July 28, 2000 - Decisions
Of course, our arrival in Juneau meant the end of our journey, at least for a few years. The reality of having to return to work hit us like a brick. Not pleasantly. But, we tried not to think about the time bomb that is our savings account and enjoy exploring Juneau for a couple of weeks.
Juneau felt like a metropolis compared to Ketchikan, Wrangell and Petersburg. In fact with a Kmart, Fred Meyer, Costco and two malls, Juneau is the shopping center of Southeast Alaska. Not to mention the traffic from the four or five cruise ships always parked at the city's waterfront (including the herds of sightseeing helicopters circling the valley many times each day). We played tourists ourselves and bought souvenirs for our families in the downtown area consisting mostly of cheesy souvenir and jewelry shops. We visited the Alaska State Museum and the Mendenhall Glacier, and went beer tasting as we toured the Alaska Brewing Company (who makes our favorite beer, Alaskan Amber).
We found Juneau to be a sleepy town, with most of the available jobs being for the State of Alaska or Federal government. We almost missed the rough-and-tumble feeling of the smaller towns we had visited. The sun was out the first day we arrived in Juneau, but that was to be the last we saw of that gorgeous sight. For the next three weeks, it would either rain, drizzle, or pour. But, the backdrop of the city was stunning and couldn't have existed without all that rain, perched at the base of towering green mountains complete with waterfalls. The smell of abundant wildflowers drifted down our dorade vents constantly, and we watched spawning salmon searching for their fresh water stream right in the marina.
We met some wonderful people right away in Juneau. Mike and Barb had seen our web site and tracked us down in Aurora Basin. They are busy outfitting their own sailboat and plan to liveaboard and cruise eventually. Our new friends gave us a tour on Juneau's only major road and we had a great time exchanging stories and dreams over several evenings.
One evening we peered into the windows of a closed local electrical store, hoping to find some parts for Jenny P, when Bill Shattenberg opened the door. It turned out he was not only the owner of this store, Anchor Electric, but also the owner of the Gypsy, a gorgeous old 65-year-old wooden ketch we had been admiring at the marina earlier. Bill was a fascinating guy, and we ended up trading some electrical parts for website design (check it out at www.anchoralaska.com).
But, amongst all this fun, the knawing realization that we really didn't want to stop cruising kept bothering us. We had absolutely loved traveling on Jenny P these past three months. And researching Juneau's job market further, we knew that it would take us a long time to pay off our boat and save enough money to finally go cruising full-time for a few years. Not to mention the fact that Jenny P had turned into a soggy sauna from all the rain. One evening I was lying in bed, a steady drip of porthole condensation pooling on my pillow when we finally admitted to each other what we'd been feeling for weeks. The only way we'd be able to pay off the boat in less than 5 years and build up our savings was if we headed south, back to a big city and found ourselves a couple of tech jobs again.
Of course, some sunshine wouldn't hurt, so off to San Diego we go.
The past week has been a rush of preparation; ordering charts of the Pacific coast, buying loads of groceries from Costco, adding a solar panel, renting an EPIRB for our 2000 mile offshore journey, checking the weather daily. It will take us at least 20 days to reach land again once we head out of Icy Strait and into the Gulf of Alaska. The weather is looking good, our storage areas filled to the brim with provisions, everything has been battened down inside (even the cats have a new litter-mat for the journey). So, on Monday, July 31st we'll slip the dock lines again and head out to an entirely new world. Michael (N7UDM) will be checking us into the Pacific Seafarer's Net which we'll keep in contact with every evening (track our progress at http://www.bitwrangler.com/yotreps). So, here's hoping for fair winds and following seas; we're heading into the great blue at last, only to land when palm trees appear.
-sdj-
