Friday, July 4: Sitka to Ketchikan

After another wonderful breakfast at Raven's Peek, we packed, drove to the airport and returned our rental car.  Sitka Airport was small and manageable, and we were soon on our way.  We arrived in Ketchikan in early afternoon and checked into the Best Western.  We'd been there on our last trip- it's a good, basic hotel with helpful staff and convenient stores nearby.

It was a rare sunny day (Ketchikan is in the middle of a temperate rain forest and gets over 300 inches of rain a year, so that's not to be taken for granted).  I ran a couple of miles down to the passenger ship pier; very interesting.    I think big-ship cruises might drive me crazy.  Here's one of the ships in port.  It's the SS Oosterdam.  It holds 1,800 passengers and another 800 or so crew.  There are ships bigger than this.

And here's ours, the Wilderness Discoverer, for comparison.

Ketchikan is a typical port town- most of the shops near the passenger port are owned by the major cruise lines and most pay a commission to the cruise lines on any sales.  This close to the cruise ships, Ketchikan and Juneau looked a lot alike:  tons of jewelry shops (many, such as Diamonds International and Tanzanite International are in the Caribbean ports as well), well-populated bars and restaurants, people wandering around with maps, places selling gourmet popcorn, fudge and Alaskan smoked salmon.  I stopped at a 2-story outdoor gear emporium to use the facilities and encountered people buying up piles of North Face and Patagonia clothing.  The Ketchikan public library had a branch in this area, but they closed it because it got crowded with cruise ship passengers who were interested only in the free Wi-fi.

Not into buying stuff?  How about an excursion?  From the brochure of one tour operator (costs per person, without tip and booked directly through them)

• "Flightseeing" by helicopter, plus "sled dog experience"- $489
• Fishing- $160 + $20 for license
• Two hours of flightseeing by amphibious plane- $229
• Ziplining $175
• Taku Glacier Lodge and feast (Wild Aalska King Salmon), including flight- $280 
• Walking tour- $45.  (Mine was free.  :-) )

The big cruise lines require that you book through them and the cost goes up accordingly.  How do they enforce it?  First, they take no responsibility if the operator gets you back to the dock too late to get back aboard ship, which is pretty understandable.  Second, the tour operators they use must agree that they won't book directly with their passengers- or they lose all business with the cruise line.  We like our way of cruising better!