A drive to Skagway – a busy day
It’s been quite a while since I posted. My regular readers may wonder why I didn’t post at all during my trip to Ontario. Well, Cathy got sick, then I got sick – we had to cancel all of our visits with friends. And on top of that, it rained for much of the week – I often shoot 100-150 pictures a day when I’m travelling, but I shot 12 photos during that entire week, except for a short day at the Canadian Warplane Heritage Museum. Oh well…
This past Monday, though, I drove to Skagway, mostly to pick up a new lens to replace one that I was returning as defective. But as usual, I got busy with a few other things as well – Skagway never fails to keep me interested.
The weather was really flat, but the 14 days that the post office will keep a parcel was up, and there was no choice. And it wasn’t snowing 🙂
At the William Moore Bridge site, work has quit for the winter – a solitary grader was doing some final levelling before leaving.
My first stop in Skagway was the airport, to send the last lens that I bought back by UPS. Alaska Seaplanes‘ 1997 Cessna 208B Grand Caravan, N750KP, arrived from Juneau just after I arrived.
Heading over to the ferry terminal, the MV Kennicott was just backing in to the dock. Fairly new on this run, replacing the much small MV LeConte, she can carry 748 passengers and 80 vehicles.
More transportation stuff. The White Pass & Yukon Route is finally sending locomotive #96 out for a rebuild following a fire.
Another look at the MV Kennicott, from the Small Boat Harbor breakwater as she started unloading vehicles.
One of things things on my list was to have a good look at the last rock slide at the Railroad Dock. It was huge.
The slide happened early in the morning long before any cruise ships arrived, and “only” took out a section of railing and scattered rocks all over the dock.
Just to the left of the top of the rock slide is what one of my Skagway friends calls the Death Rock of Doom. While many people believe the engineers who say that it’s safe, the Laws of Gravity tell me that it’s not.
Another look at the Death Rock of Doom. I guess we’ll see next summer whether or not any cruise lines will believe the engineers and agree to dock there. I don’t think it was used for the few days left in the season after the slide. I know that I wouldn’t want to be working there anymore.
My next stop was a City Hall to see how much information I could get for my cemeteries project. The clerk was awesome, and I left with 2 maps, and burial lists for all 3 cemeteries. I’ve already made huge changes to my Pioneer Cemetery page, but there’s much more to do.
I got reminded a few days previously that there’s a grave along the railway line. Harriet Pullen, owner of the legendary Pullen House Hotel, requested that she be buried there, close to what is now the ruins of her hotel, seen in the next photo. It was demolished in 1991, the year after I arrived in Whitehorse.
“Ma” Pullen arrived in Skagway on September 12, 1897, and lived there until her death on August 8, 1947. Over the years, she collected a vast amount of material documenting Alaska’s history. The collection was offered to the State in 1973 for $200,000, but legislators refused to allocate the money. It was auctioned off, and sources variously estimate that the owner grossed somewhere between $269,000 to $350,000.
Another look at the William Moore Bridge project as I headed home.
The lens didn’t work out the way I had planned – it just would not focus at night. After a great deal of research and posting questions, Canon Canada finally acknowledged that the lens is no good for what I want to do. At this point, I’m not sure whether to keep it or not – I certainly run into situations where it’ll be useful.
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