Cold cold hike back.

So we were bored one day and decided to head over to the other side of town to visit the Gold Rush cemetery and Lower Reids Falls.

24 avenues later, and the whole of Skagway town later, we reached the train depot:

Agnes pointing to a curious sign; there were no shops anywhere. Maybe just a name of the stop?

We reached the cemetery:

Tomb of Skagway's hero, Frank Reid:
And Skagway's villain, Jefferson R. Smith a.k.a. Soapy Smith:

Read more about their story here.
Then it was to Lower Reids Falls.
Beautiful?
That's me going under the falls:

So I got really wet and on the way back, almost froze to death...

Smart-ness...

The hike that made my legs wobbly.

Oh, did I forget to mention? A new Singaporean came to town. His name is Waikit and he would be staying till mid-September, long after all the other Singaporeans come back.

So Tingyi and I took him on a hike to Upper Reids Falls and Icy lake. What was supposed to be a starters' hike turned out to be one hell of an adventure.

The hike took longer than we expected. And much more energy...

After more than an hour, we reached Icy Lake; though its not icy anymore since its summer:After that, we hiked up to Upper Reids Falls.

We thought we found Upper Reids but it was actually 'Middle Reids':

This is me after I feel on my butt and almost fell into the rapids...
So we decided to hike past the rapids and try to bash straight down to Lower Reids Fall, which was a bad idea... We thought we almost made it, but when our tracks turned to be one foot wide tracks on the side of the cliff, I was shaking.

View of Lower Reids, zoomed in (we were actually a few hundred feet away from safe ground, hanging onto trees and shrubs growing on the sides of the cliff):

I was scared shit.

Then our track came to a dead end. It was now a 10cm wide edge on the side of the cliff; a vertical drop. We had to turn back.

My legs were worst than jell-o.

We went back to 'Middle Reids' and took a breather:Then we decided to head back home. But we found this instead:
Which after following the big black pipes, led us to the actual Upper Reids Falls:
There you go, three very happy, very relieved Singaporeans:

Summer Solstice partay!!!

So the 20th June was Summer Solstice and there was a party held the week before to commerate it. Here are the pictures from that crazy night (minus the sex, drugs and... there was a bit of rock and roll, more like a laidback hippee party).

Ralitza, Yoana, Jasmine and Tzveta:Chinghei with Jasmine and Tzvetalina:Me and my best buds, Jasmine and Jacob:Jacob insisted I was purposely pressing my butt to his crotch area.... like seriously...: That's all, the rest of the pictures are either too dark or too embarassing... Lol.

I conquered a friggin' glacier!

This is the mother of all entries and I am more than estatic to blog about this one: my glacier hike.

One of my goals in Alaska was to climb up and walk on a glacier and boy, did I do all that.

Words cannot describe how I felt then, neither can pictures capture the beauty of one of God's many stunning creations. And I feel blessed to have witnessed it firsthand.

Before I blabber on, let's start at the beginning.

Skagway is circled in red, and the glacier, called 'Laughton Glacier', is circled in blue. The cabin is the black spot within the blue circle.

We took a train to go from Skagway to somewhere near the cabin area.

Train ride to 'Glacier Stop': My hiking 'kakis': (from back) Chris, Justin, me(from left) Bryan, Hope:

Stunning view of the Skagway river on the train ride:

'Glacier Stop' wasn't even a station, it was just a 'stop' stop, like in-the-middle-of-nowhere stop..
So the train left us, in the middle of nowhere.

And then came a steam-engine train. Awesome:

So we started our hike on foot...

Another part of Skagway river along the trail:We were attacked by a small turkey-pheasant-bird called a grouse. It was a mummy hen with chicks so you could imagine how ferocious it was. First it 'hissed' (sounded like a hiss) at Justin, then it began charging at everyone of us. Even flew towards us a couple of times making us ducking into the bushes to take cover. It was insane...:
Along the hike:

Finally after an hour or so, we reached the cabin. It blew away my expectations. It looked like a friggin' resort....

The boys: The interior (it comes with an awesome furnace; my only complaint: the hard wooden beds): Chris trying to chop firewood for the campfire:

Now Bryan actually doing it:

The view of the river from the cabin:

The river (where the guys put their beer to chill 'em):So we began (minus Hope) the hike proper.

View of the mountain opposite:

One of many stacked rocks along the trail:The men; Bryan, me and Chris:

The toilet for the rich (see at the right corner?). It is cantilevering over the river, has glass roofs, smells like a lavender field, it comes complete with a hand sanitizer, urinal and toilet bowl and rolls and rolls of toilet paper. The washroom caters to all those rich asses who fly to some parts of the glacier in a helicopter, land and 'hike' for half an hour:One of many many piles of moose dung:

Beginning of the hike:

Chris went back after this:
Up we go:

The start of the glacier (we didn't know but see the right side of the pictures? That's all ice.):

Up we go:

That's all ice:

See how clear it is: Till we saw this gem; a waterfall:

After the waterfall, we reach the top of the ridge between two glaciers:

We walked till the ridge was covered in snow:

Snow everywhere...:

We didn't know where we were, so we just went straight to the innermost tip of the valley:

The left side:The right side: Streams on the mountain surface:

With everything covered in snow, we had no markers to judge any distances. We were so mistaken... and it took us forever to hike till this part:

Couldn't help myself:

Our goal (looks near... but...):

Still a long way to go:

Not getting any closer:

A very deceiving picture, its not near...:

Are we there yet?

Yes:

Touching the blue ice:

Sweet!: We went another way down, closer to the right side:

So we headed back down (we didn't know we were above the clouds!):
When we came back to the warm cabin, we had a campfire and roasted marshmallows:

Justin and his ice cold beer:

Me 'bbq'-ing my feet:

The gang (minus Justin):

Wild fire:

Them boys foolin' around again (this was around 10p.m. by the way, thanks to the summer solstice night, the sun never sets):

Chris got a little carried away with the kerosene:

Just a little carried away:

Chris and Bryan wrestling... boys will be boys:

Peace was returned once Chris bumped his head on the wooden plank of the bed above:

So we hung out till late that night, making use of the bright summer solstice night to go moose watching at the rapids (though we saw nothing...).

Then we slept on the hard beds and woke up with sore necks and backs.

We were supposed to leave around three but all us opted for the early train ride back... We needed our comfy beds.

'Laughton Glacier' logbook, the first entry dating back to 1981:

Goodbye cabin:

Goodbye river: Hope in the background, what was she doing?:

Some Hindustani hero:

Then back to 'Glacier Stop':

Emo shot: The train beckons:And so did our beds...

Till next time!