Chilkat Eagle Bed and Breakfast Inn Haines

... so I watched it. Then the movie "Mama Mia" came on and I watched part of it. I still like the musical better.

Then it's off to the Horizon Court (buffet) for lunch. My stomach is a little queasy so not too much sounds good. I settled for a small piece of quiche and two dinner rolls. Then I sat by the windows and looked out over the ocean. Not too much to see though because of the fog.

Down to floor 5 for the ...

... of White Pass 22 miles from Skagway to allow the other train to pass by and get a head start back down. We share the one track, and only in a couple places there's a split track where trains going up can pass trains heading back. A short while later at a split (maybe 17 miles away from Skagway) we grind to a halt and the diesel engine goes silent and our narrator Cathy goes silent and all the passengers go silent and it is very ...

... trip by ferry, one stop on the way, so we booked an inside cabin, without windows, but with two bunks, and took turns going sound asleep. While writing this in the forward salon on the ferry from Sitka to Petersburg, we had a whale announcement “on the port side” and saw four or five small whales – probably Orcas, according to my window neighbor. Their signature white markings on the underside of the tail were clearly visible when they dove. Soon we were ...

... after we cleared U.S. Customs, we visited a Klondike gold panning center. They had a great tour and then Anna got to try her hand at gold panning. After a lesson from a gen-u-ine prospector, you pan and they weigh and value anything you turn up. Believe it or not, Anna wound up with $19 dollars worth of gold, which she now has proudly displayed in a necklace. As for favorite things, Anna still says this visit was her’s.

... dinner?" ($6 each).

About six of us went with Ben (campground assistant) and got fresh Dungeness Crabs right from the fishing boat. Ben showed us how to clean them—hold the claws and legs from behind, hit the shell so it comes off, break in half and shake the guts out. Not really very hard to clean. Good thing I got the heavy rubber gloves!


Ben boiled the crabs and ...

Our early start was 4.15am! Due to our problems with the car and our suspended booking we had to show up early to make sure we'd get on the 8am ferry to Ketchikan with our vehicle, and to clear US Customs. The ferry only goes every two days so we wanted to ensure we weren’t delayed further. We spent most of the six-hour trip glued to the windows on the observatory, and later when it cleared up, sitting on the ship’s deck looking for wildlife. The coastline was lovely and we saw a ...

... tempting to stop and eat here, but as we're enjoying the walk, I choose a jalapeņo cheese bagel to go. As Terri remarks later in our journal, "The abundance and variety of wildflowers is... astounding. Everywhere you look you see color. I wasn't surprised to see the town florist had gone out of business."
For months I've been following the weather in Haines at home by viewing the webcam at ...

... a good look at it. The vintage engine in back isn't bad either.
There's laundry to do, so we do that, and groceries to buy (hmm... where should we go?). We get all the way back home from the store before we realize we forgot to buy charcoal for the grill! No problem. A return trip to Howser's later, and it's dinnertime, so we walk up the street for a halibut dinner at the Bamboo Restaurant. It's another great ...

... a log cabin structure that looks like it's been around for ages. Terri's a little put off by the patina that's settled on every surface inside the place, so I order a burger and fries to go, and we head back, stopping alongside the highway for an impromptu picnic lunch. Terri makes a sandwich from the groceries we bought, and I have no problem downing the burger, but the fries are another story entirely. They're so limp, soggy, and glistening ...

... br>From there we stopped at Amalga or Eagle Harbor where we had been told eagles sometimes fish, but the only thing jumping there were the fish. They were jumping all over the water, but the eagles didn't seem to want them.
Since the morning was passing quickly, we returned to the trailer to get some lunch and close down to head to the ferry.
We were first on the ferry this ...