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Rainy-Day Ketchikan: What to Do Indoors

Museums, totem poles under a roof, chowder, galleries and tours that run whatever the weather, in a town that gets about 150 inches of rain a year.

Home / Guides / Rainy-Day Ketchikan: What to Do Indoors

By Greg Peters, editor · Updated October 2026

Rain is part of the deal in Ketchikan. The airport averages 149.54 inches a year (1991–2020 normals), and October is the wettest month at more than 18 inches. June and July are the driest months, at about 7 inches each, but a dry port day is never guaranteed. Pack a rain jacket, then use this list.

Museums and exhibits

  • Southeast Alaska Discovery Center: a Forest Service center a block from the docks, with more than 20,000 square feet of exhibits on the rainforest and Native cultures and three entrance poles representing Haida, Tlingit and Tsimshian traditions. Pages from 2025 list summer hours of 9 am to 5 pm daily and a $5 fee, free for ages 15 and under. Confirm before you go.
  • Totem Heritage Center: original 19th-century poles, indoors and out of the weather. Summer hours are 8 am to 5 pm daily. See our totem parks guide.
  • Tongass Historical Museum: the city museum on Dock Street, with changing exhibits on local history and Native culture. Summer hours are 8 am to 5 pm daily, and one pass covers both city museums. We couldn't confirm the 2026 price.
  • Dolly’s House: the small Creek Street house where Dolly Arthur lived from 1919 to 1973, kept with most of her own furnishings. It opens in summer; alaska.org lists $10, year not stated.

Warm up over lunch

  • Annabelle’s: a wood-paneled room under the Gilmore Hotel, known for its chowders.
  • New York Cafe: a long-running café in a 1924 building looking over the boats in Thomas Basin.
  • The Alaska Fish House: counter-order seafood on pilings over Thomas Basin.

Browse

  • Star Gallery on Creek Street, for Evon Zerbetz's work and Ray Troll's fish art.
  • Crazy Wolf Studio, the Mission Street studio-shop of Tsimshian artist Ken Decker, with work by many other Native artists.
  • Parnassus Books by the Stedman Street bridge, full of Alaska titles and local authors.
  • Salmon Etc. for smoked and canned wild salmon, with samples and shipping home.

Tours that run in the rain

  • Ketchikan Duck Tour: an amphibious bus loops through town and then drives into the harbor. About 90 minutes.
  • Great Alaskan Lumberjack Show: about an hour of chopping, sawing and log rolling under a covered grandstand near the berths; this ticket adds axe throwing. A second venue opened at Ward Cove in 2026, so check which one your ticket is for.

On the way back to the ship, stop at the Liquid Sunshine Gauge beside the Berth 2 visitor center to see how your day measured up.

Sources

Confirm hours, prices and availability with operators before you go.

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