Anchorage, again

Left Hope on Sunday morning, we are “hope less” now, at least that’s what people say when you leave this quaint village on the Cook Inlet.  Heading towards Anchorage we arrived at Bird Creek Campground.  This small park was completely re-built 2 years ago, it’s the closest Alaska State Park to Anchorage, located on Turnagain Arm overlooking the railroad tracks and the Arm.  After setting up we went into the “big” city looking for a tire dealer.  The trailer had two bad tires we didn’t want to drive on anymore.  Course it was a cloudy, rainy day, perfectly yucky.  On the way back we stopped at Potters Marsh.  This is an area created by the railroad, accidently, when they built up the track bed.  There is now a board walkway part way thru the marsh which is home to spawning salmon, gulls, geese and many other shore birds and Eagles (which I saw) as well as moose and bears (both grizzly and black).  Just as we reached the first view point the rain started again, quite heavy so we beat feet back to the truck and the campsite.  Sorry folks, no photos at all.

Monday morning we were back in Anchorage, this time with the trailer, got two new tires and we were good to go.  We looked over Centennial Campground, an Anchorage city park, but decided against staying there, too many homeless or undesirable looking people for our comfort. Headed to the Passport America park in Wasilla, OK so it’s not the nicest place, but it does have full hookups, laundry and free wifi, and it’s only $13.50 per nite!  What more could a sane person ask for?! By mid afternoon it was raining again, so we hunkered down for the rest of the day.

Tuesday dawned beautiful!  Sunny clear blue skies.  We packed a picnic lunch and set off to explore the old Glenn Highway.  First stop was Old town Palmer where Jon found an old truck to examine while I went into the Quilt Shop, of course I bought more fabric!  What else do you do in a Quilt Shop?!

Heading out of town we passed a park where I spied Whooping Cranes snacking on the vegetation.

Further along the road we crossed the Knick River then the Matanuska.  One of the side roads we traveled on took us by a Reindeer farm, we didn’t stop since two busses pulled in just ahead of us.  We couldn’t see the animals from where we were so we continued on.  Lots of farming along this road and lots of “Keep Out, Private” signs too.  Found a lovely gravel bar next to the bridge over the Matanuska where we stopped for lunch.

Wednesday again dawned beautiful and sunny so we decided to go to Anchorage one more time.  This time we drove by the Eagle River Campground, very nice park!  If we are ever this way again, we will stay here for sure, course it’s dry camping, but they do have a dump station.

This is beautiful Mirror Lake, not far from Eagle River.

We drove all the way thru Anchorage to Woronzof Point Park which is located off the end of the runway at Anchorage International Airport.  First thing we see is the Alaska Range to the south.

 

Then as I’m turning to look North West, this Eagle flies right by.

Isn’t it a beauty!

We got to talking to a lady there and she explained the different mountains we were looking at.  In the photo above, the locals call that one Sleeping Woman.  Below is Mount McKinley on the right at 20,320 foot elevation, to the left is Mt Foraker at a mere 17,400.  They are 135 miles from where we are as the crow flies.  Jon got a good close-up.

After lunch we found the Sea Plane Base located on Hood Lake, these were taken from the back of the Millennium Hotel.

 

This is a lovely spot to watch the planes take off and land.  On the other side of the lake, we spotted this strange truck. Jon says it is used to move small float planes from the water onto land, to change from floats to wheels or anything else that needs to be done including storage.  That was once a 4 wheel drive truck.

And so ends another great day in Alaska.

Sad news

Sitting here North of Anchorage at a nice park with great Internet service.  Time to try to catch up with family and friends.  While doing so I found out that my Aunt Bea (in the blue) passed away a few days ago.

 

She’s the last of her generation in my family that still lived in New York.  Now I only have my dad’s brother in So Calif.  Today is his birthday,  Jon and I called to wish him a very happy day.  Hope he keeps cool there!

Seward

Our site at Porcupine Campground.  From there we drove to Seward, along the way we happened by a fish viewing platform.  The Salmon shown here are very red, not good for eating at this point.

In Seward we visited the Sea Life Aquarium.  We were treated to Tufted Puffins and Horned Puffins along with a smattering of Gulls, Ducks, Guillemots and Murrelets.

Harbor Seals and Sea Lions were showing off as was the giant Octopus

Then it was time to board our boat for a sea life cruise on Resurrection Bay.  We were treated to seeing Mountain Goats, Eagles, Puffins, Gulls, Murrelets, seals and to top it all off, on the way back to port we saw a Humpback Whale.

This was at 11:45pm.

Nite All

More Kenai

Our last day we drove up into the hills beyond the campground just to see what was there.  Cabins, some looked grand and some looked abandoned,  all were way off the road and only seen thru the trees.  We did see this cow in a grassy field.

 

Flowers here seem to grow taller than anywhere else we have been.

 

This is fishing from the beach in the Kenai river, and this is just a small group!  They are after silver salmon, all of them are dip netting which only Alaska residents are allowed to do.  They have a 5 to 6 foot round hoop on the end of a pole with a net in the hoop, they just hold the net in the water and wait for a fish to swim into it.

About a mile or so up the side road from the campground, we found some men “spawning” the salmon.  The fish were hauled out of the water and the eggs removed to be taken to a hatchery in Anchorage.  They would then be released in other streams where the fish are not as plentiful.

This  pretty Yellowlegs was fishing from the rocks above where the salmon were held captive.

Down on Deep Creek,  we saw this boat being towed/pushed out to sea, there is a person on the Pocahontas, guess he is steering. Then we saw two juvenile Eagles, one was very active, flying around and exercising it’s wings while the other sat on a stump by the water, all the time the parents were watching from two different vantage points.  The little guy in the last photo wasn’t even bothered by the Eagles.

 

Tomorrow we head for Seward

Kenai Peninsula

We left Williwaw campground on Saturday morning heading west to Ninilchik. On the way we drove thru Soldotna then turned south along the western side of Cook Inlet.  The day was beautiful, sunny and clear.  Clear enough that we could see both Mt Redoubt and Mt Iliamna, both are volcanoes in the Lake Clark National Park and Preserve on the East side of Cook Inlet.

Just so you get an idea of how big the mountain is.

Ninilchik is an old Russian settlement between the Ninilchik River and Deep Creek.  There is camping on the beaches on both rivers and lots of fishing.  Tractors put boats into and take them out of the ocean all along here.  The old Russian Orthodox Church is on a bluff overlooking the sea.  It’s fascinating watching the tractors work.

The boats come in fast, pull onto the trailer and the tractor pulls them out.  You can see in the second photo just how far into the ocean the trailer is.

The next day we drove down to Homer.  Camping is where ever there is an open spot and very close together, most of it is dry camping.  We saw boats everywhere, fisherpersons lining the banks and crowds.  Not our idea of a good place to be.  After lunch we headed to the Islands and Oceans Visitor center.  This was the highlight of our trip!  We saw 2 families of Whooping Cranes in the wetland field.  Need a better camera!

More later