Our first glacier up close and personal

After a great night's sleep at Grandma's Feather Bed Hotel, we enjoyed a hot breakfast in their dining area. Wynn had a Western Omelet and I had my beloved sausage gravy and biscuits. What a great start to the day. We took a taxi to the Mendenthall Glacier park. It is a National Forest.

We decided to hike in the park down by the stream where the salmon were swimming upstream to lay their eggs. We were told that bear sitings were most common here...but alas, we did not see any bear. We did see the salmon and then got lucky to see a big porcupine.

Then we hiked to the visitor's center where Bob found a book, a hiking pin and a stamp for his Nat,l Park and Forest book. We decided to hike to the Nugget Falls, just to the right of the Glacier. It was a little drizzly out and we sported our sexy rain hats and new rain coats for most of the day. The falls was beautiful. At first the fog and mist had made the glacier and surrounding mountains hard to see. But by the time we hiked down and starting taking pictures, the mist started to lift and we got some really nice shots.

Once again, we had to call a taxi to take us to our next adventure. In hindsight, it would have been much more economical to rent a car for the day. Things looked like they would be a lot closer and we would be able to walk more...but this was not possible. So we had some unexpected expense for taxi fares. Our next site was to visit the Glacier Botanical Gardens and Rainforest Adventure. We saw all kinds of beautiful flowers. Made my gardens at home look pretty weak. They had some very unusual upside down tree trunks that they use as hanging flower planters. These trunks come from trees that have been downed by wind and avalanches. This Garden runs right along the edge of the Tongass National Forest. This is the second largest rainforest in the world, next to the Amazon. We had a knowledgable kid as our guide. Look at some of the sites we,saw. The view from the top was gorgeous.

I especially loved the collection of hanging umbrellas they had in their greenhouse.

We ended our day in town, walking the line of shops along the Main Street. We ate at the Red Dog Saloon; pulled pork and coleslaw while live entertainment was provided by an old crooner.

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Now we are back at the Featherbed and tired from a wonderful day. I think a bath in the jet spa tub is in order. (No pictures included!) Tomorrow breakfast is at 6:30 so probably an early night tonight. We will be doing the White Pass RR through the Yukon tomorrow from Skagway, riding a little plane into Skagway. Sounds like another wonderful day of new memories. Thanks for going along for the ride.