Monday, October 8, 2012

Ketchikan in the Rain

 

Ketchikan, our last stop on the Coral Princess (7/7/12), lived up to it’s reputation – it rained all day. The average annual rainfall is about 15 feet.  Despite the ”liquid sunshine” as locals call it, we enjoyed seeing this charming little town on our trolley tour.

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The town stretches 31 miles long but never more than 10 blocks wide because of the terrain. Historic Creek Street, a boardwalk road built over Ketchikan Creek on pilings, has shops as well as Dolly’s House.  Can you guess what Dolly’s was?  (It’s still raining as you can see from the water drops on the camera lens).

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The highlight of the trolley tour was visiting Saxman Native Village where native people were erecting a new totem pole.

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It was quite interesting to see how the men moved the heavy totem pole from the building and anchored it in the ground.

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This little guy held on to the the rope too as his dad helped pull the totem pole in place.

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There was a brief ceremony after the new totem pole was erected.

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The new totem pole joined a “garden” of poles of various types:

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After returning to the Coral Princess, we enjoyed afternoon tea, nice and hot after our wet and chilly excursion.  We got one last view of this charming town as we sailed through Tongass Narrows heading south to Vancouver and the end of our cruise.

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