What would you think if you get off a bus after a winding, twisting, and scenic drive through Ketchikan, Alaska where you hike a 1/4 mile on a trail over a foot bridge to old, rusting and decaying buildings and docks sitting out over the water? It WAS REALLY COOL!!!
This is a historic cannery with displays set up to give you an idea of what life was like in a cannery up to 1959. Unlike today, where you can get nearly fresh salmon and halibut, it used to come in a can and a lot of those cans came from this site!
It is hard to imagine the smells and dangerous conditions. The underpaid and overworked staff working insane long hours in living conditions that likely didn't promote job satisfaction. This tour does that. It gives information and ability to peer into the windows as you walk along with the guide as they cover life in the cannery, the thefts by employees, and robberies from competition, plus you get to see the machinery used after the fish traps caught way more fish than was ecologically safe to do so. There is some maintenance done to keep the site safe from age, but not so much where it loses the value of seeing it close to how it was.
The displays are old, but fitting. The rust on the machinery adds to it. The stack of old rusting cans full of fish add to it. Only thing missing is the smell!
There are king crab traps, other crab traps, nets, long line fishing displays and diver displays. There are even stats of the type of salmon caught from over 60 years ago to give a good idea of how much was harvested back when there were way more fish than today.
While they provide a small meal, I really think it would have been better to have had more salmon to eat.
I do suggest this tour if you haven't been! read more