Ketchikan

Thursday, July 3, 2008: Ketchikan


Creek Street

Buckets of rain came down as we came into Ketchikan. The harbor master told us to come into Thomas Basin. It was a sharp right and before that, it felt as if we were going under the belly of a cruise ship’s bow. The Princess something or other. Massive to say the least!! Buoys out, lines ready, the usual hair-raising entrance into a slip between fishing boats with wind and current. The Prospector, the Defender, the Maverick, and a sweet, neat boat called Marilyn stood silent as Russ reversed Zulu in. A fisherman came to take our line.

“Thank you mate!” I said with much appreciation.

“I saw the tall masts swaying and came to help.” He said with a smile, front tooth broken in a diagonal line, leaving a peak gap. His face was worn from wind and sea, leathered. His eyes tired and red. His manner was subdued. “I’m about to take off again for four days—seine fishing off Tree Point.”

"I know Tree Point." I said and asked which boat he was on.

"The Maverick." He smiled in a very tired way. His fleece pants baggy, shiny at the seat, and roughed up at the knees. Short above the ankles showing white socks and scuffed boots.

The Maverick was a big and unpretentious aluminium boat. The fisherman, although tired looked ready for setting the nets—for paying heed to his livelihood, for protecting his nets from cloud-floating pleasure boats.

Mr. Whittaker came on board to clear us through customs: short-cropped sandy hair and dressed in a tidy dark black or navy uniform. He was efficient and amiable. I had rushed through tidying the boat after tying up for the occasion. Donned a pretty rose-coloured sweater and blue jeans. A blush of rose on the cheeks and sugar bean on the lips. Fresh. Russ looked like the wreck of the Hesperus. The epitome of ‘Old Salt.’ “Welcome to Alaska!” Mr. Whittaker announced with a gentlemanly smile as he left, clipboard in hand. We’re cleared.

Ketchikan! In Tlingit it means ‘Eagle with Spread Wings.’ It has a raw edge to it. A flavor of pioneer and colourful character. I could feel it in the mist and rain. Russ went up to attend to matters with the harbor master, which turned into having a few beers at the Potlatch bar with ‘the boys.’ A band had struck up and there was electricity in the air. There was smoking and dancing and laughing and loud conversation. Some of the fishermen mulled outside, hunched over in the rain wearing wool hats, leather hats, cigarettes in hand all looking weather worn in the twilight gray. It was 10:45 PM and the music played on in the Potlatch and the night had barely begun.

The next day we went for a long day’s walk: past Whale Park and Chief Kyan’s totem pole, an 1890s namesake of Tlingit chief whose family had a fish camp nearby. Past the Princess and Holland America Line cruise ships—5, 6, 7 berthed between the historic district and west end. Wooden houses perched against the hillsides—steep, high—in colours of gray, yellow, and blue. The wood trestle—Dunton Street Trestle—on the hillside skirting difficult terrain, salmonberries, hanging flower baskets. Past the marine ways, the cannery, Silver Lining Seafood company. Young men in their early teens, old men sitting in a row outside the building on their haunches on the pavement on break. Pulling deep on cigarettes. Lifting their faces high to blow the smoke out. Tired men. The first Lutheran Church built on a rock promontory by Norwegians in the 1930s, angled into the lofty sky.

Ketchikan is 10 miles long and 3 miles wide. Its face is one of trading, mining, fishing, timber. It has been told that miners spent two-thirds of their wages in the bars and bordellos of Creek Street. Today, Creek Street is for the tourists: Tlingit wood carvings and silk prints of salmon spawning/going up the river—the journey; smoked salmon, canned salmon, fresh salmon—Ketchikan, the Salmon Capital of the World. Silver and gold jewelry; soaps and jams and furs and pelts and jade and ivory and dream wheels and taffy and cozy bookstores.

Fourth of July. Don’t rain on the parade!! The floats came by representing the: police, Tongass Fire Department, water department. The mayor, the 100-year-old Grande Dame of Ketchikan, bag pipers, drummers, the class of 2009—oh so young and high spirited, the class of 68—looking good and demure, the Christian youth band with the sign—ignite youth ministry. Little children holding flags, running for the taffy and tootsie rolls and lollipops and mints, short of the muddy puddles. Smiles and laughter. Tourists off the ships: tight stretch jeans, shocking pink sweater, large leopard hair clip, high-gloss lipstick and more tight jeans with a sheepskin bolero, high-heeled boots. Glitzy in the gray. First nation people with black shiny hair and parkas and worn boots. Little children dressed in red, white, and blue holding flags and wearing oversized sun glasses. All mingling for the day—fringing Main Street to watch the parade. A happy 4th of July!

We don’t want to leave Ketchikan. Buckets—big buckets—of rain descend. There is a minus tide. Let’s go tomorrow. Put on classical music, then 105.x Community radio. Turn the heater on. Let’s go to the Fish Pirate’s Daughter play and crab fest.

It rained and rained. We made our way up Creek Street. The creek had white water rippling because of the low tide. A lone fisherman had caught a fish—a silver—lying in its own pool of blood. I turned my head. Up the funicular to the warmth of the Cape Fox Lodge. Sink into oversize chairs that look down on Ketchikan, across to the mountains and the water where boats look like toys. Rest awhile. Eaves drop on the well-heeled big-city adventurers having wine with their tour guide talking about Captain Cook. They’re having fun. Then into the civic center for the play.

Russ ran for the crab. Crack open two legs, scoop up the delicious coleslaw with ginger and vinegar and walnuts; savour hot creamy corn pudding, tolerate the over-steamed veggies, drink coffee and try to get through the brownies that were more dense and dry than hardened tar.

The piano music begins and the lights dim. Curtains open onto a bordello scene—floosies spelling out the main characters of the play—the fish pirate, his daughter, her rake thin and proper and honest fiancée, the madam of the bordello, and the protagonist. Applause. Sweetly—but at times painfully—the play unfolds and all is well that ends well.

We walk out into the rain—down the funicular—down Creek Street. I sense the original owners: the Cape Fox people (Saan ya Kwaan), who gave it to the Tongass tribe (Gaanax adi clan) for a wedding gift. Time has gone by. So much unknown. Out into our last Ketchikan twilight, the gray, where bald eagles with wide-spread wings fly.