Juneau Alaska Part 1: Background

On November 7th I left my car (my home for the last two months) behind in Seattle and flew up to Juneau, AK to visit my aunt, uncle and cousins.  Here's a map of Alaska to give you an idea of where Juneau is (hint: it's in the lower right of the image):

Juneau is the state capital, but you can't get there by car.  It's on the mainland, but the mountains are steep and rugged, and it has never been worth the investment of putting a road to Skagway, the nearest town connected to the outside world via a road.  There is a road, but it only goes about 5 miles to the south and 50 miles to the north.  Everything in Juneau arrives by boat or plane, including the entire state legislature whenever they are in session.  Here's a closeup of southeast Alaska:

Sort of like Seattle, Juneau is both on the coast and very protected from the open sea by large mountain islands.  The area actually looks like a submerged mountain range, with only the valleys underwater.  Here's a picture of downtown Juneau, taken from the docks.  The town is hidden in the narrow valley and the mountains loom just beyond:

The channel between Juneau and Douglas Island is very narrow, deep in some spots and shallow in others.  At extreme low tides you can wade (through deep mud) from one to the other north of town about 20 miles.  But high tide is around 15 ft higher than low tide, the undertow is fierce, and the water is very cold, so I wouldn't advise trying it. 

Juneau is an unlikely spot for a town, let alone a state capital, but it was originally the site of a huge gold mine.  It is closed now, but the mountains around Juneau are riddled with mining tunnels, downtown is built on the mine tailings, and Gold Creek, which runs down the valley, has abandoned mining equipment and mills all along it.  My cousin Maddy took me hiking all around Gold Creek and showed me the town cemetery where the prospector Joe Juneau is buried. 

Before the gold rush, this part of southeast Alaska was mostly populated by the Tlingit people, and the Native culture is still a big part of the city.  I went to two lectures on Native issues while I was there, learning about some of the local oral history, and how various stories correspond to known events, like glacier movements thousands of years ago, or more recently, early encounters with Russian and American troops.  Here's a picture of a Tlingit totem pole:

The next few posts will show the places I visited and sights I saw while in the Juneau area.