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...
