Alaska – In-Threes

The third and last edition of my trip to Juneau was my last full day there.* It was a day of firsts for me. Welllll, technically my whole trip was one big first since I had never been to Alaska before. But I decided to go zip lining on the morning of my last day. It was amazing, to put it super plainly. Some things speak better for themselves when you’re accustomed to living life from exclamation to exclamation:

Someone asked me if I made any friends on this trip. First of all, lol, because I was only there for three days (and contrary to popular belief, I don’t view most first encounters as the starts of beautiful, lifelong friendships). But, I did tell this person that I both did and did not make friends. I will explain-

My favourite part of travelling alone is how much it pushes you out of yourself and forces you to experience things. You cannot go to a place you have never been to before, sit down in your hotel room, and scroll through Instagram. This is not to say that scrolling through social media in any way diminishes the authenticity of your experiences (solitary traveller, not hermit). But, you find that you want to be fully present and in each moment whilst you are on your own. At least, I find that to be my case. No matter how good of a photographer I become or how many absolutely stunning shots I capture, they will never be as good as the images that I store in my mind’s eye because those will be always be filtered by emotion. So for me, when I travel alone and am not caught up in myself, this remarkable thing happens-

I meet people.

I mean, I hold conversations with strangers and share stories and experiences with them. I learn about their lives – as much as they are willing to share- and they learn infinitesimally about mine. And for however long that encounter lasts, I make a friend. I made friends with my hotel lobbyist and the woman I hiked down Mount Roberts with. I even made friends on my wild wild zip lining adventure and at the salmon bake, where I concluded my Alaskan experience. When I left Juneau, these people did not leave with me and I do not remember a single name. I do not think I will ever encounter them again nor do I particularly wish to, so we are not friends. But they were all my “friends” for a few hours and they all contributed to my amazing experience. Andddd on that note, here’s a picture of me gliding from tree to tree:

Oh, and here’s a picture of a squirrel peeking out from under the table because who doesn’t love squirrels, amirite?

* – Notice how I started with no apologies for my serious writing procrastination? Yea, me too.

I’m going to try pretending I didn’t go to Juneau last weekend. That I, in fact, am currently there and dutifully blogging at the end of each day like I said to myself that I would. But, of course, I’ve never been excellent at pretending… or not procrastinating so, I will own up to my one week of tardiness and hope my memory can still do the right kind of justice to what was definitely an experience. I will try and break up this post into two so neither are too long. I would prefer the pictures to speak for themselves, barring a few anecdotes. That being said, this is still going to be a really long post. So, I’m sorry and good luck.

Before I jump in, let’s note that I spend a great deal of my life doing a few uncomfortable comfortable things. We all do them, I’m sure most people like me are bugged by them, but we STILL do them. You know, like when we laugh at something we didn’t hear someone say in conversation but we can’t ask them to repeat for whatever reason? Or when we leave someone to have the wrong assumption about something we said or did because it’s not worth the correction and we just hope the point will never come up again? I call those things uncomfortable comfortable things. Because typically, we just can’t be too bothered.

In my case though, I do other things like always offer my own experiences when someone tells me theirs (if there’s a similarity, or the complete opposite). Not to belittle the significance or insignificance of what I’m being told (which it is often mistaken for), but to show that there is empathy or understanding; that there is solidarity in the sharing of the experience. But if you are like me, you do that enough and you begin to feel like you need to take a step back, remember what it feels like to not identify with someone or an experience. Sometimes, I forget that I want to walk into a situation like I don’t know a damned thing.

Why?

Because, if not, I get so accustomed to trying to identify/compare anecdotes or experiences to ones in my archives, that I stop creating new ones. I no longer have the blank slate necessary for completely new experiences and perspectives that are not like ones I already have. In other words, and to paraphrase my mother, I need to stop acting like I have all the damn answers.

And that’s why trips like Juneau are always necessary for people like me – Trips to unpopular* destinations taken alone with adventure and discovery being the main motives. Words like adventure and discovery always insinuate novelty anyway and novelty is required to learn. So, I needed this journey to Alaska. And, as soon as my plane started taxiing for take-off, I realised that I needed it more than I thought.

In honour of how many things I didn’t know before embarking on this trip, here are some fun (not so fun) facts about Juneau, Alaska that I learned along the way courtesy of my formal and informal guides:

– Juneau is the capital of Alaska. (You thought it was Anchorage, didn’t you? Didn’t you? Don’t lie)

– About 33 000 people are actual residents of Juneau, making it the second largest city in Alaska.

– Juneau is home to about 600 bald eagles. They’re literally everywhere like pigeons are to Chicago or NY. Okay, I exaggerate a little but they’re seriously everywhere.

– We plebeians, that do not make Alaska our permanent abodes, live in the ‘lower 48’.

– Admiralty island, 6 miles from Juneau, has the highest population of brown bears in Northern America.

– That doesn’t mean they are lacking in any other species of bear over there. I was reminded often that I was in ‘bear country’.

– There are 17 million acres of forest around Juneau

– It rains too much in Juneau. Like I could tell you they had 100 inches of precipitation each year but that doesn’t mean much to you, does it? So translation – it’s a freaking lot. But it did not rain ONCE in my three days there. Can you say miracle?

Last, but certainly the highlight of my facts:

– There is a block in downtown Juneau that has an elementary school with a middle school right beside it. Beside that is the high school. Across from the high school is a polytechnic where you learn boat maintenance and repair. Beside that polytechnic is a boat wharf where boats with issues are fixed. Behind the elementary school on the other side of the block is the retirement home, and down the street from that is the cemetery. They call that beautiful arrangement in Juneau the circle of life.

Okay, it’s over. I’m going to jump into pictures now! And as you look at these pictures, think on this – One of my tour drivers asked (in pretty standard fashion) if anyone going rafting had ever been to Alaska before. Only a couple people had so he asked why they kept coming back and a lady pipes up from the back of the school bus saying, ” Because this is God’s country.” She was probably referring to the beauty and how nature still leaves so beautifully with humanity. And it’s the truest thing I heard my entire trip. So enjoy God’s country 🙂

-The view from my hotel window – Downtown Juneau