Wildlife!

Hard to believe I've been home over a week already!  The question folks have been asking the most is "did you see any wildlife?"  And yes I did!  Here are a few pics...

Deer walking down the street in Ketchikan

 Orca!  We saw a whole bunch as we left Ketchikan (didn't get any great photos of them though)

Missed humpback whale picture...only saw 2 the whole trip, which kinda surprised me

Bald eagles were everywhere in Icy Strait Point/Hoonah 

Soaring with the kayakers 

Younger bald eagle that hasn't fully molted yet

I'm pretty sure this one was a golden eagle, because it was huge (and must have been used to people because we were able to get pretty close!)

Every time you looked up you would see an eagle...or 12

Tried to capture how many were flying around at any given point...only got 3 in this pic (one is in the tree)

On to the Mendenhall Glacier outside Juneau...we didn't see bear, but evidently they were nearby...recently

Saw lots of arctic birds here 

And if you look hard enough, there were mountain goats near the glacier too (look in the middle, toward the top 1/3 of the photo - okay, yeah they're tiny, but I saw them through a telescope, they are there!) 

If you can't see the ones above, maybe you can see these white dots - this was during the train ride from Skagway, there were a bunch of mountain goats on the other side of the river valley 

It was so cool to see so many!  As I had never seen them anywhere before.

 And then we saw a black bear and a grizzly!

(Okay, so we were at a wildlife sanctuary between Seward and Anchorage...) 

That had baby moose too - so cute!

 But then I actually did see 2 moose in the wild...or suburbs of Anchorage at least (see downtown in the distance)

 Last stop in Alaska, a little park with a lake, on my way back to Anchorage from Denali State Park

Denali

Decided to drive up to Denali State Park today on my last day.  Had a decent view and the mountain even peeked out from behind the clouds on occasion.  Hard to see it in these photos tho (but it's right smack in the middle).  Stopped in the kooky town of Talkeetna, where a cat is Mayor. I didn't run into the Mayor while I was there, but I was also on the lookout for Mexican Moose...and didn't see any of them either.

Race Day

So, it rained race day. Only added to the miserableness of the combined hills, wind and mud too. But I still finished (t-shirt and medal below to prove it).

Went back after the race and took the rest of these pics. The sun wasn't out during the race at all.

Post meal appetizer!

Hubbard Glacier....

...was amazing!!  (need I say more, okay maybe I do because these pictures can't do it justice)

10:00

The sun sets around 10:30 at night, and rises at 4:00ish.  These pictures are from about 10:00 pm one night on the boat.

Skagway

Did a nice hike in the morning in Skagway, and then rode the scenic train to White Mtn Pass.  Ended the evening with a monkey in our room!

Juneau

Yay! It appears to be working (but I can't get my other drafts to post at the moment...)

So here are a few pics from the lovely state capital and the glacier nearby:

Trying Again - Hoonah/Icy Strait Point

Since my APP doesn't appear to be working anymore, I'm just going to throw a few pics on here...

Canada, eh?

Arrived is Vancouver yesterday to catch our cruise boat to Alaska this afternoon.  Spent the afternoon wandering around downtown.  Walked by the art museum and saw this "gum head"...yes that's gum stuck to it and you could add your own!  And then because we were up for torture, we hiked, or shall I say climbed, Grouse Grind (for those of you familiar with the infamous Grind, I'm not disclosing our time) The view was totally worth it though (my picture doesn't do it justice), and you could catch a gondala back down the mountain.  Big thanks to our friend's brother and girlfriend for letting us crash at their place!