Painters Cove: Ketchikan

Overcast and windy this morning . We spent yesterday’s lovely sunshine working aboard, cleaning and vacuuming, then grocery shopping so we could leave today for sightseeing so despite the cooler weather we need to carry on. We have a limited time budget in the USA and every day we spend in Alaska is a day less we can spend in Arizona due to immigration rules.

Took the bus downtown for $1 each, there were 2 cruise ships in port so the town was fairly busy although , in summer they can have 4 or 5 here at a time.

First shock was the jewellery stores , someone said there were 47 of them ( Ketchikan is smaller than Cochrane) and that sounds about right, the whole downtown is either jewellery stores, art galleries (sculptures etc) or gift and souvenir stores. Wall to wall tourist traps!! They were all fairly busy for a while but then, all of a sudden , the shops and streets cleared as the cruise ships got ready to depart and the passengers all rushed back aboard, the latecomers actually running down the dock.

Neat old fishing boats in Bar Harbor, Ketchikan

Anyway , it was interesting to wander around the town and talk to some of the “local” shop people, most are not enamored with the jewellery people who arrive with the cruise ships in spring and leave with them in the fall. Apparently some are even owned by the cruiseship industry and all have to kickback a percentage of sales in return for being listed on the cruise ship passenger handouts

The day turned out quite nice, it warmed up in the afternoon so , all in all, it was a pleasant day.

At the harbour where we are moored, we noticed a dumpy looking restaurant and figured it catered to the fishermen with bacon and egg , fish and chips and burgers etc. so we were surprised when one of the locals we chatted with downtown recommended it as being the best place to eat in Ketchikan. Since it was handy and on our way back we decided to try it and were surprised, first of all that it was reservation only (they did squeeze us in between groups) and secondly by the quality of the service and the food.

Bar Harbor Restaurant didn't look too inviting at first glance

We both had the roast beef special, Vivian had an end cut well done but it still had some pink in it. She wasn’t going to complain since they had been so nice in finding us a table when they were so busy so when the waitress(also likely the owner) asked she said it was OK, she hesitated a fraction when she said it so the waitress wasn’t convinced and insisted in taking the beef away and cooking a new one this time perfectly. On top of that she insisted on reducing her bill by 50%.

Top notch meal and service from Bar Harbor Restaurant in Ketchikan.