Southeast Alaska is known as the Panhandle: It's a long, narrow strip of mainland coastline, plus 1,000 islands and the braided waterways that surround them. In most places, there are no roads connecting the communities there, so Alaskans depend heavily on ferries: the Alaska Marine Highway System. The ferries connect 35 communities in all, and not just in the southeast: The routes stretch for 3,500 miles, from Bellingham, Wash., in the south, all the way to Dutch Harbor, Alaska in the west, far out on the Aleutian Island chain. In Southeast Alaska, the ferry route runs through the Inside Passage, a spectacular landscape of forest, mountains and fjords. And that's what we'll get to see as we hop on the MV LeConte in Haines, heading for the state capital, Juneau. It will be a 4½ hour trip down the Lynn Canal, traveling at "schoolbus speed," as our Captain Brian Flory puts it: 15 knots, or about 18 miles per hour. We get a prime vantage point up on the bridge with Captain Flory and his
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