting up the event but not too tired to enjoy the fancy shoes and drinks.

The middle display of live-auction items

The cost of this drink basically blew a hole in my alcohol fund for this week

Another fun part of the event was that they somehow got the lumberjacks to participate in the event as well (as much as I'd like to believe in their kind-hearted and charitable spirits, I'm a little skeptical that they willingingly attended a shoe party without any compensation or bribery). They sold chocolates and trinkets to the event-goers. Each one of them had to buy or borrow clothes for the event as none had such frivolous niceties as khackis or a shirt with a collar that's not plaid.

My coworker Erika and I with two of the lumberjacks, Lurch and Tyler

All in all, it was a fun night and perhaps the only valid excuse I'll have this summer for getting dolled up and spending $10 on drinks in Alaska!

'Til next time,

Bridget

We Love to Duck Around in Ketchikan

Yesterday was our glorious one day off for the week, so Matt and I celebrated in the best way possible- we went on a Duck Tour of Ketchikan. It's pretty hilarious that Matt hadn't been on a Duck Tour yet until then seeing as he's been selling the tours for three weeks. It was a great way to see the city (and it was fo free so obviously we were excited about it) and it was our first time on a boat in the Pacific. The tour was a little cheesy, as one would expect a tour with a duck theme to be, and our narrator Paul was really fun. The road part of the tour took us all around both the downtown section and the wooded area of Ketchikan, hitting such gems as the one park in the city that actually has grass and the spot where Paul witnessed a chihuahua get carried away by a bald eagle ten years ago. We also hit actual landmarks like some of the local totem poles and the salmon hatchery.

      

Our Duck Boat: Note that the duck whistles will deploy in case of increased cabin pressure

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Salmon Hatchery: there will allegedly be real salmon here in a few weeks!

What's great about playing the tourist on our days off is that it allows Matt and I to see our island and learn facts that we can share with tourists at our respective jobs. Week by week, I'm feeling more and more like a local (although technically, I'm not allowed to call myself a local- I'm a seasonal: the difference being that the former is a winter-hardened survivor and the latter is literally a fair-weather resident). Unlike a local I don't think I'll ever get used to the amount of bald eagles I get to see on a daily basis. They are the pigeons of Ketchikan, except way more beautiful and cooler to watch.

Two adult eagles and a juvenile hanging out on some logs

Our day off was awesome and we spent our evening at The Asylum, the bar located about two hundred feet from our apartment, with Kev and his boat crew. Our Asylum meet-ups with Captain Steve and the Allen Marine crew are becoming a tradition on Mondays, as well as Fridays and any other day of the week we end up there because any time we head in, we're almost guaranteed to run into him. Also, if you stay for a drink you're guaranteed to get free food because the owner, Carlos is constantly grilling and cooking for his patrons. Anyway, I'm signing off for now, and will hopefully have some fun stuff to add later this week. Matt and I have an early day of 6:30am work tomorrow- joy!- but that won't stop us from seeing Ketchikan and having a great time.

Until then,

Bridget!

Observing the Wild Life

The thing about Ketchikan that makes summer livin' so much fun is the fact that so many people our age come from all over the country to work there. A bunch of rowdy twenty-somethings squeezed together into a small island city makes for a tight-knit community. While Ketchikan apparently can be a pretty depressing place to live in the winter (you know, because of the freezing rain and complete darkness) it is invigorated in the summer by the bustling tourist industry and the happy, drunk kids that run it. On the days where we have time to squeeze in naps and chug our coffee without screwing up our normal patterns of sleep, Matt and I go out to meet and socialize with these crazies. Last night, the Fish House (one of the several bars favored by the locals which include other gems like Fat Stan's, the Asylum and Mike's Elbow Room) hosted a music night. The Potlach Band performed, butchering hits from the 60's and 70's but in a really fun way. It was actually a blast and I got to meet some of my roommate Heather's friends from the ziplining tours and scope out my other fellow Ketchikanners.

The Potlach Band 

An interesting thing about Ketchikan night life is that because everyone's work schedules revolve around the cruise ships, going out is kind of an any-night goes kind of deal. The biggest nights I've enjoyed so far have been Sundays and Tuesdays, incidentally.

Dancers at the Fish House. Photo taken from afar- one must always remember to observe the unpredictable local wildlife from a safe distance

We've been blessed here with a stretch of gorgeous weather and had the opportunity to go grill out with some guys from Kevin's boat crew the other night at Ward Lake, a beautiful and pristine park in the Tongass National Forest. While we were there, some men in their fifties told us they were in a band (fun fact: almost every band that plays in Ketchikan is comprised of middle-aged men who are just livin', man) and that they'd be performing at Ward Lake for the 4th of July.  When asked what kind of music his band played, the drummer replied, "We play everything from Pat Benatar to the Monkeys. You know man, rock n' roll!" Enough said.


Until next time,

Bridget

Here Comes the Sun

         The sun doesn't shine too often in Ketchikan, so when it does, everyone is a little more lively and everything's a little more fun. On Saturday, the sun was out so Matt and I went to explore the less-seen side of Ketchikan behind the busy downtown district that is usually swamped with tourists during the day. We took the funicular (a gondola-type ride) up to Cape Fox Lodge which is probably the poshest hotel in Ketchikan- it seems to cater to business people and others familiar with the area because not many people come on vacation to Ketchikan unless it's on a cruise.

Matt on the funicular to Cape Fox

          Yesterday the sun was miraculously out again and it was a shocking sixty degrees. This always makes work fun because the tourists are extremely pleased about the weather which makes a good crowd for the show and a bunch of happy customers in the store. After work, the lumberjacks were working on their timber skills (because who doesn't hone their timber skills on a sunny day?) and decided to teach me how to log roll, which was so kind and naive of them- they were unaware of my stunning lack of coordination or balance.

It's actually incredible that I could stay on the log long enough for this photo to be taken

          I am pretty dismal at it right now but I plan on keeping at it (when the weather's nice, cuz that pool ain't heated) until I get respectable- I'm also hoping to be an adept axe thrower by the end of the summer as well. As far as awesome days go, today was probably the most awesome of all. An excellent perk of working with companies based in the tourist industry is that it's a very tight-knit community, so all of the employees get to go on each others' excursions and tours for free. Today, Matt and I went on the Adventure Kart Excursion, which was way way way cooler than I could have imagined it to be (I was picturing a go-kart track).

Me in front of the Kart fleet

Basically, the karts are modified military-grade vehicles that have been a bit "toned down" as our guides told us- they basically removed the machine guns and detuned them so that they could no longer go 100 mph. These babies can basically speed through any bump or rock in their paths. We went out in a caravan-style formation on a fourteen mile path through the woods and mountains, with Matt driving the first half of the trip. We then took a break at a waterfall and snapped some shots of the gorgeous views we were surrounded by.

Matt and I at an overlook- that's Prince of Whales Island behind us!

Amazingly, Matt let me take over the wheel for the seven mile ride back and didn't even seem that petrified. I was a little scared at first because of the bumps, turns and the careening death trap I was operating but the vehicle was pretty sturdy. It was pretty exhilarating and fun; the hardest part was not trying to look at the scenery while I was driving!

Weeeeeeeeee!

Today was a blast, and tomorrow it's back to the real world of work for the next six days 'til my next Monday off. I enjoy the fact that I'm always busy and that there's always something to look forward to- like fodder for my next post, for instance.


Until then,

Bridget

Ketchikan's Racy Past

           Day by day, Matt and I have been learning loads more about Ketchikan as we talk to locals and explore. For instance, the island that the city of Ketchikan is located on is called Revillagigedo Island. Ketchikan is also the would-be site of Sarah Palin's "Bridge to Nowhere," a $400 million dollar project that proposed the construction of a bridge from Ketchikan to the island where its airport is located on to replace the ferry system, which everyone besides Sarah Palin and a few other lazy people think is just fine. Before it capitalized on the cruise tourism industry, Ketchikan's main industry came from timber and fishing. The logging industry reached its peak in the 1950s with the opening of two pulp mills but declined around 1990s as contracts ended and the Forest Service began restricting the availability of timber harvest in the Tongass National Forest- this was done to halt the clearcutting and pollution that was caused by the competing logging businesses.
          In the 19th and early 20th centuries, the working men of the fishing and logging industries didn't have much to entertain them, so in came the "working woman." In the 19th century the women worked all over Ketchikan but in 1903, city residents complained about their pervasive presence. Thus, the ladies of the night were kicked out of their residences and moved to set up shop on Creek Street where they would be out of sight, out of mind. By pushing all of these shady ladies into one location, the city accidentally set up its own red light district. Today, Creek Street stands in all its glory and is now a hotspot for different reasons- tourist attraction. 

Creek Street, where you can catch all sorts of crabs

      You'd be impressed with how gifted the folks in Ketchikan are at presenting its racy past to tourists- Creek Street is a hub of shops and hooker museums (not their official title). We've been learning all sorts of fun things about Ketchikan's past and will be sharing more soon. Other than absorbing knowledge Matt and I have been working hard and reading a lot because we don't have cable, which is fine with us. It is crazy to think that we graduated college two weeks ago, we already feel like we've always been here because of how friendly everyone is and how easy Ketchikan is to love. Matt has a day off coming soon and hopefully I will too so we can go explore our city some more.


Much love!!

Bridget