Ultimate Alaskan Shopping Experience

Ketchikan Creek
Originally uploaded by aaronjmaier.

These tastefully restored houses used to hold prostitutes who serviced the voracious sexual appetites of lonely fishermen, miners and loggers on the Alaskan frontier. Recently a new brand of whore house has emerged where the pimps now sell jewelry and t-shirts to tourists seeking the Ultimate Alaskan Shopping Experience. The pigs have invaded this town and are turning the once rough and rugged logging and fishing community into Disneyland North. The whole downtown area has been transformed into a tourist holding pen where the lemmings pour off of the cruise ships and have three hours to buy as many forign-made souveniers as possible. And, yes, see a logging rodeo where all of the unemployed workers from the timber industry are now forced like caged circus bears to do tricks for their meals. Tour boats flood Ketchikan every day with thousands of shoppers eager to purchase a trinket reminding them of their visit to a quaint fishing town, yet equally eager to complain about the smell of salmon gurry in the water as they exit the boat. I wish they would bring back the old whores.