Our next stop, after whale-watching, was a "salmon bake." The salmon were actually cooked on a grill over an open fire. We were told the best wood for smoking salmon is red alder; I wonder if it was a red alder fire.
At any rate, two young men were cooking salmon. Since we had learned so much about salmon, we thought to ask what *kind* of salmon? Coho. They put it on your plate, and offered you "sweet sauce," which, we had been told, was brown sugar, lemon juice, and butter.
It was delicious. We ate a fair amount of salmon on this trip, as you might guess. Various boat trips offered us tastes of their company's special smoked salmon, and salmon was offered for dinner on the ship every night. This over-the-open-fire salmon was the best. By far. Yummmmmmmmmmmm.
After we ate, we strolled up the adjacent stream to see the waterfall they told us was there. This was one of the rare times we didn't have to do anything at a certain moment. The people running the salmon bake ran a shuttle back to the cruise ship dock, so we could go whenever we were ready.
We enjoyed the pretty little waterfall.
We paid attention to the foliage, some of which was large.
We took pics of flowers (to discover, when we got home and saw them on "the big screen," that they were full of bugs). I think this white one is cow parsley, up close and personal.
Hey. Wait. There are *salmon* in the stream! Just downstream of the waterfall!
These are chum salmon (also known as dog salmon, as they are often fed to dogs because people prefer other sorts of salmon).
It was hard to see the salmon, even though we were pretty close to them. They were sort of the same color as the silvery water. I was replete with whale-watching and full of salmon, and it never occurred to me to take video. Luckily my daughter had more brain cells available than I did. She took this video, as well as the nearer pic above of the waterfall.
I never did succeed in getting YouTube to handle this video. Let's see if blogger's new video upload can do it:
We watched the salmon for a while, then headed back downstream toward the bus that would take us back to downtown Juneau and our ship.
Fuchsia in a hanging basket.
Red alder?
This pic of Juneau was actually taken the morning of the 19th, through a bus window, which is why the exposure is a bit wonky.... But now is when I want it, so I'm using it now. The ship is out of sight, to the right of this pic. That parking structure has the city library on top of it. I visited the library, briefly, to take advantage of public restrooms before heading out to do a little light retailing.
My destination was Bill Spear's place. I have spent time on his site, enjoying his work, and have bought some of his pins, both online and in Peaceable Kingdom (my favorite store), here in Ann Arbor. Bill lives in Juneau, and his store is right around the corner from the brown building at bottom left.
I wanted one of these:
What better souvenir than a piece of Alaskan art, designed by an Alaskan, purchased on the very day that I saw humpbacks bubble-net feeding?
My humpback wasn't the only pin I bought. The pins are even more gorgeous in person than online.........
Directly across the street (also on the second floor) there are fabric and yarn stores, so I visited over there, too, and bought a little fabric and a couple of skeins of yarn. All my other shopping had been greeting cards or postcards. It was fun to buy something I could pet, as well as show off.....
Ok. Better hustle back to the ship before I'm late!
In order to facilitate chronological traverse of these posts, a link to the next one is here.
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