This is my first post. I live in Juneau and glad to have Juneau on the TAR map.
I have tried for the last two days to register so I could post this information but was having difficulty.
This is what I know about the race in Juneau on Tuesday from talking to people who witnesses events:
From the airport, the racers took taxis to the Douglas Island Boat harbor and were loaded into 3 Jet boats.
My co-worker’s wife called at 1:30pm, Alaska time, and informed him the racers just went by their boat and were loading onto jet boats. These boats took them up the Taku River south of town.
I talked to someone who drove one of the jetboats up the Taku River but he could not say where. It said he had to keep quiet about the details and could not discuss it. It would take about an hour to get to the Taku River lodge, a favorite tourist spot. Tourists are flown to the lodge by float plane. I would guess they did some task at the lodge or on one of the Glaciers around the river.
A round trip back to the harbor would have been 2-3 hours max. My Wife and Son were now at the harbor waiting for the racers to return and they never return. They never saw the boats return. One of my friends had arrived at the harbor now and was talking with the crew and they said they were shooting a commercial. At the 3 hour mark since the racers had left, the production crew that was hanging around finally left the harbor. My friend followed them and they went to the airport and the Alaska Seaplanes hanger. They were in three cars and he was the second car in line, they tried to lose him several times by stopping along the road letting him go by. He would go by and then just wait for them to go again. Finally, the lead car turned down a one-way street the wrong way to try to lose him. It did not work and he was able to stay with them until they arrived at the hanger. They crew went inside the hanger and he did not see them. He assumed they boarded float planes to fly to Hoonah. He left. It was around 4pm.
The next I heard of the location of the racers was in Hoonah on the zip line. Hoonah is 40 flight miles from Juneau and the racers would have had to get there by plane or helicopter. They would have not taken the Jet boats to Hoonah. It would be a 4-5 hour boat ride. Almost 70 miles by water. I am thinking they transferred to the float planes at the lodge or a water transfer in Taku inlet. Never heard where they went after the zip line.
At 6pm, I left work and was determine to find the finish line. I had several ideas that would make a great finish line. Mendenhall glacier, Shine of Saint Teresa, Echo Cove (End of the Road), Glacier Gardens, The top of the Tram, Cope Park.
Went to all these locations and nothing. No sign of the racers or crew or anything.
Juneau hosted 5 large cruise ships in port yesterday, so if the racers were downtown, someone would have seen them. Nothing.
The one spot I did not think of until now is The Last Chance Mining Museum at Gold Creek. This is a very historical spot where gold mining took place. It is behind the town of Juneau tuck away in a valley. It has a 1 mile road to get to the creek and then a 200ft foot bridge to go across the creek to the mining ruins against the mountain.
Still no word of the racers or what happened this morning. I will keep posting when I learn of my news! Happy 4th everyone!
I hope that wasn't too long of a post?