Heeeeeeeeeeeeey Bear

   I hope you have all had a chance to view my most recent photos here: https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.760028779102.2245726.3100290&l=0d1f3cff78&type=1

         I woke up to tons of sunshine and blue skies on Sunday.  There was barely a cloud in the sky...it was as if I lived somewhere normal.  Obviously, it was a hiking day.  Jimmy and I had our already planned for a long hike if the opportune moment should come and Sunday was it.  We had an ambitious plan: the Mt. Juneau trail (up and down can be a 7-8 hour hike), walk the ridge (for how many miles?  it was unclear, even from the guidebooks), connect to the Granite Creek trail (although we had no idea what that looked like and neither of us had been on it) and then hike back down to Perseverance.  Oh, and that "light dusting" of fresh snow on the ridge was visible from the ground...but we could still find the trail, right?

      Our day started well.  I was a bit shall we say "tired" and pushed back our start time by a half hour.  Right after getting in the car to drive the 1 mile to the trailhead (why walk when that extra mile could be just the thing to do us in?), I realized that I had left all the food and snacks that I packed on the counter in my kitchen.  Becca fail.  So we turned around and went back (only a few minute detour).  Well, as luck would have it, that was a good thing because on the drive back, we spotted the mama bear and her 2 cubs.  If we hadn't gone back for my food, we would have missed the super close encounter.  Getting to watch the bears was incredible...and we hadn't even started our hike!  (And yes, when people want bears to "scoot," they often say "heeeeeeeey bear.")

     The start of our hike was great, but super warm.  It felt like it was 80 degrees with the sun shining down on us...and the first part is up a mountain so we gained elevation fast.  We saw a ptarmigan (Alaska state bird, basically a mountain chicken with more interesting noises) and a guy with a gun (just in case he felt like shooting something...LOVE it).  The Mt. Juneau trail is stunning, but the last 1/2 is fairly strenuous.  During the last part, you're basically climbing up boulders.  There is a "trail" but you have to put your hands down a lot too.  Plus, apparently several people have died on it so it's not one you really want to slip and fall on.  LOVELY.  But I made it...after a lot of hemming and hawing, sweating profusely and apologizing to Jimmy for going so slow (actually, we were apparently booking it and made it up super fast...no wonder I was so tired!).

     We ran into a few other people at the top of Mt. Juneau.  They seemed not so sure that the weather would hold and questioned whether we could make it all the way to Granite creek with the snow-capped mountains (there is no real ridge trail, but the well-worn path is easy to lose at certain places).  We figured we might as well walk until we lost the trail or felt like it was a good idea to turn around (although with Jimmy and me, the answer to that question is probably always going to be "never").  Luckily, after about a mile, we ran into an older couple that told us some markers to look for and roughly what the ridge trail looked like.  They warned us not to turn down too early (a common mistake) or else we'd be heading right off steep cliffs and/or having to bushwhack our way down.  NOT fun. 

     Obviously, we made it (look at the pics!).  The snow was really fun for the most part (besides the parts when it was ice and with every step of the traverse, you start sliding down the hill).  There were some downhill portions where I was basically snowboarding without the board.  We were screaming like little kids.  What better way to spend a Sunday?

     Of course, it's Juneau so the rain caught up with us eventually.  Luckily, we were pretty low down by that point and were just following the basin back out to Perseverance.   At the end of our hike, the rain lightened and we got a beautiful view of a rainbow.  A perfect end to a perfect day.  I was so tired (and sore) afterwards that I passed out pretty soon and have still been recovering today.  SOOOO worth it!