Real Alaskans

What a funky little place, this Haines. Today we had little to do, having decided that the clabber sky did not bode well for poking holes with an airplane. The pilot said no guarantees of Glacier Bay today, so we decided to save the bucks for another adventure.

We visited both Chilkat and Chilkoot Parks. I found out later that both are named for tribes of the Tlingat, and that normally anything named Chilkat is south and west, and Chilkoot is north and east. That applies unless the item is a river....

No bears today, even though this is bear country. The salmon are a little slow. But the scenery is spectacular. You can see two glaciers from Chilkat State Park. We took a little "beach" walk there, which means walking over stones, some really big and rough, others smaller. Some of the stone beaches here look very forbidding. And they are impossible to hike on.

We went to a couple of funky museums. The Sheldon Museum is a history of the town and the native people. That's where I learned about the Chilkat vs Chilkoot. They have a great compilation of photos from the town over the years, some of the Fort as it grew and changed. There in the museum and later at Fort Seward, walking Daisy on the old parade ground, I began to wonder if my father had walked this land during WWII. Would this have been a port of entry for the army entering Alaska? I will look more closely through his old war scrapbook when I return home.

The funkiest museum was the Hammer museum. 1,600 hammers on display and 4-5,000 in storage. That is one bunch of hammers! What would such a collecter be called? Hammelatilist? They were at first all hammers that one man collected to live independently here in Haines. Then he caught the fever and started collecting. They are hoping to get more room soon to display more of them.

The most Alaskan conversation of the day was with the brewmeister at Haines Brewery. Whilst sipping my sampler of four of his 6 beers, we had a philosophical discussion, mostly about his life. Before owning a brewery, which puts him on the list of poverty level citizens, he was a forester. That means he measured trees and estimated the amount of forest for lumber companies and the government. He was a carpenter on the side.

He met his wife, who was willing to live in a remote area and love it. Remote means that his house, which he built, requires him to walk in 20 minutes one way. Sometimes in low tide he can walk around the beach (I know that means he hikes on rocks) or he can canoe things in. No refrigerator, just a root cellar. He has some solar power, supplemented by a diesel generator. He's working on a wind generator. He has water collection barrels. As to plumbing, he quoted a friend who said, "Why do people insist on finding nice clean water to run into their house, and then the first thing they do is shit in it? We Alaskans don't shit in our houses."

He said the next best thing about his wife, other than wanting to live in the wilderness, is that she was willing to become a teacher and let him have a brewery. I guess she loves his facial hair too. Men have an advantage in Alaska. They can grow facial hair against the elements. And most of them do.

I recommend his Spruce Ale, as it pleased me and the locals too. Several rolled by on Friday afternoon getting their half gallon refills of "the Spruce" to make the weekend odd jobs go smoother.

Tonight we joined the party waiting for the ferry to Skagway. There was a festive air among the waiters. We met several people we have seen along the way. Most of the time they recognize Daisy, not us. The family from Belgium with the two young girls that love Daisy came over. A couple who met us in Dawson Creek because they liked our seat covers was there. Daisy did her usual talking and greeting and smoozing. We were there at least two hours early, fixing dinner, hanging out.

To take the RV on the ferry, you have to register by the foot and pay accordingly. The length police came by and generally paced off the lengths of the vehicles in line to keep people honest. Carl said they busted somebody who paid for 21 feet and looked to be about 38. Sent them back to buy another ticket. How embarrassing. They also came by to be sure our propane was turned off. I know they gave it an extra turn, because I had a hard time turning it back on when we landed in Skagway.

The Malaspina ferry makes the triangle route from Juneau to Haines to Skagway every day. It was smooth as glass, quiet, big and comfortable. We went deep into a fiord headed to Skagway at dusk, with mountains on both sides of the ship. Despite the fact we were surrounded by cold water and glacial mountains, the night air was surprisingly mild. There was no wind except that created by the boat. It was quite magical. We could see Skagway's lights sparkling as we approached, a short hour later.

We disembarked from a ferry in the dark and tried to find a place to spend the night. Just when you need a Walmart parking lot, you are in a quaint touristy gold rush town with no apparent shopping centers, and the days are getting short enough that it is dark at midnight. It was disorienting, but we managed. Goodnight Skagway!