This was probably my favorite Shorex of our trip! We (the ship) arrived in Juneau at 1:30 pm and left at 10:00 pm, giving us plenty of time for our afternoon adventure. Our excursion was called Whale Watching Adventure and Salmon Bake . We went down a little before 4:00 pm for our 4:10 meeting time and were greeted by our tour guide/driver, Jonah . He’s the only guide whose name I remember—mainly because when he introduced himself, he said: “Yep, Jonah! Say whatever whale jokes you have, I’ve heard them all!” It was perfect since he was literally driving us to a whale watching activity, and of course, because of the story of Prophet Jonah and the whale. Apart from that, he was funny, sharp, and constantly firing off Alaska jokes and trivia. The thing is though, he tells so many jokes and stories mixed with facts that sometimes you get confused about what’s real and what’s not. One of the best examples was his story about a statue in Juneau. He said the city...
This was probably my favorite Shorex of our trip! We (the ship) arrived in Juneau at 1:30 pm and left at 10:00 pm, giving us plenty of time for our afternoon adventure.
Our excursion was called Whale Watching Adventure and Salmon Bake. We went down a little before 4:00 pm for our 4:10 meeting time and were greeted by our tour guide/driver, Jonah. He’s the only guide whose name I remember—mainly because when he introduced himself, he said:
“Yep, Jonah! Say whatever whale jokes you have, I’ve heard them all!” It was perfect since he was literally driving us to a whale watching activity, and of course, because of the story of Prophet Jonah and the whale.
Apart from that, he was funny, sharp, and constantly firing off Alaska jokes and trivia. The thing is though, he tells so many jokes and stories mixed with facts that sometimes you get confused about what’s real and what’s not.
One of the best examples was his story about a statue in Juneau. He said the city had commissioned a bald eagle statue—makes sense since bald eagles are everywhere here and it’s America’s national bird. But when the statue was delivered, it wasn’t an eagle at all—it was a pelican. Somehow, the order got mixed up with Florida, who had ordered pelican statues around the same time.
Florida didn’t complain because they ended up with bald eagles instead (still patriotic enough for them), while poor Juneau got stuck with pelicans… even though there are no pelicans in Alaska. Jonah told us you can still find this giant pelican statue in town, standing proudly but completely out of place.
After telling the story, he looked around the bus and shouted: “Anyone here from Florida? Give us back our bald eagle!!!” The whole bus cracked up—it was one of those dumb, funny stories that sticks with you because you’re never entirely sure if it’s 100% true or just part of his comedy routine.
Fun fact: bald eagles are as common in Juneau as maya birds are in the Philippines. You just see them perched everywhere - the tour guide kept pointing them out left and right on our ride.
Whale Watching
We boarded a small boat (maybe 50 passengers max) with a captain and a guide. The captain said it was his first sail with this boat! The guide, meanwhile, clearly loved whales and shared a ton of facts (that I honestly don’t remember but you can always Google haha).
The scenery alone was worth it—Alaska really is the most beautiful place I’ve ever been to.
We got lucky! We saw multiple whales, mostly their tails as they dove back into the water. Some boats had whales come up really close, which must have been amazing, but I was just grateful to see them at all. Because let’s be honest, it would be such a bummer to join a whale watching adventure and not see any whales at all!
We also spotted otters lounging on floating buoys, and one kept ringing the bell—so cute!
Salmon Bake
After whale watching, we headed to Gold Creek Salmon Bake. Now, I had imagined salmon bake meant salmon baked with cheese in the oven—but nope! It’s actually grilled salmon with a sweet glaze, and it was so good.
It was an all-you-can-eat spread with grilled salmon, BBQ ribs, rice, beans, hot chowder, salad, and blueberry cheesecake, plus s’mores and hot chocolate for dessert. Add in live music and it was the perfect Alaska experience.
Of course, they had a souvenir shop too. I grabbed another magnet (a must for my collection!) and one of those “fill-all-you-can” bags of gems.
The place was really pretty, here are some more photos:
Back to the Ship
Since the shuttle from town to the pier takes about 30–40 minutes each way, we left around 8:30 pm to give ourselves plenty of time before the ship’s 10:00 pm departure.
Looking back, I don’t think we missed much by not going ashore earlier. The few minutes we had in town before the tour was enough to look around.
Tip for future Juneau travelers: factor in that bus ride time when planning your day.
If you want to recreate my scrapbook titles, you can find them in my Cricut Design Space. The Alaska one I recreated from Kim Shears, while the Juneau title was designed by me.
And if you enjoyed this post, you can also check out my whole Alaska cruise blog here.
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