Mendenhall Glacier and all things Juneau....

 

  The first thing we noticed about the Mendenhall Glacier is it's so freaking close to the city. The drive to get there took about 5 minutes from the RV park. It just isn't right.

 

 This is a picture from the tourist photo stop- we know, how boring. Millions of Japanese have the same picture.

We had to actually hike a little to get this pic of the glacier, pretty cool huh?

After  seeing the glacier we took a hike, it was drizzling lightly and quite cool. We set out on the first trail and it was closed due to flooding. There was the normal sign from the Park Service about climate change- Ugh. We set out on the next trail.....................closed. This time to protect the bear habitat, yeah right- what bears?

We found a third trail that was open, sweet! We passed a family with small children, strange, they were eating as they walked along. All the signage in the park says "no food or flavored drinks on the trail, bears in the area, beware!!!" Everywhere we have been this summer has the same signs- eating on the trails seems to be a really bad idea. Having food in your backpack is highly frowned upon.

We crossed a neat little bridge over a creek with huge red salmon. Hmmmm, there are mutilated fish on the trail and on the sides of the creek. Must be bears around. Chuckle, chuckle. You got the bear spray? Nope, left it in the truck, thought we were going to look at a glacier. On we hike, we're alone now and what do you know, we see a bear. A very large black bear. We stop dead in our tracks. For those of you familiar with Patrick McMannus- it was a modified stationary panic. We look at the bear....................the bear looks at us. It goes on for way too long. Finally,  I spoke to the bear as we'd been taught everywhere. I said "hey bear, don't hurt us, we don't want to hurt you". I rang my feeble little bear bell. It sounds so loud when you are walking, and not so much when the growling is all you hear.

No one moves. It is a standoff. Then the bear feels uncomfortable, he flinches. We saw him blink and call him on it- he moves along. Psych!! We had this the whole time.

We back up and walk away right into another black bear. Luckily this one couldn't have cared less we were there and it was much smaller than the first bear. It was moving right at us, but only seemed interested in getting to the creek where the salmon were. 

That's it, never, and we mean never, eat salmon before hiking. Your breath could kill your friends and family, but will definitely attract the bears!

Hiking was over for the day, we went back to the truck.

There are no bear pictures as we were busy staying alive.

 

  There is a porcupine in this tree. Can you find it?? We didn't know they could climb trees. Learn something new every day.

After the near death experiences with the bears, we retreated to the safe confines of the Red Dog Saloon. The gun display behind us is a revolver from Wyatt Earp, above that is a huge grizzly bear. It is our kind of place, the bears are stuffed and the beer is cold!

 The usual cruise ship traffic and tourists were in town. Tis the season. HoHoHo.