Kenai to Palmer, AK

This is the Church of 1,000 Logs in Palmer, built by the "Matanuska Colonists" who settled in Palmer in 1935. A government program created over 100 colonies late in the depression era, most of them in the US South. This settlement in Palmer was the only one in Alaska and the colonists all came from Northern MN, MI and WI (mostly Scandanavian, the government thought that they were best suited for the Alaska climate). Each was given 40 acres of land, a house and some out-buildings. They were to farm the land to see if would support agriculture and eventually pay back the government $3,000.

7/12/10 Monday. Travel day two of two from Kenai to Palmer was again a beautiful day. All of the highways we traveled today had been previously traveled (Kenai Spur, Seward and Glenn), so we made no stops on the way except along side of the Turnagain Bay, just South of Anchorage, were we stopped for lunch. Dinner was stone soup served by the hosts (every person provided a can of their favorite beans to the host who prepared the soup), followed by peach cobbler cooked in dutch ovens. After dinner, the owner of the campground gave a one-hour presentation of the "Matanuska Colonists" who settled Palmer in 1935. Palmer sits in a valley surrounded by two mountain ranges, averaging only 20-30 inches of snow each winter. Summer temperatures average in the 60's and winter in the 20's.

7/13/10 Tuesday: Today we took a bus tour, driving through some of the farm area where the Matanuska Colonists settled. We saw several of the original homes that the government built for the settlers and the type and extent of the agriculture in the area. We then went to the Visitors Center which included a beautiful flower garden with many different kinds of flowers. The reason crops and flowers do so well here is the length of the summer daylight hours (18 hours/day in the summer). We then went to the Colony House Museum, one of the actual original dwellings in the settlement. Following, we were then given a wonderful lunch at the Inn Cafe. Next, we walked over to the United Protestant Church, built in 1937 by the settlers (pictured above...the Church of 1,000 Logs, more pictures to follow in the email). Finally we went to The Musk Ox Farm which will be covered in another blog. Dinner was on our own and the evening ended with a campfire and smores.

Homer to Kenai, AK

Dipnetting, fishing like you've never seen it before. This scene is just below our campground where hundreds of Alaskans are dipnetting in the Kenai River where it flows into Cook Inlet. It is a popular way for Alaskans to fill their freezers with fresh salmon for the winter. To dipnet, anglers stand waist deep in the water holding large nets with long handles. Each Alaskan family is allowed to catch 25 salmon. Some additional pictures will be with the email.

Today was travel day one of two to Palmer, AK. In that is was a short travel day, only covering 92 miles, a pancake breakfast was held before we left Homer. The day was sunny and beautiful. Once in Kenai, we went to the Visitors Center, the City Dock on the Kenai River and North Beach, which is where the dipnetters were.

Seward to Homer, AK

Welcome to Homer, the Halibut Fishing Capital of the World. You will see in the first attached picture Homer Spit, a several mile long, narrow, piece of land that separates Cook Inlet and Kachemak Bay. This is where our campground is.

7/9/10 Friday: It was a beautiful sunny day for traveling to Homer. On the way, just outside of Soldotna, we stopped at a Large Animal Carving location and took in all the magnificent carvings (pictures attached to this email). We also stopped at a scenic overlook about 10 miles out of Homer, overlooking Homer, and across Cook Inlet at what's called The Ring of Fire, mountains and volcanos that ring the Pacific from Asia down through the West Coast of the US. After a brief travel meeting for our trip to Kenai, the day after tomorrow, then the whole group headed out to Captain Pattie's Fish House for a wonderful dinner.

7/10/10 Saturday: Today was a free day and we spent the morning at the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Visitors Center, another place with many wonderful exhibits dealing with Alaska nature. We then went to the Pratt Museum where we explored the art, science and culture of Kachemak Bay. The afternoon was taken up doing 3-loads of laundry.

Anchorage to Seward, AK

This is the view from our RV, parked in Seward on the edge of Resurrection Bay. As always, there is still plenty of snow in the mountains across from us.

7/7/10, Wednesday: Left Anchorage for Seward in beautiful sunshine, but ran into rain on the way which stayed with us for the rest of the day. We made a stop at the Portage Glacier National Park on the way which had wonderful exhibits and a 20-minute video of glaciers and their effects on nature. There were two cruise ships docked in Seward while we were there, most likely for passengers who wanted to go fishing. There were many charter boats in the harbor.

On Thursday, a free day for us, we went to the Alaska Sealife Center, which is dedicated to the study and preservation of Alaska's marine wildlife and birds. It is the first cold-water research center in the Western Hemisphere. We took a one-hour back-of-the-house tour and then spent two more hours wandering through the many exhibits of Alaska's marine wildlife and birds. We saw harbor seals, Stellar sea lions, sea otters, puffins and other sea birds, as well as many other species of sea life around Alaska.

Valdez, AK to Anchorage, AK

Anchorage in July. I know that many of my family and friends back on the east coast have been suffering through a heat-wave. The weather here has been wonderful up here, upper 60’s during the day and down to 50 at night. Note the snow capped mountains around Anchorage.

Travel Day 1 of 2 from Valdez to Anchorage began backtracking out of Valdez along the Richardson Highway to Glennallen, where we turned off onto the Glen Highway to Mendeltna, AK. On the way we stopped in Copper Center and the Wrangell-St Elias National Park. In Mendeltna, we were served at the Lodge home-made pizza (which was to die for), along with a salad bar for dinner. We then enjoyed a sing-along and some games…I played Mexican Train.

Travel Day 2, Independence Day, took us to Anchorage. Took a brief stop at the Matanuska Glacier and stopped short of Anchorage in Eagle River to fuel up with gas and propane. The caravan host provided grilled chicken and garlic bread for dinner and all brought side-dishes and desserts to share. We retired to the rig after dinner where we watched the fireworks from DC, NY (Macy’s) and Boston.

Our first full day in Anchorage was spent being bussed around, starting out with a tour of downtown Anchorage. We were then dropped off at the Anchorage Museum of History and Art for two hours. The primary exhibit was the Alaska History Gallery covering the history of Alaska’s people from pre-contact times to present, including artifacts from the many distinct Alaska Native cultures (10 indigenous communities that occupied the land for 12,000 years). This displays from each of the 10 communities were divided into three parts; Community & Family, Ceremonial, and Sea, Land & River. Another level housed changing exhibitions, currently showing art, photography, sculptures, quilts, etc. from a recent competition. There was also an Art Gallery and an Imaginarium Discovery Gallery with many hands-on exhibits. After a wonderful lunch at ORSO’s, Caesar Salad and Chicken Parm on a bed of spinach and pasta plus yummy desserts, we were taken to Alaska Wild Berry Products, the centerpiece there being a 22 foot tall waterfall of chocolate. Beside the candy factory and gift shop, they also had live reindeer, tame enough that you could pet them and feel their furry antlers.

Today, our second day in Anchorage, was a free day. We headed downtown where we did some gift shopping. We found a wonderful quilt shop, The Quilt Tree, where I purchased a pattern and fabrics to make an Alaska quilt. In the afternoon we did some grocery shopping at a Fred Meyers store…a Wal-Mart Superstore on steroids. Finding an Applebee’s nearby the campground, our favorite restaurant (none in or near our current hometown), we did dinner there.

Valdez, AK

This is the view from the front window of our rig. The Port of Valdez is the most northern port in Alaska that never freezes over. The end of the 800-mile Alaska Pipeline is across the port from us.

Our first day started out with a Valdez City tour. It included Old Valdez, the original city that was decimated by the 9.2 scale earthquake on Good Friday, 1964. Next stop was the Oil Terminal, the end of the 800 mile Alaska Pipeline, where the oil is transferred to ships for transport to Seattle or Long Beach. We then toured the new Valdez, it stores, shops, museums, etc. After the tour, Marcia and I enjoyed some fabulous hamburgers and home-made curly fries at Old Town Burgers. We then did some grocery shopping and stopped in at the only quilt shop in town. Marcia made some potato salad and I grilled some chicken for dinner.

Our second day in Valdez saw us doing laundry in the morning. In the afternoon we went to the Visitor Center; saw a video on the building of the pipeline and another on the earthquake of ’64. We then headed over to the oil terminal area where we saw eagles, otters and sea lions. The day ended with an Ice Cream Social for the whole group.

The 3rd day was the Glacier and Wild Life Cruise. It was aboard the Stan Stevens, a large 2-level catamaran. We departed at 9:30 a.m. and cruised Prince William Sound going first to the Columbia Glacier. Due to icebergs and a large ice field from the glacier, we were only able to get about 12 miles from the face of the glacier. This glacier is around 100 feet thick and receding at approx. 50 feet per day. Most of the other glaciers, at least a dozen around the Sound, are still advancing. Next we went to the Meares Glacier were we were able to get within a quarter-mile of the face of the glacier. The ice is brown and dirty where it has pushed through the earth and a beautiful blue and white where it is just frozen ice. The snow up in the mountains around the Sound get 100-200 feet of snow each winter. It’s the weight of all this snow creates the glaciers. The edge is quite noisy as the ice is constantly cracking and when a piece lets go, it sounds like a cannon going off. Between the two glaciers, we were served and wonderful lunch, chicken on a bed of rice with a nice thick white gravy, mixed vegetables and some cookies for dessert. On the return trip, we were served clam chowder. Along the way, I saw the following birds; Black-Legged Kittiwakes, Pigeon Gillemots (puffin family), Bald Eagles, Cormorants, Tufted Puffins and Great Blue Herons. I also saw the following mammals; Stellar Sea Lions, Humpback Wales, Black Bears, Deer, Sea Otters, Dall’s Porpoises and Harbor Seals. We returned to Valdez around 7:30 p.m. It was a wonderful day.

Chicken, AK to Valdez, AK

5,095 miles into our journey, we're now in Valdez, AK. Old Valdez was decimated on March 27, 1964 (Good Friday) by a 9.2 earthquake lasting over 4 minutes. The quake triggered an underwater landslide creating tremendous waves that washed away the Valdez waterfront, drowning 30 people on the dock. 3-years later, the town was condemned when it was discovered it was built on unstable ground. The town was relocated to its present site, moving 52 of the original buildings there. In 1973, Congress approved the plans for the Trans-Alaska Oil Pipeline with it's Southern terminus at Valdez. The town's population soared. 25-years after the earthquake, again on Good Friday, the tanker Exxon Valdez struck Bligh reef, approx. 25 miles outside of Valdez causing the largest oil spill in North American history (until the current Gulf Oil disaster, of course).

We left Chicken, AK in the rain, but luckily, the muddy road turned to a paved road about 2 miles out. A short travel day, only covering 78 miles to Tok. It rained all day and all we did in Tok was grocery shopping.

Tok to Valdez was beautiful. The trip was mostly winding around mountains, beautiful and lush green for the first half on the Tok Cutoff Hwy. Then we turned onto the Richardson Hwy., and the mountains stood taller and still had snow on them. Just prior to Palmer Pass, elevation 2,678, 26-miles out of Valdez, we stopped at the Worthington Glacier. After the pass, you head down to Valdez, and I mean down...to sea level. One the way there are many waterfalls from the melting snows, Bridal Veil and Horseshoe being the most spectacular (pictures attached). We're here in Valdez for 3 days, one of which will be a Columbia Glacier Cruise where we will hopefully also see a lot of wildlife along with the glaciers.