Do you know the capital of Alaska?

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We woke this morning to find the ship berthed here in Juneau, the capital of Alaska. The pop is 30,000 without cruise ships (4 in here today). The ships berth right close to town just as they do in Ketchikan. The main town difference here, is that Juneau is larger, looks more prosperous, has the usual tourist shops which seem to account for most of the city shops. Outside the immediate town limits is the suburbs that have the more usual shops and services. We took a ride on the Skyway Tram to the top of Mount Roberts, which offered a very scenic view looking back down over the harbour and the city. We saw our first up close bald eagle up there; she was in an aviary after being rescued after being shot. Otherwise, there are always quite a few bald eagles high up circling high above the mountain slope and over the harbour. The only other birds we saw were crows, which are common almost everywhere we travel. We bought tickets to a local tour up to Mendenhall Glacier, which was fantastic. The glacier part which end you see is about 3 miles long but it tracks further back behind mountain passes into the upper icefield 12 miles away. New snow falling that same 12 miles back takes 80 years to reach the end! The mountains support quite a few glaciers but Mendenhall is the No 1. Like other glaciers it has been retreating since the last 250 years - the big question is, how much as mankind contributed to the natural warming over recent years!. Mendenhall flows or ends at a lake which it fills, so there are car & bus sized ice chunks out there just floating around. We also saw a local cop patrolling on his Segway today, it had a turn of speed when he wanted to go quickly. After tae went to see Motortown at Showtime in the theatre - not as good as the The Piano Man at Showtime but it was OK.

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