2024-08-21: Totem Poles & Lumberjacks

We woke up at 9:00am this morning. We watched the ship pull into Ketchikan as we got ready for the day and grabbed some breakfast from the Windjammer. We docked a little earlier than scheduled. Darrell watched a float plane fly between the cruise ship and the town as they were pulling up to the dock.

We got off the ship at 10:30 and walked a few blocks, past Quantum of the Seas, to the Great Alaskan Lumberjack Show. We had pre-purchased tickets for the 11:00am show. We found seats in the arena and waited for the show to start. It is at least partly a scripted show. I don’t know if the actual competitions are rigged or not. Our host was Lasagna Joe and there were two teams of two lumberjacks competing. One team was from the Spruce Mill lumber camp near Ketchikan and the other team was from Dawson Creek, BC. Although, the lumberjacks were all from the US. They held competitions in chopping wood, sawing wood, climbing poles, and log rolling. There were comedic skits in between the various competitions. The show was only an hour long but it was very entertaining.

After the show, we went for a walk to the Totem Heritage Center which was about a 15 minute walk. The Totem Heritage Center is a museum where they have rescued several totem poles from the area and are preserving them. There is information about their history and explanations of what the symbols on the totem poles represent. It’s not a big place, but the information is very interesting. There is a bridge behind the museum that takes you to a city park and a fish hatchery. We couldn’t go in the hatchery but walked around it and walked through the park.

We retraced our steps back to the port area and went for a walk through Creek Street. Ketchikan started out as a frontier town. When it got bigger and they decided to elect a mayor and a council to run the town, they wanted to improve the reputation of the town. This meant they evicted the brothels and such out of the main town. They moved to this area called Creek Street which became a red light district. The original buildings are still there. The building are built on stilts along the bank of the river. We walked down the street and admired the old buildings. You could see a bunch of salmon in the river making their way to their spawning grounds. We think we saw a seal briefly as well.

Once we reached the end of Creek Street, we were at the Tongass Historical Museum. We explored the museum which explains the history of the town and has displays and artifacts from the towns history. Darrell and Amanda noted that some of the displays had been changed out since they were there a couple of years ago.

After exploring the museum, we grabbed some lunch at a place called the Pioneer Cafe. It was a cute little cafe that looks like it’s been around for decades. The bill was even hand written when it was time to pay. The food was a little disappointing though. After lunch, we poked through the shops along the pier. Michael found a store giving out free arrowheads which he was excited about. We found the Del Sol store for Patrick and he was very happy to find they had shirts in his size. The stores in Juneau and Skagway did not. He bought a couple of shirts. We picked up some bubble tea from a kiosk on the pier beside Quantum of the Seas and then made our way back to the ship. We got back onboard around 4:00pm.

We relaxed on the ship and watched the activity along the pier for the rest of the afternoon. It was the second formal night on the ship. We got dressed up for the evening around 5:15pm and then headed to the center of the ship to get some portraits taken. When we arrived, only one of the four photo stations was open. We got pictures taken at the open station and asked why the others weren’t open. We were told the other photographers were in the dining room taking pictures of everyone at the dinner table. We were pretty annoyed at that since the stations were also closed when we tried to get photos taken on the first formal night as well. We waited in the Centrum for 10 or 15 minutes and then the other photographers returned. We got a bunch of pictures taken and then headed to the dining room for dinner. Our lunch in Ketchikan was a little later, so Patrick wasn’t hungry. He elected to return to the cabin instead.

The rest of us got seated at a large table in the dining room with another family of four and one of the couples we sat with the night before. We enjoyed the conversation with the other families. It was lobster night in the dining room. You can tell they are cutting costs. You used to be able to get a couple of lobsters for dinner if you wanted. They now give you one lobster and charge you extra if you want additional lobsters. One lobster was enough for us. Michael was excited they had escargot as an appetizer as well. We all had Baked Alaska for dessert as well.

After dinner, we returned to the cabin briefly. Darrell and Amanda headed to the second production show in the theatre, but the kids weren’t interested. The show was called Piano Man and focused on the music of Elton John, Billy Joel, and Barry Manilow. Just like the first production show, the singing and dancing were great but there was no story or anything that tied the segments together. It was just a bunch if unconnected scenes that had singing and dancing. It was odd.

After the show, Darrell and Amanda went for a walk on deck for a bit before returning to the cabin and calling it a night.