Juneau & the Tracy Arm Fjord

Juneau is the capital city of Alaska with about 30,000 people.  It is also built on the side of a hill with lots of waterfront.  We went for a hike around the downtown area and saw all the usual stores and another 100 jewelry outlets.  They also have a Costco, Wal-Mart and Fred Meyer so they are really the shopping capital too.  They have beautiful wild flowers planted all around downtown.   Down on the dock there was a statue of a dog named Patsy Ann who lived in Juneau in the 1930s.  This dog belonged to the local doctor who brought her from Portland in 1929.  Patsy Ann wouldn't stay home and was always wandering and visiting the downtown businesses for a handout.  She loved to go down to the waterfront and greet the ships as they came in.  Patsy Ann got to be quite the celebrity and instinctively knew when ships were coming in even before the inhabitants.  So in honor of Patsy Ann I took a picture of her statue and Goni for the blog.  Goni is eating Alaska Chocolate for the picture which we purchased downtown.   There is lots of activity down on the waterfront.  Lots of float planes taking off and landing with tourists to go see the sights.  Took pictures from the dock of one coming in to the dock after landing right in front of us.  Lots of helicopters too.  While we were waiting in line to get the bus back to the ship a couple of local kids were playing the bag pipes and drum to make some money from tips.   We left Juneau around 1:30 headed for the Tracy Arm Fjord to view a real life glacier.  We left the inside passage and went up the arm at about 3:30 .  There were frozen blocks of ice and glacier pieces floating in the water.  The ship went all the way up to the glacier and turned around so everyone could see the glacier.  It is beautiful country and a great experience.  We hoped to see some whales and bears but no luck.  It was very cold!   Tuesday night we went to The Second City show in the theater.  For those not in the know The Second City is a comedy group started in 1959 in Chicago .  Many famous actors and actresses have gained fame while working there.  It was a good comedy show and we had some good laughs.  So when we went to Oshkosh we saw Chicago the band and on the cruise we enjoyed The Second City from Chicago .  We also visited Greer in Chicago so Grover's hometown somehow got some extra attention on our 25th anniversary spectacular.  Of course that was our honeymoon destination in 1985 along with 5 kids.   After the comedy we went to one of the lounges and listed to cruise ship band play a lot of Frank Sinatra songs.  The singer is one of the guys in the program on Monday night.  All in all the entertainment on the ship has been quite good.   Wednesday we arrive in Skagway and go for a train ride up to Fraser British Columbia.  The train route is narrow gauge and was built on 1898 to transport people and goods to the mining towns.  We hear it is a lot of fun and great excursion.