Anchorage and then on to Seward

 On July 3 we left Palmer and headed 45 minutes down the highway to Anchorage for a few days. This was pretty much a stop to see a few sights in the city, restock the pantry and fridge before we go down to the Kenai Peninsula, and pick up my brother at the airport who was coming to spend the next two weeks with us for the prime fishing season. The day after arriving, we went downtown to see the 4th of July parade. It wasn't as long as I thought it would be, but it was quite interesting to see the various groups, especially the different Alaska Native Peoples, that came out to march in the parade. 

We also visited the Anchorage Museum at Rasmusen Center one day. It's quite a large museum and we spent just about 3 hours there. It is a large art, history, ethnography, ecology, and science museum dedicated to studying and exploring the land, peoples, art, and history of Alaska. 

One floor had climate-controlled display cases of important items related to many of the different Alaskan Native People tribes. It was fascinating.

A piece of art I loved.

We also visited the National Park Service Alaska Regional Headquarters building where they had a movie about Alaska and several nature exhibits. 

We have found throughout our summer that all of the national park service visitor centers as well as the US Fish and Wildlife visitor centers have had excellent exhibits, very well done.

A map showing the different national park regions in Alaska. If you click on the picture, it will enlarge so maybe you can see it better. The amount of land set aside for national park preservation is actually astounding. Kudos to the politicians that made it so!

We did a couple short walks in the area as well. One night after dinner we went to Earthquake Park which is right on the shoreline. A long walking/biking trail called the Tony Knowles Trail runs all along the coastline of Anchorage, so we jumped on it here at Earthquake Park. No pictures of this trail, but another one we did is called Potter's Marsh at the south end of town. It's supposed to be great for wildlife viewing, but as per the norm with us, we saw ducks and seagulls. It's very pretty, though, and we enjoyed the views. We even saw the Alaska Railroad go by.

The rest of our time was spent doing those mundane everyday chores such as shopping and laundry before picking up my brother Bill at the airport. After a very long travel day from New York, he was ready for something to eat, which we accomplished at The Moose's Tooth brewery and pizzeria. It was very good, and, according to Wikipedia, is the 3rd highest-rated pizzeria in the United States after Juliana's Pizza in New York City and Pizza Time in St. Augustine, Florida, as of 2015 anyway!

On July 9, we left Anchorage to head down to the Kenai Peninsula with the town of Seward as our first stop, staying for a week. On the agenda for this week is two fishing charters, a wildlife/glacier viewing trip of Kenai Fjords National Park with Major Marine Tours, doing a hike to a walk-to glacier, Exit Glacier, and puttering around the seaside town. This will be the subject of the next entry and will be a bit more picture intensive. Just to forewarn you, though, there will be little to no sun in most of the pictures for the next month....seriously!

 

Palmer/Wasilla area, Alaska

 We had left Valdez on Tuesday, 7/28, and arrived in Palmer, Alaska, on Wednesday, 7/1.  Palmer is about an hour's drive to Anchorage, and we could definitely tell we were back in civilization. We had some chores scheduled for our stay in Palmer, such as Cody needed a vet appointment to update his annual shots, very important for allowing him to cross the border into and out of Canada to come home. Also, he desperately needed a good bath and grooming as he was starting to look a lot like Sasquatch and, I dare say, smell a little like him also, LOL. 

Looking very handsome after his grooming. Too bad it doesn't last 😂

We found large supermarkets here as well as pretty much any kind of chain-store shopping and fast food restaurants you could want in nearby Wasilla. I was particularly happy to find Fred Meyer's, an affiliate of Kroger, where we could use fuel points for a gas discount. But the biggest score for us was finding Boarshead deli meats and cheeses. Life is good again, LOL. For activities we visited the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race Headquarters- no dogs, though, we'll see them in Denali - there was the first "Friday Fling" market and food truck gathering in Palmer that was fun, and we drove up the beautiful Hatcher Pass and took a tour of the nearby ghost gold mine at Independence Mine State Historical Park. July3 we move on to Anchorage for the next five days, where we will be meeting my brother who is coming to spend a couple of weeks with us as we visit the Kenai Peninsula and the fishing begins in earnest!

The first claim was discovered and staked in 1906 in this area of the Willow Creek Valley. The mine was closed in 1943 by order of the government because it was deemed nonessential to the war effort. The ban was lifted after the war in 1946, but gold could only be sold to the U.S. government at a fixed rate of $35/ounce, making mining unprofitable. In January 1951, after extracting nearly 6 million dollars' worth of gold, the mine was permanently closed. The only items of any value were the generators, and they were basically just pulled out of the buildings. After years of abandonment, vandalism, and two earthquakes, this is what is left of the mine and  the adjunct buildings. In 1974, Independence Mine was entered into the National Register of Historic Places, and title to the acreage was transferred to the State of Alaska in January 16, 1980.

Beautiful Hatcher Pass and our lunch spot for the day. I'm finding it fascinating here in Alaska that no matter where you go, you're completely surrounded by mountains, everywhere you look! We've driven hundreds and hundreds of miles, and never leave the mountains behind, not even at the water's edge.

There were many other activities to do in the Palmer area that we just did not have a chance to do. I ended up feeling that even with as much time as we have planned, there simply isn't enough time to thoroughly explore each different area if you are trying to cover the entire state in one summer. Food for thought.

Valdez: Fishing and Lu-Lu Belle Wildlife/Glacier Tour

Note: I'm getting very far behind and closing in on the tail end of the trip, so I'll do abbreviated entries heavier on pictures!

June 26 was the first day fishing on the ocean for Dan and Al. They were fishing for halibut and rockfish out in Prince William Sound. This was on a smaller boat, and it was a little bumpy, especially on the ride home, but they had an awesome day fishing.

 

We had an amazing trip on the Lu-Lu Belle Scenic Wildlife/Glacier cruise June 27. It was 10 hours long but so worth it! We saw lots of sea otters and Stellar sea lions, humpback whales, horned puffins in their roosting caves, harbor seals on the icebergs, and a huge glacier, the Columbia Glacier. Its leading edge is over 200 feet tall. Captain Fred is an experienced skipper, having been doing this for 40-plus years. He slowly maneuvered through the ice field to get within a mile and a half of the edge. It was pretty cold up there too! We had a great time.

The Lu-Lu Belle

View of our rig in the campground as we sailed out of Valdez Harbor

Sea otters

Waterfalls everywhere along the coastline

Leaving the harbor in search of wildlife

Humpback whale going down for a dive

Sea lion colony

Puffin

Puffins roosted in caves along the coast

The first big iceberg we saw on the way to Columbia Glacier

Eagle perched atop a huge iceberg.

More sea otters floating on icebergs

Getting closer to the glacier

Harbor seals relaxing on icebergs

The ice is starting to get thick and the boat is very carefully making it's way through the ice.

Harbor seals

The face of Columbia Glacier with part of it calving. The chunk creates a huge splash and waves causing the icebergs to bob up and down.

Harbor seals hanging out on the buoy on the way in.