Ketchikan: The town and around
The bulk of Ketchikan's historic buildings lie on Creek Street , a rickety-looking boardwalk along Ketchikan Creek. This was a red-light district until 1954; now all the former houses of ill-repute are given over to gift shops and arty cafés. Dolly's House , 24 Creek St, once the home and workplace of Dolly Arthur, the town's most famous madam, is now a small museum stuffed with saucy memorabilia (hours vary; $4).Most of the totem poles you see around town are authentic replicas, but the Totem Heritage Center , 601 Deermount St (daily 8am-5pm; $4), exhibits the largest collection of original totem poles in the US: 33 mostly nineteenth-century examples recovered from abandoned Native villages. The Tlingit-run Saxman Totem Park , three miles south of town, displays the world's largest standing collection of poles and an authentic tribal house. Admission, including a chance to see sculptors at work, is free, but two-hour guided tours (several daily; $30) will help to decipher the images. Fourteen of the best replica totem poles and a rebuilt tribal house stand in Totem Bight State Park , breathtakingly set on a forested strip of coast overlooking the Narrows, ten miles north of town on the Tongass Highway. On the way back, take some time out to do the easy but enjoyable boardwalk trail up to Perseverance Lake , starting at Ward Cove, four miles north of town.
Twenty-two miles east of Ketchikan on the mainland, the awe-inspiring MISTY FIORDS NATIONAL MONUMENT consists of 2.3 million acres of deep fjords flanked by sheer 3000ft glacially scoured walls topped by dense rainforest. As befits its name, the monument is at its most atmospheric when swathed in low-lying mists. No roads lead here, but the kayak and floatplane operators listed in "Arrival and information" do. Four-hour cruisein/fly-out tours are run by Alaska Cruises (tel 907/225-6044 or 1-800/225-1905, ; $198). Fourteen rustic cabins (mostly $35) are rented out by the Forest Service (tel 1-877/444-6777).
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