Back to Portland

It was a five day drive from Skagway, AK to Portland and we are home again! The sunshine feels good on my face after our last rainy week in Juneau. I had the realization when we hit B.C. and the skies cleared, that I haven't really seen any stars since the bike tour through Washington. Though I live in the city, I have become accustom to looking up at the stars each season to see a few familiar constellations. While in SE Alaska though, most nights were cloudy and I sort of forgot about looking skyward. My overall impression of SE Alaska? I like it there. It feels big in comparison to the lower 48, not just because of land size but because of big creatures, moose, bear, whales, caribou, salmon and halibut. People were really generous and everyone that I met seemed to have an intimate relationship with the place, either as fishermen, hunters, backpackers or kayakers. Even if they didn't fish, they could tell you about all the different types of salmon and when and where they run. I like the fact that it is expensive to ship goods such as, beef, dairy, tomatoes and oranges, so instead, or rather because they prefer to, folks stock their freezers with halibut, salmon and moose that their family or friends harvested. All of this makes me want to move there. But the one thing that I seemed to have trouble with was the rain. I was told that it rains all year long and most of the time we were there, it did. The few days of clear 85 degree weather in July were very unusual, even alarming to locals. As much as I don't mind the wet Portland winters, I feel some amount of depression by the end of it and look forward to the guaranteed 3-4 months of sunshine in summer. Anyway, I'm happy to be home and don't intend to leave Oregon anytime soon. Below are more photos.

Porcupine chillin' in a tree overlooking the Mendenhall Glacier.


Mendenhall Glacier from West Glacier Trail as we started our hike up to some mountain I can't remember the name of.


Mountain goat relaxing in the meadow.

More of the glacier as we ascend.


Wild buffalo herds along the ALCAN highway


We made a visit to Liard Hot Springs in Northern B.C. It was $10 per vehicle to get in and the hot springs were really nice. Unlike some popular hotsprings, the park service kept these pretty natural, rather than turning it into a big concrete pool.

We met this awesome woman through craig's list who was moving from Anchorage to Portland and hitched a ride home with her. Kirsten and I drove her truck some of the way as she cruised down the ALCAN on her motorcycle. This made our return trip a lot more fun and inexpensive than flying or ferrying.

A young caribou

I wished I was bike touring through this. I kept thinking that maybe I should hop on my bike and ride the rest of the way back to Portland so that I could travel some of the route we had originally intended to ride through B.C., but the further south we got the less interesting and busier the roads became. The drive from Prince George, B.C. to Bellingham, WA didn't look to appealing to bike with all of it's big truck traffic and construction zones. In the end, I felt happy about the decision we made to stop the bike tour in Bellingham and ferry it up to Juneau rather than bike up to Prince Rupert. It is good to be back in Portland and I'm looking forward to harvesting and preserving some fruit, nuts and wild mushrooms as summer turns to fall.