Juneau was founded as a gold-mining camp in 1880 and became the Alaska State capital in 1959 upon statehood. It locates in the panhandle of southeast Alaska and it is the only state capital in the US with no road access. Juneau get 150 inches of precipitation a year. Around these parts of Alaska, any day without rain is considered a beautiful day. In the morning it was beautiful, we got of the ship and took a short walk to catch the Mount Robert Tram to the top of Mount Roberts for a panoramic view of Juneau.
It has a gift shop on top of the mountain and in the shop you can witness a working in progress totem pole. They even let you use their tools to help a little bit.
There is a natural center with an wounded bald eagle nearby. Unfortunately that particular bald eagle cannot fly anymore and needs to stay in a cage, however, it did give us an opportunity to see a real bald eagle in close view.
There are many hiking trails on top of Mount Robert, and we took a short hike on one of these trails.
After the hike, we walked toward downtown Juneau to shop for souvenirs.
Maggie and Emily booked a Helicopter and Dog Sledding excursion as the highlight activity of this trip. Unfortunately, we did not have a clear day in the afternoon and that particular excursion was cancelled. It was disappointing, however, it is part of traveling which you cannot control the weather.
Fei and Tony attended a presentation hosted by Libby Riddles who is the first woman to win Iditarod Race (Champion of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race) in 1985. After winning the race, she wrote books about her adventures, raced sled dogs and also became a professional speaker. Lately, she wrote lots of children books telling story about her adventures. We brought one of her children's book "Danger: The Dog Yard Cat" for our granddaughter Talia. She also signed the book for Talia.
According to her, the huskies are born to run. For each race or run, they only pick 8 huskies out of 40-50 huskies. The ones got picked are so excited, you have to have special ways to handle them prior to hook them up to the sled. The ones who do not get picked are so upset that they will just continuously bawling. She said a cancellation of dog sled excursion will make these huskies more disappointed then the excursion passengers.
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