Ketchikan

We arrived in Ketchikan after a rough day at sea yesterday. Thankfully my seabands worked, and I didn't feel the slightest bit sick. Many other passengers weren't so lucky. Sometime during the night, the seas calmed.

We started out our day in Ketchikan by taking a horsedrawn trolley tour. It was a nice way to get an overview of the town, which is very "Alaskan" and also very wet. They get on average 13 FEET of rain a year! We really lucked out, though and had only a few sprinkles. After the tour, we walked around to get a few pictures. The Ketchikan River, which runs right through the town, was loaded with pink salmon.

I would just like to add one thing to what Cindy said about the tour of the city. We went through the red light district which is also on the Ketchikan River and the men had to go up the river to get to the brothels. So they have a sign in town that this is the only place in the world that the Salmon and men go up river to spawn.

Next we went snorkeling in the ocean right off the island where Ketchikan is located. We had to don super thick wet suits, hoods, booties and gloves before we got into the water. Because of the Japanese current the water is a warm 57 degrees (yea right!) Let me tell you when that water starts running into your wet suit the first time it feels like water from a glacier. As you can tell from the photo of us in our snorkel gear Cindy went snorkeling with a whale (man I looked good in that outfit!!!) Who needs a six pack when you have all that rubber tucking you in. The snorkeling was great -- we saw all types and sizes of sea stars, jelly fish, sea cucumbers, sea urchins, fish and small crabs. The floor of the ocean was granite and not sand. It gives you a whole new perspective on snorkeling. Tonight on our trek to Juneau (named after Joe Juneau) we were up on the top deck watching whales swim by the ship.