KENAI AND SKILAK AREAS

We declined to make our way over to Hope, and instead went to Kenai city north west of Soldotna. (While in Soldotna we got groceries at Fred Meyers, spent the night, and used the convenient dump and fill station right in their parking lot.) While dumping the guy behind us had been talking to Gary about fishing. He asked if we fished and when we replied no, he brought us a lovely package of fresh salmon. Boy were they good. Just outside Soldotna is a very nice nature center with a short hiking trail. That's where we disturbed this spruce grouse (say that quickly 3 times). He sounded like a wild turkey flapping in that very still and quiet area.

There don't seem to be too many pictures of Kenai we want to share here, the weather being overcast doesn't lend itself to nice shots. All the same it is a nice area to visit. Our first stop took us out to the edge of town to the Erik Hansen Scout Park, and a shot of some of its flowers. We headed up the coast shooting for the end of the road where there is a state park. We had been told that there were agates and fossils on that stretch of beach. Well, we weren't sure what agates were supposed to look like, but we didn't see anything unordinary. Eloise pretending to be Lucille Ball did pick up several small stones she sort of liked, but not the boulders Lucy got into her Long, Long Trailer film. It could be that our problem was that the tide was in at the time we were there but we don't know. There are 40' tides in the Cook Inlet. We only stayed one night here at the state park. There would be room for large rigs in the camp, and the sites were somewhat level. We shy from state parks as a general rule.

Back out on the road to Anchorage we came on the Skilak Wildlife Rec Area with its many lakes and hiking trails. We were both down with severe head/chest colds and simply wanted to shut down for a while. We found a large parking area at a trail head and just 'existed' for 3 days until we felt some better. I have to admit to getting the cold first, but I shared it with Eloise as soon as I could. Did he ever!

After that 'relaxing' stay, we ventured further down the dirt road to a camp run by the National Park Service called Hidden Lake Campground. Here's where a major adventure happened. Shouting "get outta here", the volunteer camp host began blowing one of those boat horns, emptied a whole can of mace, trying to scare off a black bear sow and her two cubs. The sow had killed the host's small dog as it was tied to the patio. A shiatsu (well, I don't know how to spell that dog breed, but this try is better than my first effort). Our site was not far away, and we heard the host call on the radio for help from the rangers, since the bears wanted to get at their kill. He told us later that the little cubs kept going toward the dog to get their mother's kill. One of the other campers hurried over with his pistol and fired shots to scare them off. When the ranger came he tracked them over to the rear of our site where he shot the sow. Yep, right out Gertie's back window! Then the ranger simply waited for the cubs to come to the mother's side, which they did pretty soon, and they were shot also. We asked why couldn't they farm out the cubs for adoption. We were told that they simply didn't have the facility to hold them until a home could be found. Further, since they had been with the mom's raids on the campground in the past and successfully got people food, then the dog killing, that there was no way the bears could be relocated. Well, here are some sad shots of the mama bear and one of the cubs being hauled off. We had to pull out of our site to allow the ranger to back in for the load. Well, that was pretty exciting! We felt so sorry for the camp host losing their "Winnie" that way. They were from Wisconsin.

As we approached Anchorage again, we took the turn-off to Potters Marsh which is on the Turnagain Arm. A new and impressive boardwalk has been constructed to allow viewing of wildlife throughout the marsh. We saw several dead salmon there, but also a couple still alive...but not for long!
E took a picture of a dragonfly posed on the boardwalk.

We made it back to Elmendorf AFB campground for the next 2 nights while we took care of getting Gertie fixed. A front vibration had been bugging us for a while. We had tried a couple times to balance the front wheels, but that wasn't making any difference to the shimmy. Johnson's Tire Center in town says they found that the lower ball joint on the passenger side was shot. Usually replaced in pairs, but they said the opposite one was really tight and good. They moved the front tires to the rear, and balanced ALL the wheels. Expensive, but hopefully will take care of the problem finally. We haven't been able to test it on the highway yet, since it happens at speeds above 50. Only teenagers and drunks are allowed to drive that fast in town. The second problem was the radiator leaking again. Remember that we had it repaired in Fairbanks some weeks ago. We found a new radiator available nearby in our part of the city, picked it up and installed it at the Fort Richardson family campground.

I'd suggest to any military that they stay in the Fort Richardson fam camp instead of the Elmendorf AFB. The Fort's is newer, 30 amp, all pull-thru's and will accommodate any size rig. Full-hook-up sites are $18 per night, W/E are $16 (same as Elmendorf), but the laundry is FREE. Eloise has done 5 loads...didn't know we had that much stuff on board!

The final picture taken out a side window is of a moose that wandered close enough to Gertie to touch her on our last night at the AFB. Camping is fun!

Today, August 21, we're heading for Valdez, all caught up on our blog for the first time in weeks!!

HOMER

Very happy we included Homer in our route. A really neat place. We got there just before the fishing derby weekend, which was bringing a lot of fishermen into the city. We parked down on the 'spit' as it's called, a 2 mile stretch of narrow beach you can see in one of the pictures. A stop at the visitor center on the road into town gets you a lot of great information from a motivated clerk. The floor had this really neat stained glass mural on it. The picture does not do it justice, it was about 7-8 feet across. There is a lot of parking out on the spit, no problem for big rigs. We stayed out there for 3 nights, parked right next to the marina. We ate halibut fish and chips at the "Fresh Catch" restaurant across the street from where we were parked. They do this kind of Japanese batter thing to the fish that really makes them delicious, not at all greasy. It's light and fluffy?

Here's something you may already know about halibut: A halibut begins life with eyes on opposite sides of its head. As it develops the left eye migrates to the right side. This helps prepare it for a successful life as a bottom fish. Since they lay on their left (white) side on the bottom, it makes little sense to have an eye on that side. With both eyes facing up, on the right (camouflaged) side, the halibut is well adapted to sneaking up on its prey. Halibut are considered to be right sided. We saw a picture of a halibut that was 12 feet long and weighed 1000 lbs! It had been caught in a gill net.

On a walk around the spit area we came across this motorhome. The guy must take off the flower pots before he moves and he must have added a lot of weight. One of the new condos on the beach shows just how low the azimuth is up here. The dish is practically perpendicular! Next is a picture of a chart that shows the different kinds of salmon and Eloise took pictures of some fishermen cleaning their catch. In the one picture you can see the salmon eggs. Did you know that out of 3000 fertilized eggs from one fish, only 400 'fry' (hatchlings) survive, of them only 100 'smolts' (small fish), then only 6 survive to adulthood, but ONLY TWO will survive long enough to return to their native waters and spawn!

As you can see, there are a lot of boats docked in Homer. This is a 1000 slip marina. Note the 4 lane boat launch. Parking on the spit was really neat, the sunset as you can see was pretty spectacular. You might even notice Gertie there in one of the pictures.

We signed up for a cruise out to the rookery and lunch at the nearby islands' Rookery Restaurant. Yep, 2 fer 1 again. Regular price $60 pp. This was a much smaller boat than the one we had at Seward, only 24 passengers capacity, but less than that on our trip. There was an area up front where you could get outside if you wanted when the boat was going slow around the rookery and other spots where we stopped. But inside was good viewing, and we didn't feel the need to go out. The restaurant/resort was very posh. Lunch was included in the ticket, and we could choose from about 3 different en trees. Eloise took the cod fish and chips, I took a hamburger and fries! After the halibut I'd had before, I didn't want no darn cod!

Up on top of the rookery was a beacon of some sort, and notice the eagle perched regally on top. Whenever he flew out from his position, all the birds on the rookery went nuts flying out of the eagles' way. Another picture shows a pair of eagles in the sky. Check out the precarious sea gull nest. Off in the distance you can just barely see the outline of a volcano spewing some steam. You may need to click on the picture to see it well. There are 13 major volcanoes in Alaska but most are on the Aleutian Chain.

After we got back, we drove up onto the hillside above Homer proper. The road winds up at the Wynn Nature Center. You can see a terrific view of the spit from here as well as the glacier that is across the bay.

I think we both enjoyed Homer very much.

SEWARD PART II

What an excellent tour! The ship was an enormous catamaran that made sailing a dream. There were less than 200 on board, but the ship must hold many, many more. The meal wasn't so much to speak about. It wasn't what we thought it would be. It was simply a box lunch that had a small packet of smoked salmon, cream cheese, colby cheese, bagle, apple and a soft drink, with unlimited tea, coffee, bottled water. Some tour companies said a full meal served. It didn't matter much since we were both a little queasy anyway. The tour regular price (Renown Tours) is $139 pp plus tax, but we had that ol' 2 fer 1 again! Most places in Alaska have no sales tax but this was one of the exceptions. They have a city and a borough. If anybody reading this is planning their own trip up here, that $100 coupon book is a real bargain!

The seas were really calm through the bay, just a little rough once out of the bay. The sky was overcast all day, but it was pretty cold. We spent the entire 6 hour trip inside. But that was okay because there were so many large windows. Our booth was forward on deck 2. A pretty good spot of seeing everything that came along. Had to move to get the picture of the humpback whale. Boy, he was something! That's his tail. The captain stopped the ship for the time he was surfaced. When he went under we left...he could have been under a half hour. The sea lion picture isn't sideways, he really climbed that rock up to where another one was. Whole lot of sea 'pups', and a couple old males talking things over. That's Holgate Glacier, one of more than 100,000 glaciers in Alaska. It wasn't "calving" too much that day, but we did get to hear it go once. He stopped the ship about a quarter mile from the glacier, but it seemed much closer! We saw beau coup tufted puffins. I didn't know there were so many! They're funny to watch. The scenery of course was magnificent...just as it has been everywhere in this way north land.

Once back onto land, we headed out of town toward Exit Glacier, not too far away. We found a terrific place for the night, off road, next to Resurrection River where we saw these two eagles sitting like bookends on an arched log. Must have been fish in the stream, but we didn't see any. I think they were already full of salmon, it seemed like they weren't flying very high when they finally left this spot, maybe they were so full they couldn't. Eagles are really remarkable...and huge. I recall one display in a museum somewhere that had a basket of rocks that matched the average eagle's weight. 14 lbs!

Next day we drove into Exit Glacier, so called because people who were trekking across the Harding Ice Field found this to be the best way off the glacier. It is an easy hike up there, and it was sort of busy with fellow tourists. There's a visitor center at the trail head, but there are no films. They had the ever present gift shop, and a ranger there could tell the serious hikers how to get into the back country. It was amazing how far the glacier had retreated in so few years. There were markers along the way to show where the glacier had been at various years. Even from as recent as 1957, it had moved an extraordinary distance. This year's run off has blocked the passage to the foot of the glacier. We were disappointed that we couldn't walk right up to it as people have been able to do in previous years. We had sunshine that day and it was wonderful.

SEWARD

We had some good times in Anchorage but as always, we were ready to leave the big city behind. As we headed in the general direction of Seward, our first destination was the Portage Glacier Visitors Center, but on the way we took this picture. We liked the unusual level of the cloud but have seen similar clouds many times since then. At the Visitors Center we got our first up close look at an iceberg. It really seemed strange to see them floating around this lake. We had parked a couple of miles down the road where it said there was a fish viewing area. The trail followed the creeks about half way. The trail was really a nice one and we needed some exercise but there were no fish. After we left the creek bank the trail became a bicycle/hiking trail and was blacktop from there on. A glacier was visible from the VC but it is not Portage Glacier. At one time you could see Portage Glacier from the visitors center but it has receded around the side of the mountain. The only way to see it now is on a cruise. Since we were planning to take a cruise from Seward we opted not to do this one. It was a big decision, whether or not to go through the tunnel (the longest tunnel in North America) and on to Whittier but after talking with several people, including a park ranger, we decided we really didn’t need to make that trip. From the information we got it sounded like a tourist trap. The tunnel didn’t excite us, we had traveled by auto-train through a much longer one in Italy. Now...Gary is saying maybe we'll do it on our way back to Anchorage!

We spent the night in the Chugach National Forest and you can see our location in the next picture. We tried several side roads until we found this spot. We don’t suffer from a lack of picturesque sites. We definitely did not need Air Conditioning. It sounds like some of you in the lower regions might like having that snow bank outside your window about now. Actually it didn’t get as cold over night as we expected, but the furnace in the morning felt pretty good.

Our next stop was Seward. We went for walks in the forest and along the water, watching the sea otters. They would go down, get a fish, then come back up and lay on their backs until they finished their dinner, then down they would go. We timed them and they were down anywhere from one minute to about 2 ½. We have always enjoyed the ocean but this was the first time we had seen the sea otters in the wild. This beautiful 2-mast sloop went out while we were prowling the beach. This evening we spent parked with this view out the front window(note the big white cruise ship in the distance) and during the evening we looked up and the cruise ship was headed out. It was pretty impressive, all lit up.

The Sea Life Center in Seward was one of our stops. At first we thought we wouldn’t go but when we checked our 2 for 1 Tour Saver book we found a coupon for it and changed our minds. It costs $20 pp. (At our cost of $10 pp it was worth it, but not so sure it is worth twice that.) Anyway, we had a good time. A lot of what we saw wouldn’t be very visible any other way. The Center does a lot of rehabilitation and also research. The sea lion, as you can see, is in for rehab. The girl was feeding him in order to check the spots on his back.

In the upper left corner of the picture with the puffins you can see an egg. In the other picture I waited quite a while so you could see the color inside its mouth. His feet were bright colored also but he was just too fast for me, I never did get one that showed that. On the puffin topic, notice the sign that was posted in places around town. I’m afraid my memory is much lacking so you will just have to enjoy some of the pictures we took with no facts. The big strange looking fish is a Yellow Irish Lord. He wasn’t yellow so I don’t know how it got that name.

We went for a hike this morning but except for a couple of waterfalls it was a little less than memorable! We did find this old car along the route. Gary said that it looked like something he drove in high school. A chick magnet? Poor boy. This afternoon we made a stop at the bakery, Yumm! Then we picked up our tickets for the 6 hour cruise of the Fjords for tomorrow noon. It includes a meal of smoked salmon. We’re looking forward to it! We should see some animal life and some calving glaciers. The ticket clerk said that humpback whales were seen yesterday.

We checked into a military campground for tonight. There's a USAF and an Army recreation area right here in town each with RV sites. We much prefer finding our own free overnight places, but Eloise wanted to do some laundry, and we can now update the blog. Military laundries charge $1 for washer or dryer, about half what it is in commercial places.