Juneau – Mendenhall Glacier & Native Celebration

On Saturday, our first full day in Juneau, we took advantage of a bright and sunny day to visit the Mendenhall Glacier, located just 12 miles from downtown Juneau.

First, a word about the area’s geography.  Downtown Juneau (and the ferry dock) is tucked into a narrow and reatively flat stretch of coast on the west side of the Coast Mountains.  The peaks behind the city are steep and high: Mount Roberts is at 3,819 feet and Mount Juneau is at 3,576. (Remember that these peaks start at sea level so that’s a lot of elevation gain in a short distance.)  Behind these peaks is the Juneau Icefield, extending over 1500 square miles, including 30 glaciers flowing down to the sea.

Mendenhall Glacier is currently over 13 miles long, extending from the Juneau Icefield down valley to terminate in Mendenhall Lake, which was formed by glacial meltwater in 1929.  It is over 2000 feet deep.  Originally, this glacier would have extended to the sea in the vicinity of what is now Auk Bay (about 5 miles away from the toe of the glacier).   Glaciers are like rivers moving very, very, very slowly across the landscape: Mendenhall moves at a rate of about 18 inches per year.  

When a glacier’s toe reaches water, the ice at the terminus begins to crack and break off, “calving” icebergs. If the amount of snow falling on the upper portions of the glacier is less than the amount of ice lost to calving, the glacier will gradually retreat, becoming  “receding glacier.”  

Since the 1700s, Mendenhall has receded up valley by more than 2.5 miles.  Today, its rate of retreat is measured at 100-150 feet per year.

The Juneau Icefield Research Program has monitored Mendenhall, as well as some other Juneau Icefield glaciers every year since 1942. The program is managed out of the University of Colorado’s Geolgical Sciences Department (go, Buffs!) in collaboration with universities in Maine and Southeast Alaska. Each year, faculty and students (college undergraduate & graduate, as well as  high school juniors and seniors) spend 8 weeks in the Icefield wilderness, monitoring parameters and conducting research projects. At 75 years, this is the longest running study of any glacier in the Western Hemisphere, contributing invaluable data to our understanding of past and present climate change.

Mendenhall Glacier and environs are part of the Tongass National Forest, which covers 16.7 million acres and extends across the peninsula/island groups all the way from north of Juneau to south of Ketchikan. The Trump Administration tried to open this area up for logging. Like all logging in Alaska (and throughout the western US), renewed logging would require enormous taxpayer subsisides to construct roads for access. But I digress…

The Mendenhall Glacier Visitor Center is a gorgeous piece of architecture located in a dramatic setting and packed with great interpretive material. I originally assumed it was a national park center, since – in our neck of the woods – the US Forest Service is so starved for funds that it can’t even keep up with road maintenance, let alone build and maintain fancy visitor centers.   (I perceive the political machinations of Ted Stevens, King of Pork, behind this center’s funding.)

There are a number of walking trails in the area around the visitor center. We opted for the stroll to Nugget Falls, the closest point to view the glacier by land.

The trail was densely vegetated in 50 shades of green, with many excellent interpretive signs along the way.

Mendenhall Glacier

Nugget Falls

On our walk back to the visitor center, not far from Nugget Falls, I noticed this plaque.

Curious about what was behind this tribute, I did a little research and was overwhelmed by evidence of just how much Romeo was loved by the local community. I found multiple articles, memorial pages, a Facebook Page, a published photo book and even a set of cantatas written in his honor. His is a story of wild grace and human tragedy, utlimately emblematic of our warped relationship with the natural world. I’ll let a local voice, Nik Jans, tell his story…

“So, there he was: a wild black wolf, washed up like a castaway on our strange shore. He first appeared in summer of 2003 along the network of trails in the Mendenhall Glacier Recreation Area, on the outskirts of Juneau, Alaska. Perhaps he was an orphan, lone survivor of a decimated pack; or a young dispersing adult in search of a mate and his own territory. At first, little more than shadow and rumor, he gradually became more visible as ice formed on the lake. He took to following hikers and skiers with dogs, sometimes approaching to within a few feet, making overtures and keening a high-pitched whine. If both canines and humans were willing, some form of social interchange took place, anything from a polite pee-mail swap to an all-out, whirling play session, with a distinct lupine accent. And with our newly built home overlooking his favored ground on the west side of the lake, Sherrie and I not only held ringside seats for much of the unfolding drama; we and our dogs found ourselves near its epicenter.

The old phrase, a wolf at the door, suddenly held a literal meaning. Sometimes we saw fresh wolf prints just a stone’s toss from our drive; and often he lay waiting, curled on the ice beyond Skaters Cabin. Late at night I’d wake to his echoing howls, sometimes so close he seemed inside. With the lake as our extended back yard, naturally there were close encounters. The handsome stranger took a definite shine to our cream-colored Lab, Dakotah, a spayed female—seeking her out, begging to flirt and play. Meanwhile, he continued to meet and greet dogs, often dozens a day. Sherrie called him Romeo, and the name stuck.    

Days, then weeks passed. Instead of slipping back into the mountains as we’d expected, Romeo became ever more familiar, seeming to lay claim to a territory that overlapped Juneau’s most popular recreation area, not to mention adjoining yards. While some locals watched his point-blank interactions in rapt fascination, others freaked. A hundred-plus-pound wolf, so close to kids and pets? Wolves and civilization just didn’t mix, they grumbled, and a few threatened to take matters into their own hands. Never mind that despite all the stories, wolves posed less statistical threat to public safety than meteorites; and besides, this was no ordinary wolf.

[Note: When wildlife officials started talking about relocating Romeo to the remote backcountry, locals formed “Friends of Romeo” to advocate for him and watch out for his welfare.]

Of course, we worried, aware of the extreme danger he faced, so near to so many of our kind. We and others banged ski poles together, waved and yelled, hurled chunks of ice. State biologists tried to haze him away. And though he’d retreat, a day or two later there he was, awaiting his surrogate pack. Still, he seemed intent on learning and following our rules of engagement and was better mannered than some of the dogs and people he encountered.

No surprise that Romeo forged close bonds with certain dogs, relationships that defined friendship. But in the process, he also spent time around their humans, recognized them and in some cases seemed to form similar attachments, radiating sociable body language, expressions, and behavior that went far beyond mere tolerance. He wasn’t being fed or petted; had no apparent motive to make such positive gestures to a certain few people other than simply liking them. Why not? The interspecies bond between canines and humans is among the most remarkable on the planet. 

For six years Romeo came and went, oblivious to our wrangles. Though controversy surrounding him continued to swirl and ebb, he’d become a fixture out by the glacier. He’d appear in autumn and stay through the spring thaw, then shift into the glacier-draped high country. Sometimes he’d disappear for weeks, and we’d wonder if he’d finally found a mate, or had at last met his end. In at least his eighth year, perhaps his ninth, he’d already more than doubled the life expectancy of a wild Alaskan wolf. Each time I watched him go, it was as if for the last time. 

And then it was. The wolf we called Romeo vanished in September 2009. Pretty to imagine him lounging with his own fat pups on a sunny hillside; but instead, he was illegally shot by a pair of serial poachers and skinned for a trophy. In their boasts—which is how they eventually got caught—the killers flaunted a stunningly banal, small-minded evil. A high-profile trial was followed by a wrist slap; actual punishment amounted to a bad traffic ticket. After that, they ceased to matter. “

Remembering Romeo, The Wolf That Stayed

Photos from Romeo, Sweet Romeo, posted on the Howling for Justice blog

Romeo returned as usual that year, hiking with friends on September 18. Then he disappeared without a trace.  Locals put up posters and posted reward money for information on his whereabouts.   Friends of Romeo investigated for weeks and eventually found his killers – those “serial poachers” who were hunting out of season, in an area closed to hunting, using a gun was not legal for sport hunting. Romeo was shot in the gut in the parking lot where he met up with his local hiking buddies.  The poachers took pictures of him confidently trotting up, followed by pictures gloating as they held his corpse up next to an image of a news article entitled “Romeo, Where Art Thou?”

Stories like this make me despair of the human race. Where is the “sport” in killing an animal that walks up to greet you? The many hunters in my extended family would be appalled.

The poachers claimed that the wolf they shot was gray, but Romeo’s pelt was found at a local taxidermist’s, tagged with one of their names. The judge ordered that his pelt be turned over to the Forest Service, and locals – led by Nik Jans – raised $30,000 to create a high quality visitor center display in Romeo’s memory (although he is not named there). Today, Romeo gazes over the heads of visitors and out to the broad valley where he was so deeply loved.

[Brief pause to recover composure…]

After our Mendenhall Glacier outing, we stopped for lunch at Donna’s Restaurant, a classic circa 1960’s diner.  While eating lunch, we eavesdropped on a conversation between our server and a very jittery local sitting two tables over. We asked what was up and learned that today was the last day of the biennial Sealaska Heritage Center 2024 Celebration. and our neighbor’s jitters were from dancing non stop for 3 days. We watched in awe ad he gulped down his food and dashed out for more dancing in the festival’s closing ceremony.  We had to check this out.

The Sealaska Hertitage Institute was founded in 1980 to advance the native cultures of southeast Alaska. In 1982, they held a cultural dance festival to celebrate the cultural heritage of the Tlingit, Haida and Tsimshian peoples and to draw young people into a revival of these tribes’ ancient traditions. Twenty years on, this is now the largest cultural festival in Alaska, drawing thousands of people from tribes all across Alaska, Canada and the Pacific Northwest for 4 days of learning, cultural exchange, art, food and – of course – dancing.

We arrived in time for the final two hours of celebrartion. Spirits were high and the regalia was stunning.

The Juneau Public LIbrary displayed pages from the book Celebration, which explains this festival’s importance to Native Alaskans. Some excerpts are below.

People gathered outside as the procession wound its way out the door…

…and some people ran around to the back to join the procession for a second time.

After the Celebration wound down, we headed back to The House for an hour’s relaxation.

We opted for dinner at the neighborhood “local,” The Island Pub.   Excellent pizza and great beer – perfect end to an adventure packed day.