Day 46

Revelation!!

The coach is white, with pretty black and grey stripes!!

The yellow peril is yellow!!

We left our campsite in Sterling and proceeded in a westerly direction, to the town of Soldotna.

On the way, we washed the coach, and the car, and dust, grime, rocks and crap from 44 days disappeared down the plughole!

This Alaska dust gets everywhere. We had all the vents in the car closed, and still it got places we didn’t know existed.

Afterwards, we went to Fred Meyers parking lot.

This store is famous for being RV friendly, even having water and a dump. RVers can stay here for up to 5 days, free, and then have to disappear for 24 hours, before they can come back for another four free days. Coupled with the Saturday shoppers, the place was a zoo.

So we did our grocery shopping and vamoosed!

We drove the fantastic distance of 45 miles to our new campground, Scenic View, near the little town of Ninilchik, and we have a magnificent view across the Cooke Inlet, to the mountains on the west side, including the active volcano Mount Redoubt. We are parked at the bottom of the hill, with an uninterrupted view of the ocean, the fishermen’s boats and the bald eagles flying by. There are only 27 sites here, with a big communal log fire in the middle where everyone congregates and chews the fat. Wonderful.

We chatted with the owner, and he showed us the rest of his property, adjacent to and up the hill from the campsite. An even better view, if that’s possible, over the Inlet.

While we were sitting at the campfire, chilling, and chatting, fortified by some more fine ale from Kassik’s Brewery, we watched as some bald eagles pirouetted over us, so calm and serene. Absolute heaven.

Then Bob the owner told us that there is only about a 90 day frost free period up here, and when all the tourists have gone it’s pretty bleak!!

Day 45

It was not raining this morning!

We still didn’t get up and rush out!!

And a very happy birthday to Wilda, mother in law extraordinaire!!!

A very leisurely breakfast at our local internet café, Naptowne, was followed by a drive to Kenai, the largest town on the peninsular, although we didn’t know it at the time.

There is an old town area, sort of preserved from the late 1800’s, including the Holy Assumption of the Virgin Mary Russian Orthodox Church, built in 1895. The priest was there, and he was the star of the day.

We reckon he was actually the original priest from when the church was finished, he was that old, but what a talker!

Non stop for about 20 minutes, and then he asked if we had any questions, after he had told us the history of the church and his own life history, and how priests are ordained, and what happens if they are widowed or get divorced, and on and on, ………until I asked him if there were any women priests. “NO WOMEN”, he almost yelled at us, “God was a man, no women of importance in the bible”, and so on. Marlipops and I looked at each other, at the couple with us in the church, and decided to get out of there pronto, he was building up such a head of steam!!

The town of Kenai spans the Kenai River, and today was the last day of the King Salmon fishing season, so there were hundreds of fisherists, lining both banks of the mouth of the river, with their tents all pitched and their rods and nets and other fish catching necessities, waiting for the tide to roll in, hoping to catch lottsa fish. We were on an overlook park thingy, watching from above, and for the two hours we were there, not a fish was seen.

We met and chatted to a very nice couple, Grayson and Pauline, from Michigan, fellow RV ers, and exchanged tales from RV nightmares.

It was wonderful and relieving to find out that other people have similar plans, problems and solutions to ours, and also very pleasant to exchange tips of the trips with them.

The rest of Kenai is pretty standard USA anywhere, so we wandered out of town to another micro brewery, offering free stuff.

Kassik’s Brew Stop is fantastic.

A small sample of six different ales, a very knowledgeable owner, and an exceptionally clean place, all lent themselves to a pleasant half hour supping.

All six ales were good, the best being Roughneck Stout. Very much like a traditional English mild.

This brewery has only been open for a year, and was started after the owner’s wife bought him a home brew kit a few years ago for Christmas. He quit his well paying job at the local refinery, she quit her job locally and they are going well.

So, we had to help the local economy by purchasing three different ales, for home consumption later. We then wandered north on the coast road, past the big oil refinery, which has been here since they discovered oil in 1957, and which produces about 15,000 barrels per day.

We followed directions from one of our guide books, and went to the beach, which has room for about 3 cars, and is all pebbles, and had a fabulous view of the oil rigs in Cooke Inlet with the mountains and volcanoes as a backdrop.

We then trogged off again to a state park further up the road, which was deserted, and had bear warning signs posted all around. So what did we do?

Went into the woods, singing and talking and yelling “Go Bear”( see previous reports) in loud, deep voices.

And, once again, we got about a hundred yards, looked at each other, and did another runner back to the car!!

The weather up here is interesting. One minute we have the AC on, the next we need the heater on. Weird. The advice is to dress in layers, and I’ve found the best sort of pants to wear are light weight Columbia pants, with the zips around the thigh, so I can convert them into shorts instantly, together with a T shirt and waterproof windbreaker thing with a hood.

Of course, Wimpypops wears 500 layers, with scarves and all sorts of unmentionables!!

Wildlife watch today was pathetic, just a noisy squirrel at the campsite.

Day 44

Another rainy day, but that does not deter your intrepid twosome!!

We drove 80 plus miles down to the end of The Kenai, as far south as you can drive in Alaska on normal roads, without getting on a ferry or a plane. Or swimming.

The town of Homer sits on the end of the peninsular, and then a huge Spit of land sticks out like a giant fishhook into Kachemak Bay, which is the southern end of The Cooke Inlet, where it meets the Gulf of Alaska.

On the way, for miles, the fields and roadsides are awash with purple Lupines and Indian Paint Brush, full of bees and other assorted flying creatures. Very pretty.

The village on the end of the Spit has been originally named Homer Spit.

As you drive over the causeway road thing to the Spit, there is a lake called Beluga Lake, why, is a mystery coz it is landlocked, and a beluga whale would have trouble getting into it unless it was a flying whale, or if there was a whaleway, ( terrible pun) and there were dozens of float planes coming and going. Busy, busy, busy.

There are millions of RVs camped all along both sides of The Spit, whose main touristy attractions are halibut fishing, ocean kayaking and sightseeing tours of the glaciers.

We wandered into the only original building still remaining from when the town was founded in 18 something, now converted to a pub called the Old Salty Dawg.

Very quaint, the walls covered with dollar bills pinned there by customers, who have written their own comments on the money in black marker pen.

Of course, we are upstanding citizens, and would never dream of defacing property of the treasury, with comments such as “Marlipops and The Captain”, and “Come On You Wolves”. Never. Nor would we search for a glass full of thumb tacks to pin the dollar bills to the wall. Not us.

Unfortunately, it is with great sadness that I have to report that the locally brewed ale on offer was pretty horrible, served in plastic bottles which were not allowed to leave the bar, as they were recycled. The beer tasted as though it had been recycled as well, through a few halibut. It was bad.

Also, the ban on smoking in public places has either not reached this far south, or is just ignored, so the atmosphere was, well, smokey!

Anyway, we left the pub and wandered across the street, to Boardwalk Fish and Chips, in Cannery Row.

The halibut was served on a skewer, fried in a very light batter, and was absolute heaven. It was far better than that reported from Haines a few weeks ago.

The chips were pretty good too, and vinegar was on the table without being requested. Very civilized!

We then walked around a bit, checking out the various offers on fishing trips and sea kayaking, and I have to commend one of the young ladies behind the counter at Mako’s Sea Taxi.

As usual, I was the comedian to Marlipop’s straight talking, and when I asked about alligators on the glacier wildlife cruise, this young girl, without a second’s pause, came back at me with “Of course, sir. We have the white alligators, the Northern species. They are white, to hide in the snow, and their claws work real well on the glaciers.” She then proceeded to explain that the kayaks all have some kind of skirt, but I would look good in a pastel shade, not the standard black. She was very good, almost a match for me, and so refreshing compared to the usual “like, like, like” which is how kids today talk, like.

On our way back to Homer from the Spit, Marlipop’s research had uncovered the fact that Homer Brewery was open to tours, so we thought we would give them a chance to redeem themselves, and paid them a visit.

The brewery, shop, sampling area and register are all in one room. The tour consisted of “Which 3 of our 10 ales would you care to sample?”

So, forewarned being forearmed, or something like that, I tried 3 that were not on sale in the pub earlier.

The brewery redeemed itself.

The samples were very generous, and after the 3, I was feeling no pain!

It would have been rude not to buy some beer, and so I purchased half a gallon of fine ale, for $ 10.00, plus a fee for the designer flagon. Considering the price of beer here in Alaska, and the fact that these people only have a short season in which to fleece the tourists, it was not a bad deal. Only problem is I had a headache when I woke up, hence the reason this travelog is being written a day later than normal.

Homer is an artsy type of town, and some sights were pretty neat, particularly the blue RV, see pix.

Also, the tracked ATV pic is for Geoff, who probably needs one in Florida!

We were very tired, so on the way back, pulled off the road to have a snooze. We were woken by a woman knocking on the window, who had seen our license plate from Florida, and wanted to chit chat coz she was from Florida. Who cares???? Go away, we are tired!!! But we are very polite, so we weren’t rude, but we wanted to be!!

Wildlife watch today was lots of bald eagles, again, and tons of dead halibut.

Day 43

Today was fun.

We started at the internet café, where they have a wonderful sign which reads:

“Unattended children will be given an espresso and a free puppy.”

Off we went, through the drizzle to the delightful town of Seward, on the east side of the Kenai Peninsula, or as the locals call it, The Kenai. See how good we are at picking up languages?

On the way, we spotted one of the classic Alaska wildlife pix, the moose in the pool. And this time we were able to spend a lot of time just sitting and watching her munching away, not a care in the world.

We had a look at some of the campsites we may stay at next week, all dotted along the side of Lake Kenai, or as the locals call it, Lake Kenai.

Seward is a much better town than Valdez, has a much more dramatic fjord guarding it, and a glacier perched almost right on top of it.

The rain was still doing its drizzly thing, so we wandered the shops, all with different outsides, and all with the same “made in anywhere except Alaska” crap for the cruise ship visitors inside.

If all the stuff is made in Japan, and China, why do they bother visiting, when they can go to their local Wally Mart and buy the same stuff?

Anyway, it finally stopped raining, and the mountains peeked from behind their shrouds of clouds and just stunned us with their diversity of color and range of textures. The differing hues and shapes make you want to reach out and stroke them, they look so soft and inviting.

We stopped a number of scenic rest areas, but once again, although the views were magnificent, photos do not do them justice.

On the way back to Monaco, (that is the name of our coach) we saw a lot of fisherists standing in the fast flowing river doing what they do best.

Yes, you guessed, staring at two big black bears who were strolling up and down the river bank, annoying the seagulls and looking for fish scraps. By the looks on the fishermen’s faces, I bet it wasn’t only the bears who crapped in the woods tonight!!!

Marlipops sez my T shirt addiction is creeping back coz I bought three today. I think the ring I bought for her today, to match the necklace I bought for her in England four years ago should hush her……a bit!!

Wildlife watch today was all the above mentioned, plus a loon.

Day 42

Before I start, a joke, courtesy of my good mate Dick Gatley.

Man goes into a doctor and says “ I’ve got a fear of lapels”

Doctor says “ You’ve got cholera”

Weather horrible, stayed in the coach until lunchtime watching Michelle Pfeiffer do her thing in “I Am Sam”. Oh and a guy named Penn or something. Then weather got better and we went out.

After finding an internet café, we wandered off to the next place we are going to stay at, Scenic View RV Park, in a little place called Ninilchik.

On the way we passed through the biggish town of Soldotna, and the twenty miles or so either side of this town were probably the worst in terms of scenery, and general scuzziness since our travels began ( except for Salt Lake City)

However, we soon realized that all the locals are intertwined in some way with the fishing industry, which up here at this time of year is tied hand in hand with tourism. There are, as reported recently, lots of creeks and streams, but we also saw first hand today some of the work done for the off shore fishing type people.

We spent a long time talking to the owner of Scenic View, and very informative he was too. As well as tasting the freshly cooked, well still cooking actually, smoked salmon, he was preparing, we found out that he and his wife go clamming, for razor clams, during certain times of the month. They use a thing called a clam gun, which acts on the suction cup principle, sucking the little suckers out of the sand!!

He then told us all about a place to go, so we went.

It is called Deep Creek, and is where all the fishing charters leave to go offshore. What is really interesting is the way the boats get into the water. Big old John Deere earthmovers, rusty as hell, hitch up the boat trailers and run down the pebble beach straight into the waves. The boats rev up, slam into reverse and off they go. Brilliant! Though I don’t know how long the earthmovers last in all that salt water. On the return journey, the boats radio the men in the earthmovers, and their trailer is waiting in the sea, the boats come steaming in, virtually flat out until the last second, straight on to the trailers, up the beach, and bingo, dry fishermen!

Then, the fun begins.

Afterwards the fish are processed, and we are talking real fish here, not some half pound tiddler from your back yard pool.

One guy we spoke to told us his grandson had landed a small 160 pound halibut! That’s bigger than me!! Well, nearly.

The salmon are monsters as well, 3, 4 and sometimes 5 feet long.

After processing and the tourists having departed with their fillets, there remains some remains, which have to be disposed of. The processors take all the offal, bones and everything half a mile up the beach, and supposedly throw it all back into the sea at low tide. Of course, this usually does not happen at low tide so there are tons of stinking rotting fish guts and entrails and other gory stuff on the beach.

Not for long.

Down come literally thousands of seagulls, as well as hundreds of bald eagles, both mature and adolescent, who gorge themselves, leaving only the bones and heads,. We only saw a couple of dozen eagles, but apparently when the processors are in full swing, there are lots.

The bald eagle pix attached show an adult and a juvenile. It takes three years or so to mature, changing color, even the beaks. Fascinating, and they are very big, 3 feet tall with a wingspan over 6 feet.

Wildlife watch today was the above mentioned fish heads, seagulls, eagles and really sad, a dead moose.

And because they are used to humans being on the beach, they are not as skittish as others. This is actually very bad for the eagles, coz they should always be wary of us. I would be wary of me if I was a eagle!!

Anyway, a very interesting experience, and a smelly one!!

Day 41

After leaving the comforts of Home Depot parking lot, we proceeded to the Seward Highway, and some fascinating scenery. The road hugs the edge of the Cooke Inlet, named after that famous English explorer, Captain Cooke, (who would have made Admiral, but he was murdered by some Hawaiians.)

Anyway, this drive is great. The railroad is just down to the right, between the road and the shore, and the train goes even slower than me, must be piloted by Corporal Cautious!

The tide was out, and there are warnings against going on the wide mud flats at low tide, coz it turns to quicksand, and can suck you down in a flash!!

So, we didn’t go on the mud flats.

At the right time, Beluga whales can be seen coming in with the tide, but we was there at the wrong time.

We got to the campsite that had been booked for over a month, only to find that our allocated space was taken, and was not going to be available. It was actually the best of the lot, so we were miffed. The owner offered to let us have another space, then move when the occupants of our space decided to leave, but by that time we had agreed that the campsite was pretty crap, on the only stretch of 4 lane highway south of Anchorage, so we told them we would be back after we drove around for a while.

We went up the road for about 2 miles, and, Marlipops came up trumps yet again. We are settled into Real Alaskan Cabins and RV Park. We are backed into a delightful space, with full hook ups, totally surrounded by trees. With the wind rustling the leaves, it is 100% peaceful. And, the price here is cheaper than the other site.

So, we went back to the first place and told them where to stick their campsite!

You have to realize that this area is full of rivers and creeks, and the salmon are just starting to run for the spawning season, so July is the busiest month down here, and we were lucky to get this place, Actually, it was all down to the smooth charm of Marlipops.

The weather was pretty terrible when we got up this morning, we couldn’t see a single mountain, but as we drove south, the skies gradually cleared, giving us views of the V and U shaped valleys between the mountains, and all the glaciers.

Note. When you look at the pix, do not confuse the train with the yellow peril. The train is the one with Alaska written on the side.

Captain Cautious had a haircut, courtesy of Marlipops, but the beard remains untouched.

Wildlife watch today was bald Eagles ( boring!), Dall sheep, so high up the mountainside, with his rear end hanging so far over the edge it was a wonder he didn’t fall off, magpies, seagulls and a ground squirrel.

Day 40

Today is Sunday, and a shopping, taking care of business day. We did the grocery/Wal Mart/Sam’s Club thing, found out that Anchorage McDonalds does a McKinley Burger

( after the mountain, which is round the corner somewhere) and generally did boring things all morning.

In the p.m. we went to downtown, for the tourist walk. Anchorage is a typical big city, and unfortunately doesn’t have anything note worthy to brag about. It is the surrounding mountains and scenery which make this place great, not a bunch of boring buildings, so there wasn’t a lot to see.

There was a neat flea market, with most of the stalls selling “made in Alaska” stuff, with one stall selling dolls with the “made in China” labels badly scraped off!

In the downtown touristy part, they have a lot of “theme” salmon, by local artists, which are statues of decorated salmon, similar to the Houston Cow Parade, only not as big. The best one was the salmomopoly, see pic.

We wandered down to the Ulu factory.

What is a Ulu?, I hear you ask.

A Ulu is an Alaskan knife, with a funny shaped handle and blade and is sold with a fancy board made from spruce. The Ulu is supposedly used to cut food, but looks very awkward to use, and we didn’t buy one.

However, if any of our readers want one, let us know. All donations to the Marlipops/Captain Cautious fund will be gratefully accepted!

We then went to the local salmon viewing area, and watched lots of humungous red King Salmon milling about, under a bridge. There were no obstacles in their way to prevent them from going upstream, they were just circling under the bridge.

Not nearly as many as in Valdez a few days ago, and the place itself was on the industrial side of the city, so we didn’t stay long, coz it was a bit skuzzy.

We have finally found out the reason for the long lines at Dairy Queen.

This place has only been open for 18 days, and is the first DQ in Anchorage for 16 years, and for some reason the locals and the imported people love it. We stood in line for 15 minutes to place an order, then had to wait another 20 minutes to get the order.

We spoke with the owner, who told us that on the weekend they opened, the line of cars for the drive through was blocking traffic on the roads around, and had to be moved!!

Wildlife watch today was a 50 pound seagull, as big as a dog, chasing all his rivals away.

Day 39

First bad weather day of the trip, combined with first problem of the trip.

It was raining for most of the morning, chilly, and miserable.

We got the coach all closed up, dumped and filled with fresh water, and then spent an hour trying to hitch the car to the rear end.

The problem was the two arms have to lock into place, and the little devils wouldn’t!

So, after lots of tries, and curses, we decided to leave, and Marlipops drove the yellow peril behind the coach.

After 20 miles or so, we found an empty pull off at the side of the road, so we tried again, and again and finally the locks locked and off we went.

We saw lots and lots of racing type cyclists, all over the place, both coming towards us and going in the same direction, and we couldn’t work out what was going on, until we read the daily paper, which told us that there were several different races, of differing lengths, over all sorts of routes. Whatever, they are all crazy, with the ups and downs of the roads and wild bears and mooses and lions and tigers!!

As we drove along the Richardson Highway, built during the second world war, the road got progressively worser, and finally we came to a female construction worker, brandishing a huge STOP sign, who informed us that there was a 20 minute delay due to construction blasting and other assorted road work stuff.

So, we had a leisurely lunch, while everyone around us was just sitting and fuming at the delay.

I forgot to tell you about the kid in Valdez.

We were looking for a particular store, and a kid was sitting on his bike eating ice cream, so we asked him if he knew where the store was, and he said, “Follow me”. So he went straight across the road, onto the sidewalk, through the forecourt of a gas station, and up the sidewalk again!! We did our best to dodge the traffic and followed him to the store, but an interesting concept of travel.

Anyway, we got to the city of Anchorage, and parked on a Wal Mart parking lot. We then discovered that the do not allow overnight parking, so we didn’t shop in their store and went to Home Depot. They welcomed us, and we have permission to stay again Sunday night.

Now to the part that fascinated Marlipops.

Anchorage is a large, typical U.S. city, so it has all the usual fast food places in abundance. Right next to us is a drive through Dairy Queen, and the drive through line never got less than about 15 cars, all evening at least until 11.30 when we went to bed. This amazed Marlipops. She is going over there tomorrow to see what the great attraction is!!

Wildlife watch today was zippo, weather was badly.

Day 38

You will all be excited to know we have found a use for the bumpy roads previously reported.

Marlipops and Captain Cautious ( who is still poorly but not poorly bad, thank you all for asking) decided to go to Valdez, well known for the earthquake of 1964 and Exxon Valdez oil spill of 1989.

So, in the dirty brown yellow peril, off we set, with Marlipops performing driving duty. The bumpy road shook loose all the rocks and stones and pebbles and boulders from the preceding 1000 miles!

Valdez is 150 miles from our campsite, and with a stop for a pic and a ooh and a ahhh every half hour, it took over 3 hours to get there. We passed so many wonderful blue and grey glaciers, countless waterfalls, tumbling down from the snow on top of the craggy topped mountains. The greenery was everywhere, and Thompson Pass, about 20 miles from Valdez, stunning. It is only 2600 feet or so high, but feels much, much higher because of all the surrounding peaks and ravines.

The 800 mile Alaska pipeline runs to Valdez, and comes over Thompson Pass. While in one of the stores I was watching the tale of the pipeline construction, and the workers interviewed all said that Thompson Pass was the worst place in the world to build a pipeline. They were working at 45 degree angles, in the 40 below temperatures, and even had to build a humungous series of overhead cables and pulleys to get the 10 ton pipe sections in place. Very informative. In places along the road the pipeline is right at the side, so if you need a quick oil change, bring your own cordless drill, and hey presto, instant crude oil!

The town of Valdez is geared for fisherists, hikists and oil terminalists. Not particularly pretty, but ideal as a base if you are into all that active physical stuff. We would have been, but we gave all that up as a new year resolution this year, so we had to sit and eat fish and chips again, watching all those fit type idiots.

We did the touristy shop thing, which was crap, and then, on the way out, went to the local stream to hopefully watch the salmon run, although we had been told it was a bit early.

Well, no one told these salmon the time, coz there was a gazillion of them, all trying to get over the rocks at the mouth of the creek, and then trying to swim upstream. Absolutely fascinating to watch them struggle, get so far, then be hit with a rush of water to end up back where they started. There really were thousands of salmon, and quite a few didn’t make it and were lying washed up on the rocks. There were about a hundred or so seagulls, perched on the underside of the road bridge, and none of them could be bothered to get the dead fish. That is the first time in my life I have seen a seagull too stuffed to eat.

Marlipops and I went right down onto the rocks at the mouth of the creek, where it met the ocean of the bay, to watch the fishermen. After about 20 minutes we decided to go back, and Marlipops looked and asked me which way did we come to get here, coz the tide was on its way in and another 10 minutes and we would have been swimming upstream with the salmon!!

There was even a couple of guys fishing by hand, just scooping the fish out of the water, there were so many of them.

We were about to leave, when we spotted an enormous sea lion bull making his way through the salmon, gorging himself.

He stopped for a while, obviously bloated as well.

Talk about an all you can eat buffet!

There were also several bald eagles hovering about downstream, probably picking up the leftovers.

All in all, one of the highlights of the trip.

On the way back, with the sun at a changed angle, (I wont say going down coz it doesn’t,) the snow on the mountain tops looked totally different from this morning, crisper and brighter.

Wildlife watch today was the eagles, sea otter, red squirrel in the campsite, sea lion, sea gulls, million of salmon, and a yellow deer…….honest, check out the pix.