Berners Bay cabin gets new look, thanks in part to beer sales

The sounds of shovels and pickaxes echoed across the beach as members of Trail Mix, Inc., a local trail maintenance nonprofit organization, and the marketing team from Alaskan Brewing Company worked to rebuild the trail leading from the water to the Berners Bay public use cabin.

This work is part of a larger rehabilitation project for the U.S. Forest Service cabin, organized and funded through the National Forest Foundation, Alaskan Brewing Company and Trail Mix.

“We’re dealing with all the problem areas,” said Aaron Gerow, a member of Trail Mix. “It was in rough shape, and we just wanted to rehab the whole thing.”

[Video: Berners Bay cleanup]

The cabin, located 37 miles and a bumpy three-hour boat ride northwest of Juneau, had sustained extensive weather damage, according to Gerow. He and two other workers had been at the cabin since Monday, working 10-12 hours a day on the outside of the structure as well as the access trail.

“We’ve burned through like 50 palm sander pads,” Matt Puma, another Trail Mix volunteer, said.

For Puma, this project is a way to give back.

“I love hiking. I love the trails. Juneau is beautiful,” Puma said.

This is his third summer working with the organization.

The Alaskan Brewing Company has coordinated with Trail Mix before, as the recipient of the brewing company’s “tip-jar charity fund” several years back.

“We pick a different nonprofit to support every year,” Andy Kline, communications manager for Alaskan Brewing Company, said. “We do that largely through the tip jar that’s in our tasting room. The money that goes in there ends up going to a worthy nonprofit here in Juneau.”

The Berners Bay cabin rehabilitation project, however, was funded through the company’s Coastal Code program. Through this program, 1 percent of all sales of Icy Bay IPA is donated to coastal cleanup projects. This typically adds up to between $20-40,000 a year.

“That’s kind of developed into supporting healthy coasts and supporting people enjoying coastline. I’ve been out to this cabin a couple times and it’s just incredible, so we just thought that’s a natural choice,” Kline said.

These projects are generally located on the west coast, concentrated on Alaska and Washington but have included Oregon, California and even Texas coastline previously, according to Will Race, marketing manager for Alaska Brewing.

“In 2007, the brewery was really growing and expanding and wanted to give back to communities in Alaska,” Race said. “It was pretty heavily debated on what we would do. But since Alaska has the largest coastline in the United States, we figured that coastal cleanups was something that everyone could agree on.”

The grants provided through the Coastal Code project range between $500 for basic supplies like trash bags for cleanup days, to $10,000 for materials and travel expenses for more remote beaches, Race said.

“We’re supportive of ocean policy,” Race said. “But our mission as brewers is more manual work, so that’s what we’ve been behind.”

Alaskan Brewing donated $4,000 to the project, which was then matched by the National Forest Foundation. The total $8,000 was donated to Trail Mix for materials and expenses related to the project, said to Patrick Shannon, director of the National Forest Foundation’s Pacific Northwest Field program.

Shannon, who lives in Portland, Oregon, traveled to Alaska to oversee the project.

Having worked with Trail Mix before, the organization was an easy pick of partners, Kline said.

“They were really great to work with then, so they’ve been kind of in our mind as something we’d like to continue supporting,” Kline said. “So the Forest Service and the National Forest Foundation, through their affiliation with Trail Mix, started contacting us about involvement.”

This project will extend throughout the summer, Kline predicted. While Trail Mix restructured the walkway, sanded and re-stained the outer walls and added an additional coat of protective lacquer, by the end of the project, the cabin will be sporting a new deck, new stairs and new windows as well.

 

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• Erin Granger is an intern for the Juneau Empire. Contact her at eringranger93@gmail.com.

 

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