Short Jog Along Flume Trail

Taking running advice from non-runners is never a good idea. Yesterday our friend drove us up our street (so far we'd only gone down into town) and showed us the start of Perseverance Trail and the Flume trail across the way as well as the creek trail in the middle that goes to Cope Park.  When I asked about running it as a loop, he seemed to think it was a bit far.   Well, today I decided to explore what all was there.  The first picture is not far from our place, looking down Gold Street along the east side of downtown Juneau. (from 1 to the bottom of the map) (Juneau readers, please indulge my exploring your well known paths.)  But I was headed in the opposite direction, and fortunately, I'm already pretty much at the top of the hill.  From here it loops to the right onto Basin Road.

There were people walking their dogs along here, still some houses, but very quickly I'm into pretty dramatic scenery.  Well, with the very steep mountains all around Juneau, it's all in dramatic scenery. 





At 2 there's a bridge and a branch to the Flume trail.  But I wasn't sure and went over the bridge and up what appeared to be a trail, though it was covered with snow and there weren't really obvious footprints.  I think it was a trail, but it looked like it was going up and I knew that wasn't right so I backtracked to the bridge and took this picture up Gold Creek  (Basin Road here is blocked to cars during the winter) toward Perseverance Trail and Juneau's gold mining origins.  The second picture of the creek looks to the bridge to the Flume Trail.

So I got to the Flume Trail.  It's really pretty short.  So, what's a flume?  Not exactly an everyday word.  According to Wikipedia:

A flume is an open artificial water channel, in the form of a gravity chute, that leads water from a diversion dam or weir completely aside a natural flow. Often, the flume is an elevated box structure (typically wood) that follows the natural contours of the land. These have been extensively used in hydraulic mining and working placer deposits for gold, tin and other heavy minerals. They are also used in the transportation of logs in the logging industry, electric power generation and to power various mill operations by the use of a waterwheel.

And that's exactly what this is.  A wooden box following the contours alongside a creek.  And while this is Gold Creek, I had to use almost the full citation because it was the last purpose that was important here -  electric power generation. 




Here's more from the sign at the end of the flume (3 on the map.)  The sign was pretty hard to read - it wasn't just the photo - so I did find the same description in PDF form.

And from here I had a glimpse through the trees back into the modern world - Juneau and Douglas across the water. 









Now I was out of the woods and back on a street with houses.  And very quickly came to the sign pointing to the stairs to the cemetery. 



We'd passed the cemetery yesterday as we were being driven around, so I figured the cemetery was probably a good way to go. 

 

Steep stairs down.   Then past the cemetery and past this brightly colored house.  I'm starting to realize that although Juneau has longer days in the winter than Anchorage, in Anchorage we probably get more light.  We've been here about five days and I don't think I've seen any blue sky, let alone sunshine.  I remember coming to Juneau once in May and it was sunny for the three days I was there.  But the people in Juneau said it was the tenth, eleventh, and twelfth days of sun for the year.  So, a brightly painted house like this adds a little cheer. 

And then I was in Cope Park.  Just a stairway from home. 

I've played tennis at this park tennis court once.  But that was summer.  Is this why they invented green tennis balls?

And then the stairs back up.

Back on 7th Street and almost home

I hadn't noticed this sign before. I'll have to follow up and see what exactly they study.



All in all, it turned out to be a very short and easy run.  The post took longer to put up.  [If you ever wonder why blogspot bloggers like to post large pictures in the center of the page instead of alternating left and right like this, it's because this is a pain in the neck to do on blogger.  The pictures and text do not show up in the composing window the way they will on the blog.  Even the preview, while closer, isn't accurate.  It's only when I actually post this that I'll know if it worked or not.  If not, I have to go back in and move things around.  Blogger, are you listening?]

For people who haven't been to Juneau (probably most of you), the map just shows downtown which is pretty small (manageable by human power.)  There is more of Juneau further north and south as well as Douglas Island.  It's been Alaska's state capital since 1906.  According to Wikipedia, the 2008 Census population estimate was 30,988 and the

 area of Juneau is larger than that of Rhode Island and Delaware individually and almost as large as the two states combined.