Honestly, I cannot be more grateful for the solid two weeks of sun we recently had. It was a beautiful surprise and blessing. The day after I made my last blog post about cold rainy days, I woke up to blue skies. That routine continued until just last Thursday. I couldn't believe my eyes every morning. If it weren't for the nice weather, I wouldn't have gotten to do half the things I did, or it wouldn't have been nearly as enjoyable. Of course, our last week in Juneau it's back to typical September Southeast Alaska weather. I'm not complaining. This is how I wanted to leave here. The real Alaska experience.
On Deborah's birthday, September 11th, we (Deborah, April, and myself) finally got the opportunity to hike Mt. Jumbo. One of the mountains I was determined to summit before I left. I don't know how I hadn't done that one yet. It was definitely one of my favorites, if not my most. As opposed to all the other mountains I had hiked, this one is located on Douglas Island, across the channel from Juneau, so it was a whole new perspective of the city from up there. We went at the perfect time. The fall colors were in their prime, not one cloud in the sky, and a comfortable 55 degrees. Once we were near the top, we spotted an endless amount of blueberry bushes. So good. We stopped to pick them on our way down once we had eaten or sandwiches so we'd have bags to put them in. It only took us less than three hours to the peak, even after our multiple blueberry breaks, and we spent two hours at the top before we hiked back. The only thing that could have made that day better is if we had started hiking earlier in the day. We didn't begin the hike until after noon. We forget we are losing approximately 13 minutes of daylight every day here. Ridiculous. The sun set rapidly on us, and we found ourselves hiking through the forest in the dark at about 8:00 at night with no headlamps. I blame our stupidity for that. I don't know what we were thinking. Clearly we weren't. All we had to direct our last hour of our hike was the dim light of our cell phones. It's comical now, but at the time we were getting extremely irritable catching every branch or stump. But, overall, it was one of my favorite days in Juneau.
Last week I finally got to go on the tour I had been trying to get on all summer long. Taku Glacier Lodge. I had been kicked off it 4 times before. I guess fifth times a charm. Again, it could have not been a more beautiful day to go. It was well worth the wait. We took a 20-25 minutes float plane over the ice fields to the lodge located right next to the Taku glacier. I went by myself, so I ended up getting put on a plane with a really friendly family from Germany. Don't worry Dad, they tried to teach me some German. When I told them I was half German, they couldn't believe I didn't speak it. They might have even corrected me on my last name. Oh, whoops. That's embarrassing. They pronounced it more like you do, Dad. Not the Americanized version we've grown accustomed to. Anyways, they were really fun to hang out with throughout the tour. At the lodge they fed us a delicious Salmon lunch. We even saw a bear cleaning out the pot of food outside. We had a couple hours just to wonder around and hang out with the dogs running around. I found a shady spot under a tree by the water overlooking the glacier and journaled for a bit while on one of the dogs layed his head right on my lap. I wanted to stay there the rest of the day.
The last two weeks has been so clear and dark at night, you can see every star in the sky. I love seeing the big dipper shining right over Mt. Juneau every night. So Alaska. I can only imagine how beautiful this place is in the winter time. One day, I'll experience it. But something even more amazing is that we have been able to see the Northern Lights on multiple occasions. Simply magical. After two summers in Juneau, it's the first time I've been able to see them. So stinkin' cool. I'm so happy I got to see them before I left. Again, I have the nice clear weather to thank for that.
The remaining ACA staff, which there is like a dozen of us, took one last cabin trip together. We hiked 5 miles at night with our headlamps out to Eagle Glacier cabin just to hike 5 miles back the next morning. So worth it. One of the most secluded and beautiful spots I've come to find in Juneau. It was nice to spend time with everyone before we all part ways. Not to mention the most amazing sights to wake up to. It's things like that you can only experience in Juneau that I'm going to miss most. Along with people, of course.
The night after we got back from the cabin was our end of season company party. We went to Erica's parents house who treated all of us to a feast, where we also watched the season video Chris and I had spent sleepless nights working on the previous week. I'm really happy with how it turned out. I will post it on youtube for you all to watch once we get it mailed to everyone who wasn't there to see it. It really displays a good picture of our job and how we spend out days here. After Erica's house, they got us a bus to take us to a variety of bars around Juneau. Good time with the staff, but then we still had to work the next day.
It's Sunday. I'm about to go into work which may just be my last tour of the season. Unreal. This summer flew by. Our ferry leaves Tuesday night. I still have yet to pack a single thing, but lets be realistic...we know none of that will happen until the day I leave. But we still have to clean the house and whatnot. Our house is up for sale. We have had multiple house showings this week. Makes me kind of sad seeing the "For Sale" sign on our front door. I'm not quite ready to leave Juneau, but I'm excited for new adventures with my roommates. For all you at home, I will see you very soon. So much love.
