June 25, 2017

We spent another day here in Wrangell as we hadn't really seen anything of the town yet. One of the attractions here is the petroglyph beach. The best time to see them is a low tide, as they can get covered at high tide. So after Ken, Kim, and Emilie went to drop off some fish at the cold storage place, they came back and picked us up at the boat around 9:30.

The 5 of us and 2 dogs piled into Ken and Kim's 2 seater truck and we headed down to the beach. There are personal homes right next to the entrance and the deck and walkway was littered with small children's toys. We wandered around and found as many as we could and spent time trying to figure out what they represented. Ken saved the "orca" one till last. It has been moved up above the high tide area so reduce the erosion on it.



Then we headed back into town and parked at the Stikine Inn. Greg and Ken headed off to the hardware and marine stores to replace the bilge pump we gave him. Emilie and Kim and I wandered the town. Pretty much everything is closed on a Sunday so it was a complete ghost town, however the main store, Angermans, was open and we were able to shop a bit in there. They had a great selection of clothes and gifts, but surprisingly, I didn't buy anything.

We continued to walk through town looking in the store windows and to catch up to Ken and Greg. We stopped at the cultural center to admire the small totems outside that were being worked on. There was a woman inside doing some sewing on a sewing machine, however it looked pretty much closed. But she ended up opening the door for us and welcoming us all inside for a look. She introduced herself as Rachel. The building is new and was built to house and cover some other totems that had been taken down. They were in various places but were rotting and needed to be taken down as they were a safety hazard. It was great to be able to look at them up close and to see the different "forms". They had modern ones as well as old ones.

There is a cemetery near the harbor where the white folks are buried in rows in a grassy area, and the natives are buried in the adjacent forest. Kim and Ken end up walking there with the dog fairly often. At one point, Kim asked Rachel if she knew anything about a grave site that Kim was fascinated with there, "Emma", who had a lovely frog engraved on her tombstone. It turns out that Emma was Rachel's Grandmother! Ken also mentioned his book and how he had dedicated it to the local Tglinkit (sp?) tribe. Rachel asked if they had ever seen inside Chief Shakes house (a longhouse in the harbor) and they had not and of course we hadn't either. So she offered to meet us there and open it up for us.



So we walked back to the truck and then drove over to the harbor to meet her. It has be restored many times and was just restored again in 2015(?), so it was really lovely. The inside totems and the artwork stored there and the stories were fascinating. My favorite where the hanging lamps that used "hooligan" oil to burn (a small fish).




OK, gotta move this Blog along! Then we drove back to the Stikine Inn and had a late lunch. The portions are huge and the food really good. Then back towards the harbor with a stop at the most recent Chief Shakes grave. Parked at the harbor and walked over to the cemetery so that the 3 of us could also see "Emma's" grave. Cool frog.

The Reiki Master gang went back to have a nap, and we headed back to Spellbound. But we had exchanged some text's with our new friends John and Judy on Stella Maris. They had arrived on the dock yesterday and we had said that we would try and catch up with them today. So we walked a few feet down the dock to say hello to them. They had met some other people at church that morning and so we also met Carmine and Carol on "Sleepless" who came over as well. We all talked boats and routes and waves.

Back to Spellbound to make some salsa to take as a appetizer over to Reiki Master where they again served dinner. But it was also movie night, so we watched "The Hundred Foot Journey" which was great. Probably should have done better than it did, but it's a "feel good" movie so …..

Back to Spellbound after another surprisingly busy day given that it was supposed to be a bit of a "down day". Our plan is to move to Roosevelt Bay tomorrow.