Wednesday, July 30 - Exploring Homer

  Bob says I was too grumpy about Alaskan towns yesterday - I think it was the result of the long drive; anyway, we are both enchanted with Homer!

We awoke to another clear day, although the forecast keeps predicting rain.  The young woman who is working here for the summer cooked us a terrific mushroom and tomato quiche with seedy bread and excellent jam.  We haven’t seen any bear or moose yet, but we were told that in June, the month also best for birds and flowers, the female moose and their young come into town and hang around as it’s a safe place for them.  A moose and her baby stayed on the lawn right in front of our room this year!  Obviously a great place!

View from the Bluff

Homer is divided into the Spit, the Town and the Bluff.  We drove up onto the Bluff which overlooks the Spit and Kachemak Bay and got some spectacular views of the bay and the heavily glaciated mountains beyond.  We continued on to the Carl E. Wynn Nature Center which has about 5 miles of trails through bog and woods.  We were looking for the Boreal Chickadee which differs from the Black Capped, which also occurs here, in that it has a light brown head, and would be a life bird for us.  We walked some of the trails identifying the many wildflowers in bloom.

Monkshood

Dwarf Dogwood

Coastal Paintbrush

 Although the peak for wildflowers has long past, there were more here than we’ve seen elsewhere.  We had to leave more quickly than we wished as we had arranged to meet Karl Stoltzfus who runs Bay Excursions, a water taxi/nature tour operation at noon.  As we were getting to our car Bob tried once more to call the Boreal Chickadee, and in one came and sat on a branch above us chickadee-ing away!

Karl's water taxi

We drove back onto the Spit to Ramp 3, parked and waked down the very steep ramp to the boat area.  The tides are quite extreme and everything connected to the water is attached to floating rafts guided by very tall pilings.  We found Karl at his bright yellow taxi boat with several people on board whom he was going to drop off at various places along the bay and then bird with us.  He set off at 24 mph and reached Halibut Cove across the bay in 25 minutes.  From Homer you can’t see any houses on the far side of the bay and I was surprised to  find a few small communities, mostly fishing camps, hidden in coves.  These houses were on really high poles as the tides can exceed 20’.  We left off a few people and their gear and continued to a beach where some hikers took off, leaving Bob, me, and a Texas birding couple.

Halibut Cove houses

Karl gunned the boat and we headed towards the end of the bay. We passed many sea otters, one group of 19, many Bald Eagles, including three young on a tiny island surrounded by seals   We finally found some Murrelets, small brownish seabirds that Bob had been looking for on our Seward cruise and finally could study them at close range and separate the rare Kittiltz’s from the common Marbled - another life bird!.  Unfortunately we couldn’t locate any Aleutian Terns, another of Bob’s targets.

Sea Otter

Halibut Cove Light House

It was time for Karl to pick up some more taxi customers and we headed back against the tide and wind and spent 45 minutes with the boat slapping hard against the waves.  Karl picked up two women hikers from a beach where they had hiked over a ridge to a glacial lake.  We returned to the Spit at 4 PM; Bob and I found an espresso shop and refueled with mochas and macaroons.  We returned to our B&B to relax a bit and at 6:30 drove back to the Spit to Captain Pattie’s Fish House for Alaskan King Crab legs.

Great King Crab Legs!

 I figured this was the place to get them as we are heading inland tomorrow.  Bob and I split a 1.5 lb platter of legs with nothing else except mugs of Homer beer.  The legs fortunately came with heavy shears and pliers as the shells are quite thick and prickly.  Just delicious!!  We drove through the tiny “old town” and walked a ways on a lovely boardwalk overlooking marsh and distant mountains before returning to our B&B.

Twilight glow

Tuesday, July 29 - Driving to Homer

Bob & I slept in until seven and then went over to the hotel restaurant once again.  We split an order of scrambled eggs with hamburg and spinach and tri-colored potatoes which was very good and enough for the two of us.

Exit Glacier 

We checked out of our hotel and drove up the road to the National Park entrance for the Exit Glacier.  You are supposed to be able to walk right up to this glacier and touch it.  We passed signs on the road with dates starting in the late-1800s where the lower edge of the glacier was back then.  As we drove closer we saw more current dates showing how the glacier has been retreating.  We started walking on a trail and reached an overlook where you could touch the glacier in 1998, but it has retreated 500’ back and become steeper and more dangerous so falling ice would now clobber you if you stood at the base.  So lovely as it was, we actually had better views yesterday from our boat!

Kenai River

Blue Bells, Campanula rotundifolia

We retraced our drive 29 miles to Moose Pass where we turned west onto the Sterling Highway which crosses the Kenai Peninsula to the Cook Inlet.  We drove along the very long twisted Kenai Lake stopping occasionally to watch for birds and look at the fantastic scenery of mountains and water.  Fishing camps and fishermen were everywhere and every time we looked closely at a stream if was full of fish!

Salmon Berry

The highway left the mountains and entered the rolling west coast which is more populated than the Seward side.  As we got closer to the coast we passed through a few messy towns which were stretched along the highway with no evidence of any zoning or planning, which is the case for most of Alaska we have seen so far.  In Soldotna we turned off to the Kenai Nat‘l Wildlife Refuge which has boardwalks, trails, and a nifty visitor’s center. Everything the national and local government does in regard to parks and preservation is first class, but the rest of human activity is pretty chaotic!

  We did come upon an old Russian Orthodox church overlooking the large Cook Inlet, surrounded by a lovely cemetery full of overgrown wildflowers.  Several huge volcanoes appeared across the water: perfect snowcapped cones!

Homer overlook

As we approached Homer we came to an overlook which totally charmed us.  It had a spectacular view of the huge Kachemak Bay lined on the far side with snowcapped mountains (actually the backside of the mountain range we were seeing from our boat trip from Seward) and below us the town of Homer with its several mile long sand spit stretching out into the water.  The overlook itself with full of flower and vegetable beds and a lovely entryway into town!

We found the Bay Ave B&B which overlooks the Spit and met Lori and her husband who run it.  We settled into our room with an amazing water and mountain view. We heard some squawking and saw several Sand hill Cranes flying by!

As we had skipped lunch and it was already 6:30 we drove out on the spit to find the Fresh Catch which Lori had recommended for dinner. The spit has a harbor and clusters of tiny knick-knack shop, cafes, fishing guide stalls, one of which had a dozen halibut of various sizes hanging up to be cleaned.  We both had fettuccini with scallops and salmon for RR and salmon and the world’s sweetest mussels for me.  It was way too much food but really good and we managed to split a rhubarb crumble for dessert!

Today's catch!

Homert has a Santa Cruz off-beat charm in a stunning location.  Tomorrow we are going to take a three-hour boat tour with a birder for a couple of lifers Bob needs.  It’s 10 PM and the sun is still shining on the marsh and mountains outside!

Monday, July 28 - Cruising Kenai Fjords National Park in the Gulf of Alaska

Our boat

We awoke to partly cloudy skies at 6:30 and arranged our gear for a long day on the ocean.  After cappucinos at the local Starbucks in the neighborhood Safeway, we parked our car downtown at the Kenai Fjords Tour parking lot where we were picked up by a small bus and transported to the boat harbor.  We joined a group of about 50 and marched down a pier until we reached the Alaskan Explorer, a  comfortable  cruiser.  We found a booth on the lower deck, which was less crowded than the upper deck, and settled our packs and optics.  Captain Mark L. gave us a short safety talk over the sound system which consists of speakers all over the boat so you can hear him wherever you are, which is great as he spent the next nine hours filing us in on all sorts of really interesting information regarding the animals, birds, geology, plant life, etc of the region.  He is a great teacher and also sounds just like George Clooney (be still my beating heart!) so I knew I was in for a great day!!  He also asked that any birders pass a list of desired birds to a crew member to be given to him so he could help any birders with their life lists.  Bob had already prepared a list which he gave to one of the crew.

The day became overcast which turned out to be perfect as the sea was calm and the light good for seeing everything.  The galley crew served us warm cinnamon buns and fruit juice as we passed a basking Sea Otter for our first nature encounter.

Sea Otter basking

We slowed down to look at the Bear Glacier which gradually slopes down to the ocean in a wide valley, our first glacier that emerges from the vast Harding Ice Field, a monstrous expanse of ice thousands of feet thick that stretches inland beyond the coastal mountains

Bear Glacier

 We motored south out of Resurrection Bay where Seward is located into the Gulf of Alaska.  Our captain took our boat close to the shore where a series of sea stacks, covered with trees and colorful flowers, are located.  We saw Steller's Sea Lions resting on rocks.

Steller's Sea Lions

Meanwhile the crew was constructing delicious chicken wraps for us.  I was expecting pre-made, supermarket deli items, but instead they brought us delicious freshly-made wraps full of chunks of poached chicken and crispy veggies - best wrap I’ve ever eaten!

We were entering the Northwestern Fjord at this time (so named because that university did the initial research on this area).  A large fin of a Salmon Shark glided by the boat and then we neared the huge glacier which has been retreating quite swiftly over the past 50 years.  We first passed

Salmon Shark fin

mini-icebergs and then came to the 3000’ high wall of turquoise ice.  The captain turned off the engine and we drifted for half an hour watching this amazing structure creak and groan and explode as chunks of ice broke off and fell into the sea.   Harbor Seals were swimming around the base of the glacier looking for small icebergs to haul out on, but also endangering themselves with the violence of the falling ice!

Northwestern Glacier

Blue glacier ice

Harbor Seals resting

We left the glacier and headed back to the Gulf.  The captain  steered the boat into a bay that is a particularly good place to see the rare Kittlitz’s Murrelet; we dashed up to the bow and tried to distinguish this murrelet from the more common Marbled Murrelet, but the difference is pretty subtle and we couldn’t see it as the birds quickly flew.

Horned Puffins

On the way back to Seward we cruised by the Chiswell Islands with seabird rookeries on them.  One had a lovely collection of Horned Puffins and another a group of Thick-billed Murres (both life birds!).  A rookery of gulls suddenly exploded with the birds shriking.  I thought a Peregrine Falcon had attacked them but it was a mature Bald Eagle.

Female and baby Steller's Sea Lion

Humpback whale

They are stictlyly fish eaters, but this one calmly sat in front of us tearing the gull apart! We also saw a large group of Steller's Sea Lions, this time huge males, smaller females and a nursery of young black first years.  The crew passed out freshly-baked chocolate-chip cookies to revive us as we started to doze!

It finally started to rain as we approached Seward at 6 PM.  We left our amazing crew and captain and drove back to our hotel.  We cleaned up and headed back to the  Resurrection Roadhouse for a delicious dinner of salmon, steak, berry cobbler and a bottle of Argyle pinot noir.

Sunday, July 27 - Driving to Seward

We got up at 9:30 to brilliant sunshine.  I took a leisurely shower (more than 90 seconds) - something I never do in drought-stricken Santa Barbara!   We got a substantial breakfast in the BW restaurant of grilled cheese, scrambled egg and bacon sandwiches and set off at 11:30.

Bob setting up his GPS

We drove down Highway 1 (the Seward Highway)  and a few miles out of town pulled into the Potter Marsh reserve, a vast fresh water marshland formed when the Alaska Railroad built an embankment to separate the area from the sea.  We walked a mile along beautiful wide boardwalks watching Bald Eagles, Canada Geese, and various gulls.  Bob saw a Common Redpoll, a new life bird which I missed. The streams running through the marsh were shallow but we could see schools of about 20-50 large salmon churning up the waters!  Just amazing!  I can see why the animals and people around here live off of fish!

Potter Marsh

We continued down the coast of a long bay called Turnagain Arm of the Cook Inlet and pulled off on an overlook where Buluga Whales are supposed to be seen.  It was very low tide and we tried to make the far off white caps in the deep channel into whales, but I don’t think we saw any. This area has a tide of 33’ and a possible tidal bore  which can build up to a 6’ wave speeding up the inlet.  We didn’t see it happen but I can see why there were no boats there and many warning against getting stuck in the muddy quicksand on the sandbars!  The clouds were building up and the rest of the day consisted of intermittent showers.

We turned off onto the Kenai Peninsula and drove past forested mountains and miles-long lakes until we reached the harbor town of Seward.  After  checking into the Seward Windsong Lodge at 3;30, we drove downtown where we could see a huge Holland America cruise ship in port along with many fishing boats.  At a fish-cleaning area we saw a gull eating a salmon fillet that Gelson’s would have been proud to sell!

Seward Harbor with cruise ship

A great Chain Saw Bear!

We found the office of the Kenai Fjords Tours where we are to take a cruise tomorrow, stopped at the Kenai Fjords National Park visitor center and walked around the town admiring the many murals on the walls of stores.  We bought some snacks, rum, & coke and returned to our room to relax before dinner at the restaurant next door where we consumed huge hamburgers and salads before returning to our room for bed.

A Seward mural

Saturday, July 26 - Flying North

I took Miss Maddie down to the Cat House Hotel this morning and settled her into her regular Junior Suite.  The hotel was full, jammed with feisty cats climbing all over the rafters, but fortunately Mad is a very bold cat and she will soon whip the others into doing her bidding and leaving her favorite sleeping holes available.

We left the house at 1:40 for our 7 PM flight which was none too much time.  We took Hwy 1 down the coast past Malibu and all the beaches were crammed with holidayers and festooned with hundreds of colorful umbrellas and also lots of traffic.  We made the Alamo lot to drop off our rental car at 4:20 and took the bus over to the LAX terminal.  We’re flying on Alaska Airlines, first class,  using American miles as we don’t want to hang onto our miles for too long.  Bob was very pleased that that allowed us to saunter through Security without taking off our shoes or belts!  We made our way up to the Board Room, as Alaska calls their premiere lounge,, settled into comfortable chairs, and nibbled on cheese and drank free beers for an hour.

We went down to our gate and got on board in seats 2D & F, wide with lovely leg room.  Our tickets said we were to get a snack which turned out to be really delicious polenta cake with Bolognese sauce and a spinach salad and a glass of decent red wine.  Alaska rules!

Polenta & salad

We flew up the central valley of CA, over Lake Tahoe.  After just two hours we were seeing beautiful snow-capped volcanoes of Mount Hood and Mt. Ranier emerging from the haze, and then we were landing in Seattle.  We found another Board Room in which to relax with cookies and cocoa, before boarding  another 737 and taking off for Anchorage.  We passed over the extensive Seattle area in the dark and then when we were over Canada I saw a thin rim of twilight appear on the northern horizon!   It grew to about 180 degrees of the horizon and dimly illuminated the landscape.  We arrived in Anchorage at 1:30 AM and flew over the small city beautifully situated in the midst of mountains, water and forest.

Mt. Ranier

Although it was the middle of the night the airport was full of life with open shops and McDonald’s.  We rented a Toyota Corolla from Avis and drove a short way to a Best Western where we collapsed and into bed at 3 AM Alaska DaylightTime (one hour behind Pacific).

North to Alaska!

We didn't make any plans for this summer as I had my right knee replaced in late April and we didn't know how soon I would recover.  Well, I was very lucky and am walking and hiking better than ever, so Bob thought it was time to get back on the road.  He's always wanted to go to Alaska, so we're setting off on an impromptu exploratory trip in the height of the tourist/mosquito season to see how we like it.

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