Haines, Alaska

Haines is a town of about 2,800 located in southeast Alaska on Lynn Canal. Most visitors see Haines via cruise ship or ferry, but Haines may also be reached by road.Haines and Skagway are the two towns that connect the ferry system to the highways at the northend of the Inside Passage. The Haines Highway winds through beautiful Chilkat Pass(evelation 3493 feet) toHaines Junction, Yukon Territory, 146-miles away on the Alcan Highway. Canadian Customs is located about 40 miles up the road from Haines. From Haines Junction, it's about another 200 miles to reach the Alaskan border.

Eagles!

One of the main attractions in Haines is their widely abundant bald eagle population. During the winter months of October through February, Haines has the highest concentration of bald eagles in the world!

When I was there in the summer of 2008, I took a rafting trip down the Chilkat Bald Eagle Preserve. While this wasn’t during the high concentration winter months, we still saw our fair share of eagles. We saw so many, and some of them so closely, that I can’t imagine what it must be like there during the “busy” winter months!

The Preserve was declared a state park in 1982 in hopes of preserving and protecting this critical habitat for the bald eagles. Protection is also provided to help sustain the natural salmon runs of the area. The park allows for traditional salmon fishing, but only if the conditions and uses do not adversely effect the resources. Salmon runs begin in the summer and continue on to late fall or early winter. Shortly after spawning, the salmon die and it is these carcasses which provide the main food source for the bald eagles.

The five miles of open water on the Chilkat River during the freezing months is called an alluvial fan reservoir. Alluvial fans are also called inland delta’s. These fans occur at the foot of mountain ranges and mark the presence of river floods. The Tsirku fan, essentially the area that makes up the Chilkat Bald Eagle Preserve, is a accumulation of gravel, rock, sand and glacial debris at the junction of the Tsirku, Kleheni and Chilkat Rivers. During the warmer times of the year, water from melted snow and glacial ice flows into the Tsirku fan. The fan gains more water than it can purge, creating a very large reservoir of water. At the height of winter, when all of the surrounding waters have frozen, water in this large reservoir remains between 10 and 20 degrees (F) above surrounding water temperatures. This warmer water seeps into the Chilkat Rivers and keeps it from freezing. The natural phenomena of the Tsirku alluvial fan and the abundance of food is what creates such a large population of eagles from October-February.

Fort William H. Seward

Haines is also the site of the first US military base built in Alaska, Fort William H. Seward. Fort Seward wasbuilt in 1904and was the only US Armybase in Alaska before the start of WW2. In 1922 the fort was renamed Chilkoot Barracks. It was used as a supply point for US Army activities in Alaska during WW2. The fort was deactivated in 1946 and sold to a group of private investors. Currently, the fort is a registered National Historic Landmark and its buildings house restaurants, shops, hotels and even some private residences.