Original posted in London to New York blog, May 31, 2010
Petersburg, Alaska
THE Second Amendment of the US Constitution declares “the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed”.
The Mosquito Amendment, being written in braille on my left forearm, declares “the right of the people to bare arms shall be infringed by horrible, little buzzy things who leave you covered in welts and scabs and have you itching like crazy or covered in sticky, filthy anti-histamine cream”.
We have heard tales of a huge drop of Deet – the active ingredient in most anti-buzzy bastard sprays – in parts of India and Nepal which all but eradicated the rampant population.
From my experience of the last couple of weeks, the sprays are of no use whatsoever, but if the Alaskan authorities want somebody to drop bucket loads of the stuff on the annoying little gits, then then we will have a willing volunteer.
I love the smell of Deet in the morning, it smells of… actually, scrub that, it smells absolutely foul.
Of course the mossie problem – a quick count has the number of bites and scabs on the back of my right hand alone at about 20 – has been magnified by the quite remarkable weather, which held out throughout our stay in the 49th state.
Since the downpour which greeted us in Whittier two weeks ago, we have not seen one drop of rain in Alaska. The only rain we have had came during a detour into Canada.
We have had some cold nights, particularly as we edged to within 140 miles of the Arctic Circle, but the days have been glorious – the coldest night in Denali National Park to the heat of Juneau spanning more than 30 degrees Centigrade in little more than a week.
The warm weather brings T-shirts, shorts and sandals and acres of open skin for the mossies to attack. And boy have they risen to the challenge.
Not everybody, Phoebe for one appears not to have been bitten at all, but for those of us in the firing line, it has been a frustrating few days.
Even in the evenings, fully clad from head to foot, hands buried deep in my pockets and with my hoody top pulled tight, they’ve still found their way in.
Tonight, we have the sanctuary of the overnight ferry from Petersburg, out of Alaska and into Prince Rupert, British Columbia.
This is our third ferry down the Inside Passage on the Alaskan panhandle, the thin sliver which runs down the coast between the mountains, glaciers and the coast. It is also, bar a few small planes, the only way to get around in this neck of the woods.
Our first ferry belatedly ushered out of Haines to the state capital Juneau. In largely glorious sunshine, it was four hours on deck soaking up some breathtaking scenery and the wildlife it contains.
Bald eagles have been regular companions during the last week, but there were sightings of sea otters, reports of whales and a lengthy escort by a pod of creatures.
There were those, seeing the white markings and black bodies, who argued they were baby orcas, but we were soon put right and informed they were a type of porpoise. Either way, they were spectacular.
Juneau itself is not what you expect from a state capital.
It is small and there’s not that much to the city centre, with most of its downtown shops and businesses geared to serving the cruise liners which line up at the dock (there were between three and five each day we were there, including a visit from our old friend the Diamond Princess).
There’s also not many places which can host a large green bus and a few tents dotted around it, hence us setting up camp 20-odd miles out of town.
Sadly, this caused a split in the group with half a dozen ‘rebels’ opting to stay closer to what action is on offer in a city centre hostel – or hotel for one of their number who fell victim to the pet stomach bug.
Why they did it is understandable and any resentment between the two camps has been buried since we reunited over a few beers. But we are in this trip together and, in my mind, we should stick together pretty much regardless.
It’s also a shame, because they missed out on a pretty good laugh at the campsite as we sparked up a roaring fire and broke out the marshmallows and a few beers.
Not that Fran was laughing as she became the latest victim of the stomach bug and set up home in the toilet block for the night. A guy did the same the following night and reported two bears wandering past the window.
Thankfully, she was soon back on her feet and back to full health, but not soon enough to enjoy another of the ‘wow’ moments on this trip – the Mendenhall Glacier.
Having skied for many years, the odd glacier has crossed my path, but not normally on a stunning blue sky day and very rarely this beautiful, particularly if you throw in the neighbouring Nuggett Falls.
Our trek down to see both also produced another type of wildlife – the paddling Puggle.
Puggle is the nickname Phoebe has been landed with. Actually, it’s one of several, but the less flattering Skanky Weasel only applies to those times when we’ve been away from showers for a few days.
It harks back to day two, all those weeks ago, as we drove across Germany and Phoebe’s contribution to Phil’s team-building quiz: What do you call a baby echidna?
The name has stuck and, with her insistence on wandering around barefoot whenever possible, the walk down to the glacier provided plenty of opportunities to paddle in the lake and she left little wet Puggle tracks all the way down (quite helpful to track her as she walks inordinately fast for someone with such little legs).
The glacier trip also produced not one, but two reprimands for Matty.
First up came one from Mr Ranger (it was like being in an episode of Yogi Bear) for parking in the wrong place and then, most dramatically, from the elementary school teacher who stepped out in front of the bus to scold us for turning in their car park. She actually made the time out signal in front of the bus.
She had a point, but why are her children playing in a busy car park in the first place?
There were no such run-ins with authority the next day as we ploughed into Juneau itself to sample its delights and did what has now become traditional when we hit any form of civilisation – grab our laptops and head off in search of wi-fi access.
Don’t worry, we didn’t spend all day in the same bar tapping away. Some left to head out on walking trails, some went to Wal-Mart (bizarrely) while several hit the multitude of barbers in Juneau and, in my case, grabbed the first haircut since Cardiff.
From there it was back out to sample the delights of Juneau by night.
Poor old Nick, however, never reached that far as he became – in quite spectacular fashion – the latest victim of the sickness bug.
Shame really, he missed a good night which finally saw me enjoy a basketball game with a spectacular finale (Lakers v Suns, Western Conference Final, Game 5), but by the time we got back to the coach to head onto the ferry, we were delighted to see him back on his feet.
Freddie was not so delighted to see Nick had raided his collection of Coke at the back of the bus to hasten his recovery.
And so starts the tale of two nights which kicked into action sometime after 1am.
The first came on the ferry from Juneau to Petersburg, which a group of us opted to spend wrapped up in sleeping bags on the aft deck to watch the scenery go by and the sun rise.
It was surprisingly pleasant and the plan is to repeat it tonight. Hopefully, this time some of us won’t sleep through the sunrise.
The next night – following a quiet day on a Petersburg campsite, enlivened by the late arrival of a local not too happy we had pitched our tents all over the space he claimed to have reserved by throwing a flea-bitten tent on the ground – had a rather less pleasant outcome.
The sickness hit sometime between 1am and 2am and boy does it come on fast.
Around 11am I was lying awake listening to my iPod, feeling fine. By midnight, I was fast asleep (eyewitnesses can vouch for this – or should they be earwitnesses). By around 1am, I was lying there wondering why the previous night’s veggie lasagne was having such a strange affect on me.
About five minutes later, we had an answer as, propped against the wall of a less than salubrious toilet, the lasagne returned with a vengeance.
Crawling back to bed and for long spells sat watching the dawn break, it was with huge regret about the amount of feta cheese consumed the night before.
Thankfully, the bug appears to last no more than 24 hours and this bout appears to have come in on the shorter side of that.
There won’t be anything too extravagant passing my lips until breakfast, but at least there was significant recovery to enjoy the lovely town of Petersburg, although not to eat the sandwich Mike kindly made me for lunch. Apologies, both for that and sitting on the one he made himself.
There’s not much in Petersburg, but it is charming, friendly and enough to recharge anyone’s batteries.
You can tell how good a place is by how energised everybody is when they eventually return from their exploring to descend upon the bus. Everyone was buzzing tonight and enlivened by wonderfully hot ferry showers, we head to Canada in high spirits.
And nobody, it appears, is sick…
