A Whale Watching, Gold Panning, Bear Viewing Alaskan Week

We had an awesome week full of fun and adventures, so let me just start by promising you that we actually do hold full-time jobs and Chris really is taking an online class. With that being said let me tell you about our whale watching, gold panning, bear viewing Alaskan week.

On Wednesday, our ever-blessed day off, our good friend Captain Ben helped us to get on a three hour whale watching tour. Wow. We tried to take pictures to show to you all, but it really is impossible to catch the majesty of these enormous creatures. Pictures just can't do it justice.

"Thar she blows!"

Called "flukes," this part of the tail is what you see when the whale dives.

Sea lions on the beach.

When Saturday rolled around we had the unique opportunity to go gold panning! A couple weeks back the senior missionary couple from the Juneau Singles Branch, Elder and Sister Sunderland, came in for dinner at the restaurant. They were so fun to talk to that they actually invited us to go gold panning with them on their P-day. This is a fun hobby of Elder Sunderland and we loved spending the day with him (his wife had flown down to be with their daughter) and learning from both him and a prospector who was by the creek when we got there. Though we were at it for a couple hours we only found a few tiny gold flecks that would add up to maybe a dollar once they are processed and any other minerals are removed. In fact, the flecks are so small you can hardly see them in the picture - but trust us, they are there! We didn't strike it rich, but we sure had a lot of fun.

After church on Sunday we went on a nice evening walk around the local college campus. We heard there was a giant totem pole there and we really wanted to find it. When we found it we were really amazed by not only the size, but also all the detail. It would take a lot of skill to carve something like that, and it is unfortunately a dying art.

Once we found our totem pole we headed out to the glacier to find some bears! Rumor has it you are most likely to see a bear in the evening - right when we work every night. We spent over an hour walking some simple trails and waiting for our epic bear sighting. We just knew we would see a mother bear scooping up salmon from the creek as her cubs wrestled in the long grass. But we had no such luck. We gave up and went closer to the glacier to enjoy the view. When we were walking back on the paved pathway to our car we saw a park ranger whistling and hitting his leg as if trying to get a dog to back off. We continued to walk forward and all of a sudden a bear comes strolling out of the grass to our side and walks right in front of us less than ten feet away! Taken aback it took a moment for Chris to grab out his phone and get a picture. If you take a look at Chris's great pictures (remembering he's the one who normally takes all the amazingly beautiful pictures on our blog) I think you can safely assume he was a little more frozen in one spot and startled then he would like to admit. Last week when he wrote the blogpost he was begging for a close up bear encounter, and when he got one, well, you can take a look at the pictures yourself to see how great he was at capturing this proud Alaskan moment...

Remember to pray and remember to play,

Mr. & Mrs. Alaskans-Andrew