Day 9 - Monday, August 10

Waking up in Destruction Bay, in the Yukon was a blessing! What a quiet and beautiful place! After breakfast, we started maybe the most exciting drive of all trip. This place is absolutely gorgeous. You can't stop looking around. Everywhere you lay your eyes, you go WOW!!!!! Incredible. If you have just one day in Alaska/Yukon, I highly recommend the Alaska Highway, between Destruction Bay and Haines. Mountains, rivers, lakes, canyons, trees, low vegetation, flowers, glaciers... What a drive!!!!!

I was super excited to see these birds. It was also the first time that I have seen a bald eagle in it's natural habitat. This is the biggest concentration of bald eagle in the world. People come from all over to photograph these creatures, especially in November, when they are fishing salmon before the long winter.

Mike looking for the bear. There is a Grizzly bear who lives here and is spoted everyday by tourists. It is used to having people around and has a tag.

,

This picture was the first attempt to photograph the bear. It would have been a Kodak moment, if I had've moved faster! Here is the scene: this big, hairy creature was behind the bushes trying to fish.
Suddenly he appears right in front of us - about 10 feet away - running, and carrying a good size salmon in his mouth. But in a split second he was in the woods again. That's why I just got his butt! But Mike got amazing shots afterwards!

He is back! Mr. Grizzly shows up few minutes later and gives us a show! He wanders around for about 10 minutes, fishing, not minding a dozen tourists (including us) armed with our cameras, ready to get whatever he can give us. Everyone was quiet, and I was a bit nervous. Well, I was right there, about 30 feet away from a Grizzly bear, after all!

This is downtown Haines. It's really small - less than 2000 people - but very cute too. I ate salmon again (I have been eating it every day here), and we got some goodies for the trip. I could spend more time in Haines.

This fish was half eaten by our friendly bear. He spends his day going up and down the river fishing for salmon. Maybe that's why he doesn't mind the people around, he has plenty of food in the river.

At 8:15 the ferry heading to Juneau took off. It is a very comfortable ride. You can get a cabin (for about $100) or if you are not going too far, you can just sleep anywhere, like us who slept on the floor and chairs. Our trip was just over 4 hours. People said they saw a killer whale, but we didn't. Hopefully tomorrow, when we head south to Prince Ruppert, Canada, in another ferry.

Day 9 balance

Word of the day: WOW!!!!

Kms: 400 plus ferry ride
Hours: 4 hours in the car

From to: Destruction Bay, Yukon to Haines, Alaska and to Juneau, Alaska.

Animals: very good day in Haines. We saw tons of bald eagles and one very friendly Grizzly Bear, the very first one I saw in the wild in my life!!

Hotel: Breakwater Inn ($95)