Hoonah is a short 20 minute flight from Juneau, but our flight was still delayed an hour while we waited for the clouds to clear enough to "hop over" the channel. It was however, a beautiful flight.
Hoonah from the air.
Hoonah is another team that we played in high school, but this was my first time visiting.
Welcome to Hoonah
The Hoonah Indian Association owns and operates their own clinic, which is pretty nice for a town of their size.
They let us use the dental room. SEARHC, which is the consortium we work for, provides Hoonah with a dentist a couple times a year. Dental care is very important in villages, so they usually have the nicest rooms in the clinic. Of course we did have to be a little creative to make it work for eye exams. Jason and Dr. Garber used this room and the hallway to do exams, and I registered patients and fit glasses in the waiting room.
We flew in bright and early Wednesday morning, and since there were no patients scheduled until 1pm we took some time to play tourist.
Hoonah is home to the worlds longest zip-line, which we just had to ride. It was pouring down rain and so foggy we could hardly see down the mountain which added just a little to the excitement!
Thimbleberries were ripe, so we stopped for a snack every time we passed a bush
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Hoonah packing company.
About 7 years ago the town converted their old cannery into a tourist stop and Hoonah is now on the map as a cruise ship port. They have about 5 ships in a week.
The white building is the grocery store as well as ACE hardware
In the evenings we checked out all the sealife on the beaches and docks...
as well as some of the totems around town.
On the flight home we saw a couple brown bear fishing in a river as we flew over so the pilot turned around and flew a couple close circles so we could get a better look. I tried to get photos but they were too far away.
fields of fireweed
