mendenhall glacier bike and brew!

When Daniel and I first started looking at the expedition list, the Juneau Bike and Brew Tour caught our eye pretty quickly. The description was a bike tour up to the Mendenhall Glacier, and then a tasting of local craft beers at a pub in the port. Once we heard that most of our group was also participating, we were in!

The boat arrived in Juneau around 2pm and we were off and ready to go on our bike ride at 215p!

The trip up to where the ride began was a short trip around the city of Juneau. The tour guides were really nice, and both from Juneau, so they had lots of stories about the city and surrounding area. We passed a huge field leaving the downtown area that was covered up with Bald Eagles. I was ready to jump out the window to get some pictures, and they were all like, "Eh, and there are some eagles. But look, there's a Costco behind them! We love Costco!" So funny what people get excited about.

The ride itself was 9 miles and took us around the Mendenhall Glacier National Forest. We started off with a huge hill (I'm talking changing gears, which this girl knows nothing about), and then it evened up, but the wind and cold drizzle made up for the "easy" ride.

After the ride, we had a short walk up to the viewing deck of the glacier, opposite side from where we biked to. We passed a stream on the way, and were able to see some salmon swimming upstream. I couldn't believe how big they were! There were some trying to jump into a drainage pipe, so although they have great instincts, they clearly aren't that smart. They use up all of their energy getting upstream, that once they get there and lay eggs, they literally float back downstream to die. There are also different salmon seasons. These were Pink Salmon that we saw, and according to our guides, not all that tasty. We were told Pinks are what you probably find in cans, yuck.

Once we were done with the ride and the tour of the park, it was on to the Brew part of our tour! We were dropped off downtown at a local pub in port. It's actually an old hanger, where sea planes would take off and land from. Since it's so close to where the planes still are, it got kind of loud at times, but great atmosphere! Alaskan Ale is brewed and bottled in Juneau, so that's what we had. We were able to taste 4 kinds - Porter (sick), Pale Ale (good), Amber (good), White Ale (the best).

Our day is Juneau was definitely a great one, even though we didn't get to check out the town itself.

 According to Alan, the naturalist, you know a sheet of ice is a glacier when the ice under the snow is blue.

"Look, a glacier!" Charles, always the comedian! 

View from the other side of the park.

Pink Salmon swimming upstream. Had to have been 2+ feet in length, they were huge!