So Sorry it's taken me so long!!

Hi! Welcome back to my blog. It has been a long time. I have missed writing here, but things have been beyond crazy here lately. I can't believe it's October already. Lots has happened and since I'm notorious for long blogs, I should get started...

Last I left off, I had just finished my job at the Chiropractor's and started working at the Newspaper. Eric had just returned from Sitka and Eric' parents had come in as our first guests. I'll start with that. Eric's parents came in for a week to visit. Sadly, they didn't get the best weather most of the time. Their first day - it poured. That didn't stop them, but it did me. I sat inside while they went out and explored our neighborhood. It was great seeing friendly faces again and fortunately we were both able to take some time off to spend with them.

We spent the bulk of the time hiking. The town is so small, there's not much to see just by driving, the best way to see is to hike. We explored some of our favorites and got to explore new trails ourselves.
This is Auke Lake. It is surrounded by beautiful homes, float planes, and a great trail. Despite all the rain, the nice thing about Juneau is it has very tall and thick pine trees. A lot of the trails are covered with them, which means that even when it's raining the trees will normally shield you from the raindrops. So you can still enjoy a hike on a lightly raining day.

One day after getting waffles from our favorite breakfast place, we decided to walk in Auke Bay Harbor - the nicer harbor in town. It usually has boats docked from all over the country that are sailing to wherever their heart desires. Plus you can see sea lions, jellyfish and eagles pretty well here. We passed by a fishing boat that looked like it might be selling fish. Eric and I still haven't mastered fishing, nor did we know how to recognize a commercial boat. As we were walking back to the car we noticed that another guy was purchasing a fish from them and they were putting out a sign for sale. So we asked how much..

And there's our fish! And the smallest one they had no less.. 10 lbs of king salmon - the most prime salmon in town. We've learned that there are a variety of salmon that habitat the area, but this is the locals favorite. With Eric's parents in, we figured why not? Can't get it much fresher than this. But... how do we fillet it? Thankfully the fisherman did it all for us and gave us some ideas on how to use up this much fish.

That afternoon fish was served. We just baked it in the oven - no seasonings. Wow was this salmon rich! So fresh, so rich, so flavorful! So rich, in fact, that I don't think the 4 of us even ate much more than 1 lb. of it. But man, was it delicious. We saved up the rest of it and made salmon omelets for breakfast the next morning, a suggestion by the fisherman. They weren't as good as we had hoped. The eggs had covered up too much of the salmon flavor. We ate so much salmon that week, that Eric and I have barely eaten salmon since. Half of that salmon is sitting in our freezer still.

One of the hikes we later explored, which has now become a favorite of all of ours, is the Fish Creek Trail on North Douglas Island. We were completely surrounded by nature. The beauty of the tall trees and the lush greenery that surround you is just amazing. North Douglas is an area not very heavily populated and so usually you'll find yourself alone on trails. As the name suggests, there were tons of fish swimming upstream, to spawn. Eric thought that he'd be able to catch a fish with his hands there were so many. And he almost did! But, gosh, if he had - we had no idea how we were going to carry it back to the car.. we were at least a mile or 2 into the trail and a 15-20 lb salmon walking back would not have been fun to carry with our bare hands.

Eventually the creek got wider and it seemed that the birds were using it as their flight path. An eagle would fly down the stream every couple minutes, not to mention ravens and seagulls.

You can see it was another wet day! But we had fun. We hiked until we came to some freshly killed salmon on the trail - recently caught and eaten by a bear. Since it was then safe to assume a bear might be near, what better time to turn back? :)

We were waiting for a clear day for one of our favorite hikes and finally we got one! Perseverance Trail - tons of waterfalls to see and tons of berries to eat. With Eric's parents we hiked further than we ever had before. My ankle was still a little tender, so I started getting to the point where I wanted to turn back. But we thought we were so close to our next waterfall, so I stayed back and let them check it out so I could rest my ankle. Eric came running back for me and told me it was worth it to go further.
Well, the picture does not do it nearly enough justice. Because this area was gorgeous. There was a river running on 2 sides of you with the waterfall in the distance. We sat there for awhile to take in the views and rest my ankle. I really enjoyed this spot. We watched a guy pan for gold up here. Next summer I think we'll have to explore even further. This trail always seems to keep getting better.

We spent our evenings going to the glacier, because there had been so much bear activity there and we were trying to find bears for Ruth and Emil. Remember in my last post I mentioned our bear sightings got better. One night at the glacier as we're walking along what we call the Bear Trail, we heard some folks say that there was a bear in the tree. I was excited because there were other times we had went where we had just missed bears in a tree and I thought it seemed silly that the Bears would go up there. Well I was right about that...

Ha! I got a kick out of this. The Mama bear and her 3 cubs were ALL in the tree. The Mama just relaxing and the cubs playing around on the branches.

They are SO fricking cute. Oh my goodness. There better never be one cub walking around my house because I may just keep him. These guys just played around in the trees for at least 20 minutes. I must have taken at least 40 pictures of them in the trees.

The little guy on the bottom got stuck on his tummy around a branch. He was rocking back and forth trying to get un-stuck. Too cute. The Mama bear and other 2 cubs headed down the tree for dinner, leaving that little guy behind. The Mama bear started calling for him and he responded with his little cries. She eventually started climbing back up and just then he figured it out. They are just too precious. It was so much fun watching them in the tree and then climb down it.

Once they got down they headed into the woods to catch their dinner. We got to see Mama bear trek through the water while the cubs waited on the edge. She caught one within minutes and brought it back to the cubs to eat.

At one point they disappeared into the forest and I had heard they had come out on the other side of the trail. So I went looking over there for them to not only find the bear, but realize that it was another Mama bear and her 2 cubs! Ironically enough, they also started up in a tree, but it was a very lush pine tree and hard to spot. They took on the same pattern as the first set of bears. They came out of the tree to go eat. And they did so so close to the other set of bears that the Mama and her 3 cubs got nervous and headed deeper into the woods.

Eric's Mom was just smiling from ear to ear with excitement. We all were, but it was fun watching her experience all of it. So, at this point the Mama and her 2 cubs are so close to us eating their fish. Until they hear some tree branches rustling. The cubs, within an instant, grabbed the nearest tree and started climbing up it. I would've never guessed how quickly bears can climb trees, but they climb as fast as a squirrel! They must have received some signal from Mom and quickly went back to eating. Then, the rustling got louder. The cubs bolted up the tree. But this time that tree was right in front of me. I could've reached my hand out and touched the cub I was so close. So close I couldn't even take a picture. The Mama then got on her hind legs.. and this is when I started backing up. She was reacting this way to the moving branches, but knowing that she was getting more aggressive.. I thought backing up couldn't hurt.

Everything quickly calmed down and the little cubs wiggled their butts down the tree. After all that, we shortly noticed that the other group of 3 cubs and their Mom could be found at the top of another tree now. Gone to rest, I suppose. The twin cubs then walked right under the elevated path we were on. Shortly afterwards they retired into the woods as well.

We got a solid hour show and my jaw was probably wide open the entire time. We were able to get up close and personal, more so than ever before and those cubs are just too cute. Never would I have ever imagined seeing as many bears as I have this summer and in the ways that we did. It's just been amazing.

I think, now, we can officially say we will never get a better bear sighting than this.

Amongst our other exploring, we headed out to Auke Bay and stumbled across this great area. Welcome to the new location of Bears & Beers. :) There is a recreation area here that has cabins (not officially, 1 open all since it's a park) for you to use, fully equipped with a fireplace, grill, and 2 fire pits (1 by the cabin, 1 on the beach). There's a nice walking path here and a campground.

Shortly after Eric's parents left, we were invited to a BBQ on the beach at one of these cabins. We saw a group of porpoises swimming in the bay. Now, I also need to tell you of what we learned to be an Alaskan BBQ - crab, smoked salmon, king salmon, shrimp, halibut, brats and homemade everything else. It was pretty cool, we never expected such a spread! I made my famous carrot cake. We came home with only crumbs, but also we have made a nice group of friends. :)

At this point, the fall rainy season of Juneau was quickly approaching. We knew that any nice day we had could be our last. We tried to take advantage of any nice day we could. All summer, Eric had been trying to get me to hike to a peak with him and I was able to use my ankle as an excuse for awhile... but that was over. Eric wanted to use this day to hike to the top of Mt. Roberts. Now, it really isn't as bad as it sounds because we would take a tram halfway up and only have to hike about 2 miles to the top. Doesn't sound bad right? It's 2 miles, but 2,000 feet up. That is a lot of elevation to gain in such a short distance - making the trail super steep.

About halfway up the clouds started covering all of Juneau. This was kind of disheartening.. you want to see everything from the top! I was dying at this point. You can't even see the tram we took up from the above picture.

As we got a little further the clouds let up some. The coolest thing was seeing the mountains beyond the mountains we're used to seeing.
I would like to say that this is the top, but nope. The clouds just started surrounding us completely. I liked the imagery here. I stopped shortly after this. My lungs and legs were burning and I was just completely exhausted. I had packed my book because I expected Eric would want to go further than I. So I told him to go on and I started heading back down. The temperature at this point was close to 40 degrees.

Within 2 minutes of Eric walking further up, I lost sight of him. There were times when the clouds completely surrounded you and it was very surreal and a little scary. I didn't realize that until I found myself all alone surrounded by clouds. Eric didn't make it to the top of Mt. Roberts but he did make it to the top of Gastineau Peak. He said it was pretty awesome up there, but neither of us seemed to realize that he should've taken the camera. Oh well.. that's what next summer is for, right? :)

In other news, Eric spent 2 weeks in D.C. and has completed his Officer's Basic Training course. It was a loooong 2 weeks without him and with a 4 hour time difference between us it was hard to talk. D.C. worked him hard while there, spending 12-14 hours in class and training. But he now has a new ribbon to add to his insignia and is looking more official in his uniform. Mom was awesome and came up for a week while Eric was gone to keep me company. She was lucky and had some of the best weather we had all summer. We even broke record high's. Eric was so upset that he missed almost a full 2 weeks of beautiful, perfect Alaskan weather.

I got to to hike more than I expected to get her too and we tried some new restaurants. We also got invited to a beach BBQ (that's right, we do have a beach) and she was able then to sample all of Alaska's specialties. I swear - people up here know how to BBQ. All on a bon fire - there was steamed crab, brats, burgers, salmon and halibut and some other things. Mom had fun meeting some of our friends, who were also nice enough to invite me over while Eric and Mom weren't here to make sure I wasn't alone.

Unfortunately I had to work - a lot. So she was left to explore the town on her own. I think she's seen almost all of Juneau at this point. Now, to get her to see the sites you can't from the road. She didn't get to see any bears, the salmon run had just stopped. But she loved the eagles and saw a porcupine.

Summer is now over and the rainy season has begun. Apparently the hurricane wind season has also begun. Three days out of the past 2 weeks have had winds over 50 mph - which means the power goes out. Last week the airport recorded 68 mph winds. Describing Juneau's fall, a writer at the paper wrote, "Juneau's fall is the closest you'll ever get to living underwater.." I'm starting to understand this.

The other bit of news that I have is that about a month ago (yes, again I'm sorry it's taken me soooo long to update this post) I got the promotion I was working for! I am now the Creative Services Supervisor at the newspaper. It's funny how much things are different here. Back in Chicago, I had the bare minimum of experience to get a good job. Here that experience is gold. This is huge for my career and with the experience in Newspapers, I shouldn't have a hard time finding a job once we move again. I honestly like what I'm doing. It's busy, but I would rather be busy than not. But this is almost too busy. And lately, it's been killing me. Our whole department is changing and there's all these new tasks we need to learn and start handling. So, it's been tough but I'm constantly getting compliments for the work that I'm doing and everyone seems to be noticing how much I'm working my butt off. I like it because I know I'm doing a good job and I'm making the department better. It's fun seeing the progress and improvements you are making. :) But I am stressed and exhausted right now. Last night I was at work for 12 hours and mostly because of carelessness. But I got a huge compliment when I was almost at my breaking point...

Tomorrow, Eric and I leave for our honeymoon! We'll be gone for 3 weeks and after the past couple at work I cannot tell you how much I need it. When I started this job, I informed them of this trip - a lot of bosses, I was afraid, would not allow that much time off. They said it was ok, and that I would be taking it unpaid - no problem! But the compliment I received.. was that the Publisher is going to pay me for a week of my vacation as a Thank You for all the hard work I've been putting in. I cannot tell you how good that made me feel. I would've never expected that, but it really made me feel like a valued employee and assured me that as nuts as it's been I have been doing good. :)

While I'm gone - the paper may fall to pieces. Sadly to say. My right hand man is also on vacation for almost the entire 3 weeks that we will be gone. Us 2 are huge components in the smoothness of the daily paper going out - so we'll see what happens when I get back...I'm almost already not looking forward to my first day back - but let's not think of that. :)

We've made some good friends over the time too and they seem to throw a different potluck party every weekend. They are awesome because everybody makes things from scratch out here. You know you will always eat something amazing whenever you go to one of these parties. And our Margarita Machine - one of the best wedding gifts we've received - it is the hit of the party! People love this thing!

We've also been busy trying to plan all our trips next year because the PFD (oil money) sale is going on with the airlines. And coordinating with friends and family to come up.

Ok. I don't even know how long this thing is now. All I know is I've been working on it for about a week to update everyone before we go. The snow has started falling on all the mountain tops here which is a constant reminder that winter is quickly approaching. Once we get back from our honeymoon, the days will only be about 7-8 hours long. Darkness is coming. We'll see how winter treats us...

Nice weather + 2 visitors = a busy Jill & Eric

Things have been busy out here in Alaska! Lots has been going on.

To start, I've gotten another job to start once the Chiropractic gig ended. It's actually exactly as Eric and I had planned. I am the newest Graphic Designer at the local newspaper, the Juneau Empire! Probably 1 of 10 Graphic Design jobs in this whole city, so I'm ecstatic that I got it AND that it opened up exactly when I needed it to! But I have to tell you of the story of how I got it, because it's kind of weird and a little funny. First, I should mention that I applied for the Graphic Design Supervisor position. They had asked for 5-10 years of experience, which I don't have, but also all the tasks and skills required I had. So, I figured there's slim pickings in Juneau and why not? The next day I got a call from the boss asking me to call him back. So, I thought, fantastic I've got an interview! I gave him a call and he asked if I could come in that day. Well, fortunately my job at the chiropractor's closes for 2 hours for lunch. So I said sure - thinking this would just be a quick meeting to go over my portfolio and skills. Three minutes into the 'interview' he starts telling me about all the benefits and salary. My reaction is, Why is he telling me this? Then he says, Well it was great to meet you, follow me. Thinking I would be going on a tour of the place, he then brought me to the front desk and asked the receptionist for a new hire packet. He then asked me to fill out all sorts of paperwork and bring it back to him as soon as possible - he wanted me to start in 4 days. So, I took the papers, looked at him, and said, "So... I got the job?" His response, "Yeah! I figure you'll do great, but if you don't we'll just let you go. You're from Chicago, you can't be that bad." LOL. I should mention he's from Detroit. :) I actually didn't believe I got the job, since it was a Supervisor position and he barely asked me anything, so I only told my Mom and Dad that weekend and waited until I got further confirmation before telling anyone else.

So upon leaving the building, I promptly sprained my ankle in excitement. It was raining and I was trying to walk quickly to my car to prevent my portfolio from getting too wet. My heel caught a rock the wrong way - my shoe went one way and my heel the other. Fortunately, I don't think anyone in my new workplace caught my wipe-out. I hobbled into the car, took my shoe off to stretch my ankle and immediately called Eric to tell him I got the job! Then.. the sprained ankle. I had never sprained it so bad in my life. It was my right foot, a.k.a. the driving foot, and I was concerned I wouldn't be able to get myself back to work. Slowly but surely, I made it back there and hobbled into the office, as I could no longer fit my foot into my shoe. On the bright side, I was working in a chiropractor's office - as soon as I told him what happened he immediately began caring for me. He taped up my ankle, gave me ice, and told me to stay seated the rest of the afternoon. Luckily, for me, the rest of our appointments that day were regulars so when they came in, they knew the whole drill without me having to worry. At this point, I could no longer walk, so Dr. B gave me crutches and I called Eric to pick me up.

I felt so useless. It sucked. I spent the rest of that night on the couch with my foot up and on ice. Thankfully, the next day I woke up and I didn't need the crutches anymore! I could walk on it, but I was slow and limping. Still.. better than crutches. Luckily that weekend was also rainy, so I didn't feel so bad spending most of it inside.

I was fortunate how quickly I became mobile again because on Monday morning Eric was leaving for Sitka, Alaska to fill in at the Pharmacy there. He would only be there 5 days. The original plan was for me to go with him, but then I got this receptionist job and since I would be working through the week I couldn't. I'll make it there another time.

The immobile weekend gave me a bunch of time, though, to fill out this giant stack of paperwork I was given and to write up all the questions I had for this new boss. I didn't even know my hours! Plus I also had to drop the bomb that I need 3 weeks off for our honeymoon. So, during Monday's lunch I headed over there to return the paperwork and ask my questions. Everything went well and he answered everything the way I wanted. Honeymoon got approved! The only downside, even though I don't really consider it one, is I wasn't hired to be the Supervisor - just another designer because I have no newspaper experience. However, he just wanted to see how quickly I picked up on things and then we could later discuss the promotion. With only 2 years of experience, sounds great to me! It was now official! Wooohoooo!!!

I was to start the next day. So the week that Eric was in Sitka, I was going to be working 2 jobs. As I teased him, I never thought by marrying a Doctor would I have to work 2 jobs. :) The chiropractor's office is only open for half days on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so I was going to work the opposite shifts at the newspaper in order to hit the ground running on my first full day. That next day, I got a new boss. The company was merging 2 departments and so oddly enough the guy who hired me 4 days prior was no longer my boss. My new boss had not even seen my resumé. A little weird... maybe there's just a lot going on. He was excited to have me and so I wasn't concerned, just with everything else that happened.. it was just strange.

Eric didn't so much enjoy his week in Sitka. For those of you who aren't too familiar, Sitka is about 90 miles west of Juneau, but only plane or ferry can get you there. We've heard from people here that Sitka is the most beautiful city in Alaska. He said work was boring and the weather was rainy. He got out to hike a little, but was happy to come home. I still haven't seen the pictures he took.

The weekend he came home we had the most perfect weather we've had here all summer. 75 and sunny for 6 days straight. Lovely! We tried to spend every minute we could outside, but Eric's parents were coming up 3 days later and we still have stuff on our spare bed that we needed to find a place for. Well.. we figured we could do it all at night and went out during the day. :)

There were about 30 of these bright yellow birds flying outside our window. Since I keep my camera on the windowsill, I got some good shots. I don't know what this bird is, but I had fun watching them all.


On Saturday, the weather was so nice that we had to get out. But to safely test my ankle we went on a flat and short hike. We headed to the glacier to hike the Nugget Falls Trail. The skies were so blue and clear!


The hike to Nugget Falls was easy, but with such a great day it was filled with tourists! Not a big deal, I mean look at what we saw!


It really was super easy to get there, especially with how close you were able to get to the falls. As you can see by the other tourists. They're also good to see how large this waterfall was. It was just beautiful and the glacier was just right next to it. Surrounded by a full circle of beauty.

We've been watching a lot of the travel channel lately and have been surprised at how much Alaska is on there. Hey, we're new to cable. :) But where we didn't expect Alaska was on the country's 10 Most Extreme Beaches. Mendenhall Lake beach makes that list. Why? Because that is the lake with the glacier in it. Which means you can swim with icebergs and the water never gets warmer than 40 degrees. Apparently, though, on the hot days this is what the locals do. Some even on the cold days and they bring hot chocolate in thermos' to warm up. After the hike, Eric was pretty hot so he considered going in. First, he tested with his hands - not bad. Then he took of his shoes and tested with his feet and calves - a bit chilly, but he still thought he could handle it. After 30 minutes of contemplating...


He finally went in!! He told me to take a bunch of pictures because he wasn't posing and he wasn't going this alone again. He walked in to his waist, dove all the way in and promptly walked right back out.


But you can see - he had a good time. :)

The glacier has been a popular place for bear sightings, if you remember in my last post or two. We were still on the hunt for the Mama and her 3 cubs, but had slowed down on search with the ankle sprain. We decided to walk the popular trail for bears just to see if we'd see any. Too our surprise we got to see the Mama and her 3 cubs!!!!!! They were hiding under a tree, eating their freshly caught salmon. Look, I got one peeking out!


There was a small open space next to the tree and the Mama was out checking out the area and if we were any threat. The humans were the caged animals in this park, but this bear could easily hop over the fence if she wanted to. Fortunately, there was a ranger making sure nobody got too close. This was good because a lot of tourists can be dumb. Most people know to never get between a Mama and her cubs, yet these tourists were sticking their hands through the fence just to get a good picture. The Mama was even popping her jaw as a sign of anxiety.


But look at how cute these little guys are!!!!!!! Gosh, I just want to grab one and take them home with me. I can't get over how cute they are! They walked into the open path and we were fortunate to see them just going about their day for about an hour.


We even got to see the cubs wrestling and playing around with each other. One cub even went up to the fence and poked his head through. But I had my camera on manual focus and I couldn't focus it fast enough. They are just too dang cute!!


This was by far the best bear experience we've had!! And as Eric put it - probably the best experience we'll ever have. (Well, stay tuned for the next post because it DID get better.)

On Sunday, we decided to do another somewhat relaxed hike. The ankle felt fine yesterday, I just walked slow. This trail we decided to do a trail with a little incline. With Eric's parents coming in just a couple days, I didn't want to be sitting on the couch while they went out and explored. So we headed out to Douglas Island for this trail. To our surprise it was a wide open meadow. Not something we've seen out here before. With no trees it was super hot, but it was nice to feel the warmth. Eric will disagree with that statement. :)

The rest of the weekend we tried to sit outside, read and fly the super kite Eric's Mom bought us years ago. Soaking up the sun. I even got a little color! It was a perfect weekend.

Remember how I said we'd clean. Nope - the house was a disaster by Sunday evening. Luckily, my last day at the chiropractor's I only needed to work a few hours. I happily said goodbye and went home to clean! I knew what it was going into it and while I didn't like the job I did get to meet a lot of new people and learn more about Juneau. However, the weather was perfect again Monday and so I spent the better part of the afternoon outside. Which meant we were up late that night cleaning for his parents arrival the following day.

On my way home that day, I stumbled across an eagle walking in the brush outside our stairs. It scared me a little, as I thought it was a bear, but it was neat to see him so close. It is scary how large they actually are, they're HUGE! This was a young one - not bald yet. You can see him sitting on the branch.


Eric's parents arrived last Tuesday and they leave shortly. We've been so busy showing them around town that I started writing this blog a week ago. I thought, in order to keep this short and so I actually get this posted, I will make a new post for their stay. It's been nice having family up here, but it's also been busy! Until next time...!

I'm really starting to love this place

Of course, we still haven't experienced the fall's heavy rain or the winter's short days, but my goodness the summer is just amazing up here. I know I had my doubts and frustration a few weeks ago, but we've had some fantastic weather here lately that has completely shifted my views. With sunny days and temperatures in the high 60's we've really been getting the opportunity to go out and further explore our town. With every new trail there's always a new beauty to be found. With every new area of town explored, a spectacular new view is awaiting to be seen. With every new experience there are fond memories that will stick with me for the rest of my life.

I know I skipped my usual posting last week, so one would think that we've been busy, but mostly just lazy. This new job has lied to me. The 30-hour supposed weeks have turned into 37 hour weeks with 10 hour days. The weird thing is that the office is only open for 30 hours each week, but the Dr. likes to overbook himself and then run slow and I'm stuck there until the last patient leaves. Not what I signed up for. Sadly I haven't been able to do the things I had hoped while working this job, like look for new jobs and write my blog. I hate this job. There are only me and him on a daily basis who work there and when he keeps me there an hour later than I'm supposed to be there it would be nice if he could at least turn off the bulk of the lights while he rushes out the door just to help me out a little, but no. It is so slow and so boring there that I now look at it as getting paid to read my book and become a master at Solitaire. I have 9 days left and I cannot wait to be done.

On the bright side I am meeting some new people and making some new friends. I'm getting my design background publicized and getting some great tips on things to do here - clubs to join, trails to hike, art studios and classes to sign up for, etc. And you can't beat the commute, a 7-10 minute highway ride with no traffic ever! I even met a guy from Juneau who went to Columbia College in Chicago for film and lived in Logan Square! :)

In other news, we were finally able to find our crab source two Saturdays ago. But the mistake we made was fall for the deal - we came home that day with 7, yes 7, crabs - probably about 20 lbs. I had wanted 4, but the deal saved us a few bucks and I thought, 'What the hell I'll find recipes for all this meat!' Part of the reason too was because crab season (and maybe just Dungeness crab season) ends August 15th. So we thought if we could freeze some it would last a little longer. Afterwards we tried going to some of the grocery stores looking for a larger steamer pot so that we wouldn't just have to cook one at a time. No luck. So we headed home and started cooking. From cooking, to cleaning, to cracking, I think it took us a solid 5-6 hours. It was exhausting! You can see below the bowl on my left is just filled with crab meat, to the right the plate with the crab that still needed cracking and there was still a full crab in the sink.

Eric is officially a master of cooking these now and I got pretty good at the cracking. We filled, to the rim, an entire 1.5 quart bowl of crab meat or, roughly, a 2 liter. So let the recipe experiments and week of crab begin!

- Saturday night we just had fresh crab.
- Sunday lunch was a crab and artichoke dip. Sunday dinner was a red pepper and tomato pasta sauce (also known as Fancy Pasta) with fresh spinach and crab tossed over pasta.
- Monday lunch was the crab artichoke dip again. Monday dinner was crab cakes. My second attempt at those, with a new recipe. These were better but still lacking something. I will continue to perfect.
- Tuesday dinner was crab and artichoke pizza. This was my favorite. It was so flavorful and delicious!
- Wednesday, we froze the rest of the crab. lol. We were officially sick of it and needed a break.

Over the weekend we also finally bought hiking boots! They have become our trusty trail companions and I wonder how we did without before. Maybe we just turned around at the sight of mud before? :) Now we just tromp through it! So in order to break in our new shoes we decided to do the airport trail, which was not even 2 miles (one way) and mostly flat. Below is one of the views - a new mountain view we hadn't seen before. There were sea lions swimming in the water here.

Below if you look closely, you can see the airport runway with the glacier behind it. What a cool airport, don't you think? This was one of my favorite views on the trail. I just found it entertaining and awesome.

The trail wasn't much but it's a nice walk and it was the perfect length because my shoes started bothering me. We got high shoes for their ankle support and I can't remember the last time I wore gym shoes with ankle support - so I just wasn't used to it and my ankles wanted to breath. Although, this trail did remind me a little of Savannah because it was marshy with little waterways going through it.

During the week, we got invited by Eric's boss to join her and her dog, Cooper, on a trail on North Douglas. Douglas is the island across the channel from Juneau. We had yet to go anywhere on North Douglas and so we happily accepted. This has become my new favorite place. The trails in this area are just beautiful and the views you find are just stunning.

You can hear waves crashing, which is always relaxing, along with eagles singing and the views are completely uninhabited - no houses, no bridges, just beauty. There's not even hardly any people there either, making this the perfect peaceful place.

This past Friday evening we decided to head out to Mendenhall Glacier because the newspaper had printed a photograph of a Sow (Mama bear) and her 3 cubs walking across the road to get to the glacier. The article also said that because the Sockeye salmon are spawning in creeks off the glacier, that bear activity in the area has increased. So we went out to see what we could see! Once we got there we hiked the most common tourist trail, but also the one that follows the creek, with no luck. However, we did see something we never have before...

Can you tell what it is? It's a porcupine! In a tree! Who knew they could climb trees? Because I sure as heck would've never looked for them there. Another man on the trail pointed it out to us. I need to research this more. Do they fall out of trees? Because if so, we're going to have to start looking up..

We ran into a student that was working in Eric's Pharmacy who told us we missed a bear and a glacier calving (when parts of the ice break off of it) by about 40 minutes. Argh! So close! But apparently, it was one or the other - they both happened around the same time. We would've probably been in bear territory, but I would've rather seen the calving. The glacier was a beautiful deep blue when we got to it, where the ice broke off.

This past weekend was supposed to be nice weather and Eric was trying to drag me to the top of Mt. Roberts. Now, it was going to be a cheater hike, because we were going to take the Tram half-way up. But what remains was 2-3 miles with a 2000 ft. elevation gain. I can feel my lungs tightening in my chest just thinking about it! Luckily for me, the weather was cloudy and rainy. Since we had hyped ourselves up for a hike, we decided to do the Lemon Creek trail because it is covered with high evergreens and so can be used as protection from the rain. This is where our hiking boots came in handy! The trail was filled with mud, muck and muddy puddles. We had hiked a bit of this trail before, but hiked a lot further that day. It looked like a rain forest in there. Okay, so Juneau is a rain forest. But when I think rain forest I think of the Amazon. This trail made me feel like I was in the Amazon with all it's plants, trees, streams, falls, and puddles. It eventually started raining harder and our makeshift tree umbrellas were no longer being useful, so we headed back home.

Sunday was cleaning day. Another bad weather day but we had a lot to do around the house. Eric's parents are coming 2 weeks from today and our spare bed still has stuff on it that we need to find a place for. Plus with me working and us hiking in mud, we needed to clean. Later in the afternoon the rain stopped, so we decided to go out to North Douglas, where we heard there was good fishing, and continued to attempt this new skill.

As you can see, Eric caught one! But with our limited knowledge as to what fish is edible or not, we put him back. You see we have a little book that has the most commonly caught fish - mostly salmon - and this guy wasn't in there. While walking out to our fishing spot we met some other fishers and asked if they were having any luck. They told us they only caught a few 'double-uglies'. Well... this guy is pretty ugly.. so we assumed that's what it was. This spot was a good location, Eric got a nibble just about every other cast. He then got a fighter on the line and that fighter ate Eric's lure. We lost that one. While Eric was putting a new lure on, I realized that the tide had come in a lot - almost to the point where we were going to lose our only path back to our car. He tried a few more casts with no more luck (bad lure?) and then we headed home.

After another great day in Juneau we decided after dinner to head back out to Mendenhall Glacier in search of the Sow and 3 cubs. Most of the activity was happening around 8pm at the Glacier so we got there at 7:45 just to make sure we wouldn't miss anything. The activity was almost non-existent when we got there. We saw another porcupine up in a tree and heard that the cubs were in that same tree Sunday night. (Almost!) So we walked around that same creek trail, amid way too many tourists, and finally got our bear. Not just a sighting, but a 30 minute show of this little guy eating his dinner!!

Then going to get a drink of water...


I love this picture, he's just so cute! We were hoping when he went to the water that he was going to catch another salmon (even though he had 2 large ones already), but he was just thirsty.

What a show! And we were only about 6 ft. away from him, behind a fence at least, but had he wanted to attack the fence would not have even slowed him down. He was not at all phased by everyone watching him, nor their constant camera clicking and flash. He was just happily eating away. I have about 60 photos from this 30 min. dinner - it's almost like a still-motion film. Eric and I both had fun taking pictures. What a show! What a place! We found it interesting that he didn't even eat the meat we eat on a salmon. He mostly ate the skin and the fins, the fattiest areas on a fish.
It's just amazing how close you can get to the wildlife here. We watched until he headed into the woods and then headed back home on cloud nine.

And this is the reason I'm really starting to love this place. :)

Eagles, Salmon, & Bears - Oh My!

This last week definitely started as a lazy one for me. I was bored with the rain, I had organized everything in the house and just didn't know what to do anymore. I continued the hunt for my job search and with hardly any exciting possibilities, I thought maybe I should start looking for some part-time jobs just to give me something to do during the day. I decided to apply for a temporary receptionist position at a Chiropractor's office. The appeal was: part-time, temporary, my last day would be the day before Eric's parents come up, and with such a short gig it hopefully allows some more creative positions in Juneau to open up. Within a day, I applied, interviewed, and got the job. :) I'm not too excited, as I feel like I'm demeaning my degree by answering phone calls and making appointments, but it's only temporary. I start today.

We also started the process for our wedding album. It was no small task organizing the 1300+ pictures and cutting it back to the suggested 55 needed for the album. But we got that done and only have to wait 6 weeks (!) to see the first proof. We also, finally, got the claims process started for all the broken furniture. The guy came in last week to assess the furniture. We got our new grill and our twin bed built today. We're supposed to be getting a new bookcase, but the guy can't find one similar. Couch got fixed, dresser and bike to be fixed, and mattress to get cashed out. All other small items got cashed out too.

We had explored downtown some while it was raining. Downtown is an experience! Think: San Francisco hills on crack. There was one hill we went down that our safety lock seat belts were actually holding us into our seats! It's crazy - I love it!

Towards the end of the week, the rain finally stopped! And it even stayed clear over the entire weekend! On Saturday, after running some errands and attempting to buy crab again with no success, we decided to try Perseverance Trail which started downtown. We heard it was one of the most popular trails, so we checked it out. Shortly after the trail begun we came across this:


We thought that we had to go through this door-thing to continue on the trail and were slightly taken aback. Until we got a little closer and noticed the trail continued to the left. Perseverance Trail follows the old ore mines from the early 1900's. This was an old mine entrance. We walked a little inside until Eric saw the sign "High Voltage" and then left. But the temperature difference surrounding this doorway was pretty amazing. There was at least a 20 degree drop!

After continuing through the lush green forest, the trail opened up to a valley filled with waterfalls streaming down the mountains. There are 3 small ones leading into the larger one in this picture, hard to see in the small picture. (I think if you click on the picture it will expand in a new browser or tab.)
A little further down the trail, we came to an even larger waterfall! It was beautiful and powerful!


After that, the trail started getting forest-y again. We arrived to this bridge over the roaring waters and it was amazing! This picture does not do this area justice. The waters were so loud that Eric and I couldn't even hear each other speak! This was my favorite area on the trail.


Perseverance Trail itself is only about 2 miles long, we decided to continue on to the Glory Hole Overlook which from the map didn't look that far away. By the time we got there, I was pretty tired. It wound up being about a 3.5 mile trek with a 700 ft increase in elevation. While that doesn't sound too bad, it was a constant incline in trail. With all the rain the week before we hadn't gotten a lot of exercise, so I was huffing and puffing. Below is the glory hole.


Or the big hole they blasted out of the mountain - probably for gold. There was a whole town built in this area for the mining back around the 1920's and today there's not even a single trace of it. It's amazing how it hasn't even been 100 years and you would've never known a town ever existed there. The trail was loads of fun, and once we left Perseverance Trail there was not one other person on our trail or in sight. It felt like we were completely alone in the beauty of the mountains.

On Sunday we got invited to join another Pharmacist, his fiance, and their friends in from Sitka, on the West Glacier Trail - which obviously ran on the west side of Mendenhall Glacier. Sounded like fun, but I was afraid since we had hiked 7 miles the day before, that I wouldn't be able to hike too long with these guys who've lived in Alaska for months! I asked Eric if he could slack it up a little bit so I didn't look like the loser. :) Once Eric checked the stats on this trail, he found that it was another 7 mile round trip trail, but this one had an elevation increase of 1300 ft. - double yesterday's...

I agreed anyway because we had planned to do a hike that day and this way we got to socialize more. But since we were going in our own car, we could turn around at any point. The first mile or so of the trail was flat... which was great for my sore legs.. but made me worry about what was still to come. Now instead of 1300 ft. in 7 miles, it was now 1300 ft. in 5.5 ish. Until we reached this:


The hike turned more into a rock climb. But better a rock climb than a steep hill! It was fun, and shortly after that we arrived at this view:


That's the middle of the glacier, not the bottom nor the top. There were a few waterfalls around the glacier that were in fuller force than when we had visited in March. The mountain across the glacier apparently has mountain goats often. We took out our binoculars (Thanks Twan!) and searched... but found nothing. At this point, one of the girls seemed exhausted and wanted to turn back. WHAT? I wasn't even tired and we had hiked 7 miles the day before! I was ecstatic! :) We convinced her to go a little more, but that was it. I like hiking with these folks! I am not the first one to want to turn back. I guess that's because I usually hike with Eric, and back in the day his brother, who could hike 15 miles a day and still want to keep going. So this was a nice surprise!

After the hike we headed home for lunch and a little break before going out to attempt fishing again. Before fishing, we decided to stop along Salmon creek, where the day before we had seen tons of people and birds around this area. Perhaps the salmon were spawning? Yup! What a sight to see! I think this may be one of the best things we've seen/done in Juneau so far. This is definitely something to see in your lifetime. There were hundreds and hundreds of salmon in super shallow water swimming against the current to find their spawning spot. The water was so shallow in some areas that the fish were almost entirely out of the water, swimming on the water surface just to get closer to where they wanted to be.



Where the water was a little deeper, the water was so clear you could just see the groups of them holding their ground against the current. Eagles were everywhere, snatching fish from the water to eat. The fish were so pretty. They had tiger-like stripes of emerald green and maroon, which you can kind of see in the above picture. These are called Chum Salmon and are normally silver. They change colors when they're spawning.

Take a good look at this picture. It really doesn't do it's justice as to what we experienced. But if you notice every speck, splash and dot - each of them is a fish. You could just look up the stream and see the salmon everywhere! It was so cool, words can't really experience how awed I was by this spectacle.

After spending a good chunk of time at Salmon Creek, we headed down the road to attempt fishing. Shortly after we got there we noticed that everyone was pulling out fish. But, a bunch we're throwing them back. Hmm.. so now we needed to find out why. They were catching the Chum Salmon (or the spawning ones) and while we don't know for sure, I think it's illegal to kill them, but we've also heard that since they are full of fish eggs and on their way to die - that they don't taste very good. We met a woman who told us to put fish eggs on our hook and that we'd catch more (so since she killed one, maybe it isn't illegal?). She put them straight in my hand.. kinda slimy, kinda squishy, but not too bad. It was odd though...

After Eric attempting (I wasn't up to the fishing, but was happy to keep him company) a few times with no luck, he realized he had the wrong hook. So we went to the grocery store to get the ones we needed, headed home for dinner, and then back out to try the new hook. Once we got back we found the eagles swarming all over the area to eat up the scraps left behind by the earlier fisherman. Although a little blurry, I really like this picture. Since the sun was low, and since I'm still learning my new camera, I didn't have it on the best setting. But this guy is sitting on a fish head and was eating away at it until I approached him.

For those of you who don't know, this is a bald eagle. But bald eagles don't go 'bald' until about 5 years of age. You can see this guy's starting to go white.

The new hooks were a success! ...kind of...

Eric caught a fish!! Can you see it at the shore line? Can you also see the tiger-like stripes? Yup it's a Chum. Damn. Can't eat it. A few more like this before it got too dark to really see what we were catching. So we at least know that we can catch fish now! We just need to start catching fish we can actually eat. :)

In other news, we've seen 5 bears in 5 days!! All from the living room - we LOVE our house! We met a few people over the weekend who have been here for 8 months or so and still haven't seen one. We've seen 12 now? We've lost count. I've stopped naming them because most of the bears we only see for like 30 seconds, so I can't distinguish if they are new guys or oldies. It's taken me another 10 bears or so to be able to snap a picture because they move so fast and I even keep my camera on the windowsill. But this morning one sat out our window for a solid 5 minutes and I was able to finally get some good ones!


He (or She) was a big one! Did I mention how much we love our house?! :)

Gah! The rain won't stop!

All my posts mention rain - it won't stop raining here and it's starting to bug me. We managed to get a couple nice days last week, but when you get a taste of the good stuff it stings when it's gone. But when the sun comes out and the skies clear up, it reminds you just how beautiful this place is. So, once again, we didn't have too interesting of a week. So, this should be a short update. :)

The best part of last week was we booked the flights for our honeymoon! We will be spending 2 weeks on the South Island of New Zealand and 1 week on the beaches of the Cook Islands, in the South Pacific! We are super excited! It takes forever to fly anywhere good here, nor is it cheap, so we figured we might as well go somewhere that is far to get to from anywhere. So it will take us a horrible 22 hours in total to get to New Zealand, but to go to Central America, Caribbean, or Florida it would've taken us 18 - 24 hours. Where as anywhere else in this country you could get to those places within 10. Fortunately the price difference was minimal too, so the next step was Eric asking for all that time off. His boss didn't even blink when he asked, in fact she's going in February for a couple weeks! So now to plan the rest of it... We have some time though, we'll be going mid-October until the beginning of November. We hear the fall is the worst season in Juneau, so we figured that was the best time to get out. In New Zealand, it will be spring and in the Cook Islands it will be a warm summer temperature. And the fun part? Eric still has vacation days to play with! That's one very nice perk of the PHS.

Over the weekend, I got a little homesick. Like I said, the rain was really getting to me. We've been skyping with friends and family, which is great! But sometimes I think it's makes me miss them more. If anyone else is interested in Skyping, just let me know! You can find us as one of the 5 Metterhausen's on there. (The others are family.) Fortunately, Monday came with no rain and a care package from Meagan (my maid of honor at our wedding) which made all things better. :)

We checked out the Alaskan Brewing company with one of the guys Eric works with, where we had heard they just serve you as many beer samples as you want... for free! And these beer samples are about 6 oz., so it's a hefty, free serving! Alaskan makes some pretty delicious beers, and I am no beer fan. But there was one that stood out.. it tasted and smelled exactly like beef jerky. Ick! It was terrible! Eric and Grant liked it, but gross. :) Then there was another one that was like a sweet brandy beer... double ick. Tasted too syrupy, but again, the boys liked it. But it was fun, and we'll be bringing all friends there to taste the wonders of Alaskan beer.

We also checked out another harbor to see what they were selling. We had heard rumors of king salmon and shrimp. So we headed out to find that you buy king salmon fresh from the boat - can't beat that! The flaw? They sell it in one whole fish and at $8.50/lb. it's still not as cheap as we thought it we be. The bigger flaw? It's one whole fish! So you have to buy all 20 lbs. of it! Not only do we not know how to fillet a fish, we also don't know what we would do with 20 lbs of it! Haha... so until we start catching our own, invest in a freezer and a vacuum seal food saving system, we won't be buying king salmon fresh at the harbor. We tried to then go get crab, but we think we went too late because nobody was there.

So despite the fact that I'm not working, I'm meeting people on my errands. I'm always interested to hear if people are from Juneau or where they're from and what brought them here. Well, through this quest, I'm learning that nobody is from Juneau. I think the only person I've met who's from Juneau is our realtor. Everyone else is from everywhere else. Pennsylvania, Arizona, Oregon, Wyoming, California, Washington, Idaho - that seems to be the most popular. It seems that most people got a job offer to come up here and were excited about the location, so came up for a new adventure. Sound familiar? But it makes me wonder... if nobody is from Juneau... is it because nobody wants to stay in Juneau? Hmm... something to consider...

Rain, Rain, Go Away

Well, it's been slightly depressing here lately. It's been raining, well... we're on day 9-ish of straight rain. And, normally, rain in Juneau is like a light mist - where you can still go out and enjoy the outdoors, you just come home with a head full of frizz. But for the past 9 days it's been a steady and heavy rain. Today, and the next 2 days are supposed to be warm and sunny or partly cloudy, but so far it's still rain.

All this rain, made for a not so interesting last week. We did get our new furniture delivered though! We now have tables - coffee, end and dining. And of course, still trying to get everything put away. I also did a lot of cooking last week - made my first cheesecake! It was delicious and pretty easy. I've apparently also sent a lot of desserts into Eric's work. So much so, that this week they're already asking what's on the menu. :) They may be disappointed because at this point I wasn't planning any large dessert for this week. We'll see what happens.

While our week was not all that interesting, our weekend was pretty entertaining and exciting. On Saturday we ran a bunch of errands to start the day. The previous weekend we had noticed a pick-up truck in the mall parking lot that had a sign for crabs. So this weekend, we decided to stop by, check it out, and buy some crabs. We bought 2 - 2lb. ish Dungeness crabs for $6 a piece - ground beef is the same price as that up here! But they were live...and not rubber-banded. And they just put 2 crabs in a trash bag, 2 LIVE crabs in a thin trash bag. Crab claws are pretty sharp so they started tearing holes in that bag right away. I was a little freaked out the whole way home, as you could hear and see them moving around in the back seat. We were originally going to run more errands after picking up the crabs, but we're afraid if we did stop somewhere and the crabs broke out of the bag, we would never get them out of the car. So we stopped home, put them in a cooler and put about 40lbs. of weight on top of the cooler so they wouldn't get out.

As you can see they were pretty big suckers. Once we got back from our errands we then had to determine how the heck to cook them. Cooking them, actually, is pretty ridiculously easy. All you do is put them in a steamer and steam cook for about 10 minutes. The tougher part was getting the crabs from the cooler to the steamer. I let Eric handle this entire process... :)



Once cooked, the next hardest thing was cleaning them. You have to take the crab apart some to clean out all the guts... nicely said, huh? But that's how they describe it all when you search for instructions online on how to do this. Again, I let Eric handle all this. :) He struggled a bit with the first one, but the second one he cleaned with ease. Serve with a little butter and oh my goodness it was the best crab I've ever had! One of those crabs fed the both of us, so I used the other one to make a Crab and Artichoke dip, recipe provided by Laurel - delicious. So we may be eating crab every Saturday and we'll most definitely be making for guests - provided this pick up truck continues to sell crabs in the parking lot. :) Next time I want to get a few extras and make fresh crab cakes out of them! But we also need a bigger pot, as our largest could only hold one of these at a time.

We also tried to go to a Farmer's Market in town, hoping maybe we could get some better produce prices. Well... the only produce sold at this market was rhubarb. Everything else resembled a flea market - consisting of a whopping 4 tents. We will not be attending this 'farmers' market again. It was pretty lame.

For the 4th of July weekend, I was pretty excited for the fireworks. I thought it would be pretty cool to have the fireworks light up all the mountains and reflect off the channel. They were supposed to be Saturday night, but were canceled due to bad weather. So, they got postponed until Sunday night. Sunday morning we went to the 4th of July parade in downtown Juneau. It was pretty fun, although raining. The only downside was apparently they aren't allowed to throw candy anymore - they have to physically hand it to someone. Well that means that us 'big' kids aren't going to get the random pieces that fall to our feet. :) Our favorite thing was this dump truck that sort of danced down the street. I'm not really sure how else to describe it, but try to imagine a super huge dump truck bouncing to the left and right down the street. We were impressed, never seen anything like that before.That night the fireworks were a go! ... At midnight. Because, of course, that's when it gets dark around here. On the way downtown, the radio was hyping it up so we got excited for the show. It was a good show, up until the finale.. because there was NO finale! That's the best part of the fireworks! Eric claims there was a finale, but when they set off 10 fireworks at once and call that a finale... well I disagree. As we were walking back to the car, Eric jokingly said, "Outdone by Chicago on a Wednesday night." So that was a little disappointing but we brought the camera out to see how it would handle fireworks and we got some cool shots. Unfortunately, the weather was still really cloudy so we didn't get to see the fireworks illuminate the mountains, like I had hoped. But had fun, nonetheless.



Then, on Monday, since once again the weather was predicted to be bad. Eric and I painted the master bathroom a beautiful blue color. We also built an over the toilet cabinet for extra storage. It's amazing the transformation a coat of paint and some rearranging does. We used all the same fixtures and mirror as the previous owners, but by moving it around some and the new coat of paint, it looks 100 times better!

Then, the best part of the weekend, we also tried Skype for the first time! First with Dad and family. And then with Matt and Meagan to play Settlers! Surprisingly, it worked wonderfully! I'm in love with Skype. What a cool program, really makes you feel more at home even when you're thousands of miles away. And the best part? It's FREE!

Lastly, here are the pictures of our place that I promised. It's still a little messy as we continue to find places for things, but we are getting close and I'm starting to plan where pictures should be hung. But I'm also trying to decide, first, if I want to paint. Fortunately none of the walls are white, so it's just a matter of if I want to keep the walls the colors that they are.

A view of our living area from the upstairs loft. Obviously, this is our living room and kitchen. Notice the views out of our windows - just forest, hence why we see bears. When you lay on the couch you can see all the birds in the area flying close to the tops of trees.

This is our unfinished loft. The twin bed lying against the wall is one of the things the moving company broke - well they just lost pieces, but pieces necessary to build it. It will be our computer and art area, with a twin bed and tv in case someone wants to use it. Through the door, in the back, right corner is our "attic". It holds our water heater, but also serves as some much needed storage as well. It's a decent size which is really nice.

Standing in our living room, here is a photo of our kitchen, dining room and hall way - you can see the laundry closet. Through that hallway is our pantry, 2nd bathroom, and bedroom.

This is our Guest Bedroom, where all you will sleep when you come visit! It's a little messy right now, as it's kind of like our working room. We put stuff in there that we need to install or that we don't know where to put just yet. And it's also our donation room, all things we don't want we're putting in there. Our condo board discussed the option of doing a yard sale at the end of this month, so we're keeping everything for now, just in case we can make some money of it all. But our first guests come mid-August, so it will all be gone before then - sale or no sale.

Here is our Master Bedroom. The main door is to the right of the dresser, the other doorway is our walk-in closet that also leads to our bathroom. We have a nice large window on the wall I'm standing at, not photographed because the light was giving the camera too much glare, that you can see the top of the mountain from.