Alaska '08 Day 60, Ketchikan

Sun Aug 10, 2008

We got into Ketchikan around 3AM and parked in the ferry lot until 9AM before driving out to Clover Pass. Good thing, Clover Pass' sign is down for work or whatever so there was no indication from the road, just happened to see a camper from the road. The campground is tight. If anyone parks next to us I can't push out the slide. There are a lot of seasonals here. Maybe guides for the charter boats. For the most part they are in tents or slide ins. Lots of gear under patio tents at their sites. There is one across from us with a military/safari style 6x10' rectangular tent with a stove. They were smoking fish in the stove today. The campground has a motel with maybe 20 rooms and a large marina. There are maybe six 20' Hewes with "Clover Pass Lodge" on the side for coho charters. Water in the marina is really clear.

After getting set up in the campground we ran down to the South East Alaska Discovery Center so the kinds could finish off their Junior Ranger program for the Tongass Natl Forest from the ferry. This visitors' center is run by the Forest Service but has info for all the public land government agencies. The place looks new and has some really nice displays. The kids really liked this and the junior ranger scavenger hunt.

We walked around downtown, over to Whale Park and took some pictures of the totem poles and the funicular.


Walked the marina (berth 3). The city has decorated the marina light poles with stained glass! The docks, boardwalk and street downtown are all on pilings. Along the pilings we could see the occassional starfish and even a dungeness crab.


Down at Creek Street, on the Stedman St Bridge there was a group of fisherman trying to catch pinks with flies from the bridge. When a guy hooked a pink he would walk his line above everyone else and over to the foot of the bridge then walk down and land the fish.


We walked up Creek Street which is a historical section of town where they built on pilings along both sides of a creek in downtown. There were two harbor seals in there. I don't know if they were catching the pinks but I did see one holding a pink but it could have been a spawned out carcass.

- Jon