We arrived at Ketchikan at around 10 am, we had breakfast before docking and headed into town for some more trinkets and a browse around town. We were told that this was the town for Alaskan carved soap stone, which was something Penny wanted as a memento from Alaska, so soap stone hunting was on the agenda for most of the morning before we had to meet to go on the Cultural Tour at 1 pm. We found a great place for Soap stone called Alaskan Fine Art and found a couple of pieces to bring home. The sculptor / carver (Eddie Lee) was on site and greeted us at the counter, he has been sculpting for over 30 years and is very proud of his work.
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| Ketchikan harbour and township. |
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| A unique thing in Ketchikan is that the stairs are actually streets. |
We caught the bus to the Ketchikan Cultural Centre and received a full history and description of local totem poles and their meaning. Interesting stories and nice to know what the meaning is behind each pole.
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| Despite what Penny thought this guy is holding a fish in his left hand :-) |
From there we visited a re-creation of a typical First Nation village and told about the building construction and village lay out.
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| First Nation handiwork |
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| Art work on a traditional hut |
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| Main hub for a village |
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| Internal decoration of the main village hut |
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| One of the many totems. |
The tour finished up at around 4:30 pm and we set sail again at around 6 pm. Time got away on us and we missed main service for tea so ended up at the pizza bar for tea and had a nice pizza with a refreshing drink (rum and coke). This was our last land stop before we head back to Vancouver on Saturday morning.
Cheers
Gary and Penny
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