The trip to town

(SitNews) Klawock, Alaska - In keeping with my tradition of being under-prepared, I arrived at the trailhead in jeans and only then considered the inevitabilities involving heat and sweat once I started hiking in the beautiful, warm afternoon air. I had reservations at a hotel, but was too focused on the hike to think rationally. At first the cool of the shaded woods kept me comfortable as the trail switched back and forth. I started to warm up when traffic on the trail heated up.If Ketchikan has, or is big enough to have an iconic element, it’s arguably Deer Mountain. It’s on the nameplate of the newspaper. It photobombs hundreds of thousands of tourist pictures every summer. It’s inviting, yet with snow at the top it reminds everyone this is Alaska, not some docile, unpopulated part of down south.I don’t know how many times I’ve looked at Deer Mountain or asked about the trail over the years but just about every Ketchikan resident told me where it starts, the terrain and about the views. From what I gathered, people from Ketchikan who hike, hike Deer Mountain.

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