An area of the Haines State Forest in Taiya Inlet could be open to amateur rock climbers and hikers if a newly-pitched tour gets permitted and developed.

A Haines-based company, Halutu Sky Walk LLC, has applied for a land use permit with the state’s Department of Natural Resources proposing a via ferrata route and use of state-owned tidelands for a buoy or floating dock, a temporary seasonal weather shelter and a small gear shed. 

Taiya Inlet from Mount Riley, south of Haines, Alaska
Taiya…

Rashah McChesney is a multimedia journalist and editor who has reported and edited newsrooms from the Deep South to the Midwest to Alaska. For the past decade, she has worked in collaborative news as the...