Arriving at the Port of Skagway, we were met with beautiful scenery, rainbows, low clouds and fog.

Nature Walk

Soon after arriving in Skagway, we decided to attempt one of several self-guided nature walks. We ended up biting off more than we can chew but before turning around, we were thrilled to experience some gorgeous landscapes, interesting conifers, and several varieties of moss and lichen that I have never seen before.

At the far end of our walk, we found a great spot for photographing one of the mountain peaks in the area. The photo below was taken at 500mm and is a merge of 3 photos to capture as much detail as possible. To get a sense of scale, in the lower left-hand corner is a stand of trees in a clearing covered in snow. While taking these photos, another couple came up the path and stopped to do the same. It was great to meet others who shared similar interests in both nature and photography. In fact, it was in talking with the other photographer that he gave me the idea to try exposure stacking, something that I had not tried before, but happened to read about in my camera’s manual a few days before our trip!

Coming back from our nature walk, we headed back into town to see what other interesting things we could find. One of the local tourist hot spots is Klondike Doughboy, home of Alaskan Fry Bread. What is Alaskan Fry Bread like? Well, if you are familiar with funnel cakes often served at State Fairs and the like, Alaskan Fry Bread is a larger, flatter, and better version covered in cinnamon and sugar. I was too busy eating mine to take a picture of it for the blog. Sorry about that.

About this time, my pack of photo gear was beginning to feel quite heavy after the nature walk and tour of downtown, and seeing as there were two other cruise ships in port, there really wasn’t a great place to sit and enjoy our newly acquired sugary fried treat. Eventually, we found a street corner to sit on that happened to be cattie-corner from the infamous Red Onion Saloon, which, according to their website, was, in its day, “one of the finest Bordellos in town.” While resting on the corner and enjoying my snack, a line started forming outside the Saloon, and, considering its history, I thought it would make an interesting photo. Unfortunately, I was trying to photograph with one hand while holding my fry bread in the other and was not paying attention to the exposure. Considering I was last taking photos in the woods which was shielded from the sun, all my photos of the Red Onion Saloon were extremely overexposed, resulting in the following attempt at recoving one of my photos.

Tourist Row, Skagway

A few other items of interest in the town were a Thai-food restaurant that we were hoping to eat at but it seems to have closed in 2021 and was still up for sale. Sign hanging over the door and everything. Another interesting eatery was Peppers bright red food bus (see below) . We didn’t eat there but having never seen a food bus before, I had to stop and take a photo.