Rain, dogs and whales - Juneau!

As we approached Juneau that morning, the clouds were very low and I thought "Oh no. More rain."  But even the clouds in the mountains were lovely.

As you can see from the deck and the railing of our ship, it WAS raining. And cold.

But we were going dog "sledding" no matter what, so we bundled up, put on the water resistant shoes and slogged through the mud with the best dogs! I think there were 12 dogs in the team. When they saw their musher approach with us, the dogs started barking like crazy. They were ready to RUN! These are Iditarod dogs and used to 50 below zero when they run, so this 50 above zero weather was like running in Miami for them. We stopped a few times so they could rest and drink. The ride was about two miles or so. We were in kind of a golf cart. Those dogs can PULL. We went fast. It was great. In the rain.

This is Kara and me in the dog sled cart during a rest stop for the dogs. The musher took our cameras and took pictures for everyone.

We were allowed to pet the dogs but only the ones the musher said we could. He knows his dogs. This is Olive Oyl and me.

Then we had two really great sessions with mushers, explaining how the dogs are cared for and how they train for races. This picture is of me with a puppy. Part of the training is for the puppies to be handled by strangers so they get used to people. Sweet baby dogs.  I think this was my favorite excursion.

We also went on a whale watch! They put us on a catamaran that was loaded with binoculars for our use. They also provided a FEAST, which included roast beef, reindeer sausage (?!), salmon mousse, shrimp cocktail, cheese and crackers, fruit, dessert - all sorts of yummy things to eat as we headed out to the sea. 

We saw a whole bunch of whales. We could see and hear them exhaling through their blow holes. These are two at once!

We could also hear their bodies slap the water. This is the tale of a humpback whale.

This is our darling young bus driver who took us from the ship to the catamaran and back. She looks so Alaskan but is from El Paso, Texas!