June 29, 2009

Sitka, Alaska (by Eric)

We spent 12 days in Southeast Alaska, 1 in Juneau, 3 days in our “home” port of Sitka (one day before we went on our hunting trip and 2 days after the trip finished).  In my humble opinion, Southeast Alaska is one of the most strikingly beautiful places on the planet.  The cold northern Pacific ocean meets the rugged landscape of mountainous land… heavily forested with Sitka Spruce trees, alders, cut through with waterfalls, glaciers and rock outcrops. The amount of life in the area is quite astounding, especially in the water.  Starfish, rock fish, sea otters, clams, mussels, and jellyfish were a few of the sea life we had seen.  

Pretty much everyone in Sitka makes a living from the sea, or supporting those who do (or guiding tourists such as ourselves that want to experience the beauty of the area).   The town of Sitka is on the west coast of Baranof Island, sandwiched between the Pacific and the mountains of the Island.  Paved roads only cover about 14 miles of the area around Sitka, so the town is very isolated, the main mode of transportation around the area is via
boat, and to get anywhere else, you have to fly.  The town of Sitka is dominated by the docks, with a myriad of yachts, commercial fishing boats, sailboats as well as other working boats and ships.  Just a few blocks from the docks, there are many shops, mostly dedicated to serving the tourists that invade the town every few hours during the summer cruise ship season.  There are also seafood processing plants and ship supply stores.  The center of Sitka has a Eastern Orthodox church, a reminder of the Russians who founded Sitka over 200 years previously.

The most striking thing to me about Sitka, were all of the old wooden boats, some of them kept in beautiful condition, however most of them were as rough as their owners who eke out a living with them.  More often than not, as we walked through the rows of boats, we saw the rough owners, living in their rough boats, spending their weekend in port, preparing to go back out to sea to catch a few salmon, halibut or cod to sell back to the processors in town.  Not the most glamorous way to make a living, however I do believe it beats sitting behind a desk, wondering which cover letter is appropriate for the weekly TPS report.  Anyhow, it was very interesting to see the people and equipment that went out to sea, in very close to the same manner as has been done for many, many years.

 June 14, 2009

Happy Father's Day to all of whom this applies, and to everyone else: Happy Weekend!  We are back on Papua, and have actually unpacked at least two of our suitcases already...only two more to go.  We have almost 1400 photos to sift through, so we will post a few every now and then when we get them edited.