Juneau-a-go-go

Alright, lets begin with the most important/ interesting thing that's happened here in Juneau. No, as far as I know, there's been no more news on the apparent volcanic activity in the Juneau area. This is much more important. I became an overnight celebrity in the town of Juneau, population approx 30, 000. I made it into the frickin newspaper.




Photo: Juggling can be a winter sport, too
Juneau Empire

Simon Wong, left, shows off his snow juggling skills to his sister, Lian, on Wednesday near Marine Park. They are visiting from Auckland, New Zealand.



Not much else to say about that, really. A slow news day I guess. (Also, in the photo it looks like I've just got one snowball but really, the rest are just out of shot! I swear! Ha.) I'm pretty happy nonetheless. I have my souvenir from Juneau, cos god knows everything here is so frickin expensive! I mean, seriously, $75 for a PRINT of a painting? I'm sorry, that's just ridiculous. If it was the original, signed and dated, then maybe you could get away with it, but dude, $75? Also, the native artifacts are pretty expensive too. Which, I guess makes sense but $200 for a small carving is pretty ridiculous too, dude. I thought New York was expensive, but man, Alaska can get pretty dang pricey too.

The hostel. It's ok, but the other night a group of like, 20 kids and a few adults have been here for a few days now. But luckily for us, we're getting kicked out of the hostel tomorrow (they have this policy where you can only stay for 5 days every 3 months which kinda makes no sense, but ok). It also gets pretty annoying that we have to be out between 9 and 5 every day. Especially on a day like today when it's snowing like crazy outside... I guess it's a good and bad thing though. It means we get a lot of things done but if we have no plans like today, the time seems to go pretty slow. I mean, Juneau (and from what I can tell, everywhere else on this godforsaken continent) have closed down for the winter which is kind of annoying. Yet for some reason I'm surprised by it every time.

Note to self: Summer. Summer is when things are alive.

The weather hasn't been all bad though. Yesterday was pretty nice. We headed out to Mendenhall Glacier which was pretty extraordinary. I mean, you'd think that any self-respecting kiwi would have seen one before - Franz Josef and Fox etc. But no, not me. I'll get onto that though. I promise. Not much to say about that really. It was blue. It was pretty. It was cold. Well, not really that cold, not really that pretty, not really that blue. We did a hike where the snow sometimes got up to our knees. It was kinda intense. Especially when I almost fell into a hole. Woah.

Oh, also, I almost forgot. I totally saw another Bald Eagle swoop down and grab some kind of meat...thing from the side of a dumpster. Kinda gross, yet majestic. And of course I was too slow to take a photo so I have no physical proof of it but you gotta believe me. You just gotta!

Right, I think that's it yous fulla's. Oh, besides the fact that I'm going HOME in 11 DAYS. That is frickin, ridiculously nuts.