June 30, 2018

Beginning of the End

It is an early wake-up this morning.  Like any morning that the alarm is set early we both wake up every hour during the night so as not to oversleep.  When it finally does go off at 4:30am, the getting up is merely a formality since we have been laying awake waiting for our cue.  he car needs to be in the ferry boarding line at 6:00 for our trip across Prince William Sound from Valdez to Whittier.  We make some coffee in the room and John grabs a couple back-ups from the breakfast room downstairs.  Breakfast doesn’t start until 6:00 but they have coffee, rolls and cereal out for the ferry folks.

The ferry is about 2 minutes from our hotel and the line-up is an exercise in hurry-up-and-wait.  We’re near the front of the line but the loading managers have a different plan.  All of the big vehicles, buses, RVs and camper trucks are loaded first and we make it aboard at 7:20.  An hour and twenty minutes of our lives we will never get back.  The on-board seating is pretty lush, we have all of our electronic devices and our tuna Subway sub—life is good.

The weather is of course overcast with heavy fog as we roll out of Valdez Harbor.  It seems to us that some other ship had a problem here once but we make it out OK.  If there is some question of the score in the large animal race, it was 4 whales to 4 moose until Mary saw the moose on the road 2 days ago pulling them ahead 5-4.  We start getting a break in the weather about halfway across the sound and there is a whale sighting off the starboard side.  Sure enough there are a couple orcas playing about 100 yards out making the updated score Whales 6, Moose 5 in an unexpected comeback.  Only a day and a half for the moose to make a move.

We reach Whittier on schedule at 1:15 and get off fairly fast to make the 2:00 tunnel opening with

ease. Our car says we have about 50 miles worth of fuel left and we’re pretty sure there is gas in Portage, so we move quickly to the tunnel line. There is no gas in Portage, but we are pretty sure there is gas at the Hope junction.  Nope.  Then at the Sterling Highway.  Nope.  Then at Moose Pass.  Nope.  By now we are 15 miles past our lodging for the night, we have 10 miles worth of fuel left and 20 miles left to Seward with no phone reception.  We later learn that there is no gas on the Seward Highway, packed with cars, from Girdwood to Seward, a distance of about 70 miles.  Business opportunity???

The semi-happy ending is that we stop at the Fudge shop in Moose Pass for gas directions and the fellow there says he has a couple gallons in a can for his lawn mower that he would be willing to part with. Hallelujah!  We now have enough gas to get to our lodge for tonight and back to Girdwood tomorrow. We’re in such a tizzy about the gas that we aren’t enjoying a beautiful day to the fullest.

Our lodging for tonight is the Summit Lake Lodge right on the Seward Highway.  These folks have 16 cabins and 6 motel rooms on a very pretty lake tucked in the middle of nowhere.  There is a full service restaurant and bar with a pizza-ice cream-espresso shack off to one side.  Meagan, with ancestral ties to Minnesota checks us in.  Our cabin is beautifully updated with all the amenities.  It all looks very familiar with the pine log furniture and woodsy décor.

We get a couple free drinks for happy hour in the bar with chatty Kendall and a fantastic dinner with server Tom.  John has a ribeye with horseradish-demi glaze, deep fried brussels sprouts and garlic mashed.  Mary has a parmesan crusted halibut served over a pasta with cream sauce and we gulp it all down with a Joel Gott Cabernet.  Very civilized.  Very familiar.

It continues to be a beautiful evening for the walk back to our cabin and we would love to see a sky full of stars if the sun wasn’t still out at 11:00 pm.

Todays Observation: Valdez is the terminus of the Trans-Alaskan pipeline with huge storage tanks on the hillside across the harbor from the town.  In the fog this morning we passed the reef where the Exxon Valdez ran aground and could see it happening in pre-GPS days.

June 19, 2018

Accomplishments

It is still spitting rain this morning but the gales of yesterday have subsided and there are a few fishing boats moving around.  We pack slowly in the hopes that chances are the weather will get better before it gets worse.  The news this morning is full of the record breaking storms of yesterday and we don’t know if we should be proud or disappointed.  We will have a ferry ride across Prince William Sound at the end of our trip so, fingers crossed, we shall return.

After two days of unsuccessful attempts at activities we are determined to visit the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center this morning.  Leaving Whittier, we wait a while at the tunnel but make it through at the 10:00 am release (their terminology). It takes about 15 minutes to get back to the Seward Highway and the AWCC and it is still spitting rain, but we have seen worse.  We are going to make this happen. We need to accomplish something

It actually turns out OK.  We spend a couple hours chatting with moose, reindeer, caribou, wolves, eagles, owls, black bears, buffalo, musk ox, and most impressively, brown bears.  Some of these are rescue animals and others are here to be representative of the local animal kingdom. The caribou enclosure is next to the brown bear enclosure and when the caribou are gathered near the fence we see one of the bears on the other side looking hungrily through the fence. Food porn for the bear.

It’s a couple hour drive down to Seward, our destination for the night. We stop at Moose Pass for lunch at a little local diner.  John get the Texas burger with jalapenos and Mary had chicken tenders with blue cheese dressing and perfect fries. On the way we passed the Summit Lake Lodge, a gorgeous property in the mountains and on a lake.  We had a spare day at the end of the trip that we booked in Soldotna (critiqued by our coach Marc) so we cancelled that and booked Summit Lake.  A better decision—thanks Marc.

Driving into Seward we finally got a look at the non-stormy picture book Alaska.  The snowy mountains cascading down to Resurrection Bay could have been the cover of an Alaskan tourist guide.  We are at the Hotel Seward, a historic property a block or so from the bay.  We have a corner room with water and mountain views, a fireplace and amenities we haven’t seen so far on the trip.  Very nice.

Our front desk person has recommended Chinook’s for dinner tonight.  It is on the small boat harbor about a mile from our central location. We opt for a seat at the bar when we get there with a nice view of the harbor.  Tim, our bartender, is from Mankato which leads to some in depth conversations about party schools and the Vikings Adam Theilen.  He spends ten months a year here and tries to find warm weather for the other two with an occasional stop back home.  Apparently because of ease of transportation Hawaii is a common destination for wandering Alaskans.  Mary had a salmon sampler which was salmon about 8 different ways and John had a king crab leg and salad.  Both excellent.

We leave a curtain open tonight so should we awake at an inconvenient hour we will be able to check out the midnight sun.  We are at the 19 hour and 21 minute daylight schedule and it won’t change much in the next couple days.  John woke at 3:50 and there was plenty of early morning light pouring in.  Sunrise was less than a half hour away.

Today’s News: A man in Eagle River was killed by a brown bear, a woman and her 5-year-old were swept away in a raging river, and another family was devastated because a river had rerouted itself and was now eroding their property.  All the news today is man vs. nature. Inhospitable.

June 17 - 18, 2018

Unfulfilled Plans

June 17, 2018.  Our city days are done and now we’re off for our water week on the Kenai Peninsula.  It is still spitting rain this morning.  Whatever the giant crane was used for last night is not evident to us.  We got up at 6:00 this morning and the crews had already dismantled the big derrick attached to the crane and were packing up the rest of their supplies.  Round the clock daylight comes in pretty handy for jobs in traffic areas.

We’re on the road before 10:00 which is pretty good for us.  It is not a long driving day but there are some stops we want to make along the way.  The first is Costco where we pick up some breakfast bars and try to buy some booze but liquor is not available on Sunday until noon. 

There are just a few highways in Alaska and while they have numbers, they are usually referred to by name. Today we are on Alaska 1 south which is the Seward Highway.  When we went to Palmer we were on Alaska 1 north which is the Glenn Highway.  Our first stop about 15 minutes into our trip is Potters Marsh.  This is a several hundred-acre wetland across the road from the Turnagain Arm of the Cook Inlet.  There is about a mile of elevated boardwalk that allows humans to invade this natural area without disturbing the flora and fauna that exists there.  It is mostly a habitat for birds but there are bears and moose who venture in from the nearby woods and hills.

There is a small problem for us.  The wind is blowing at a sustained 40 mph with gusts into the 60s.  It is 57 degrees so walking into the wind is blinding which is inconvenient on a sight-seeing trip.  We do see an eagle in it’s nest and tons of geese with brand new hatchlings.  Our only other discovery is a collection of moose tracks paralleling the boardwalk.

We are staying in Girdwood tonight at Hidden Creek B&B which is near the Alyeska ski hill.  We explore the neighborhood around the ski area and nose around in the Alyeska Hotel.  The hotel, at this time of year, seems to be a wedding destination.  They also have a restaurant on top of the mountain which couples a dinner with the tram ride up for 39 bucks.  It would be very attractive on a sunny day.  There are leftovers from our last two dinners in our backseat that become lunch at the base of the ski hill which is also very attractive if you’re hungry.

We continue south for our next adventure, the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center. But, and this will be a continuing theme, it is starting to rain.  There is a mile and a half walk or drive which is one of the highlights of this facility, but we would prefer the walk and we aren’t going to do it in the rain.  We will go past here two more times this week, so we will wait for better weather.

We veer off to the east to Portage Glacier.  There is a well maintained welcome center manned by the National Park service where we spend a couple rainy hours watching movies and meandering through displays of all the stuff we would be looking at outside if it were sunny. There is a “Salmon Viewing area” just up the road and we pull up our rain hoods to look into this shallow clear creek, but the salmon didn’t get the message.  None present.

We give up for the day and head back to Girdwood and our B&B.  The hosts aren’t here but have left a note to get us into our room.  They have three guest rooms on the lower level of their very nice home and all are occupied tonight. John visits with hosts Ron and Michele and dog Bailey when they return from a walk while Mary gets us settled in.  They recommend “Chair 5” for a burger and beer which is our preferred dinner for tonight.  We change our tune when we arrive however and each get a dinner salad and split the “Halibut & Chips” dinner.  Everything is mediocre but the place is packed by the time we leave (including a walk-in party of 22) so it must be a local favorite.

It is cloudy, spitting rain and mosquitoes so we forego an after dinner walk and go back to reading and computer stuff until bed time.

Today’s observation:  Weather affects attitude as much as activities when traveling.

June 18, 2018. There is a reason these two days are combined. Because today was non-existent. We are up and at ‘em at 6:00 this morning.  At 6:10 the power in our room goes out.  Host Ron has a generator that keeps some upstairs lights and the pump running.  That means we can shower by the light of the Kindle and pack by the light of a borrowed flashlight.  The stove is gas so we can join fellow guests Gary and Nonnie from Roanoke and Georgia and Dennis from Indiana for a candle light breakfast.  There is a lot of smoked salmon and reindeer sausage with scrambled eggs and bagels.  All’s well that ends well.

It has been raining all night but it is letting up as we get our stuff to the car. We have a glacier cruise scheduled today and need to make the 10:30 tunnel opening to get to the port city of Whittier. We backtrack our route from yesterday heading east to Portage.  As we go through Portage the wind is going crazy and the rain has returned in full force.  The car is rocking back and forth and the windshield wipers can’t keep up.  The phone chimes with an email message from the cruise company telling us all cruises have been cancelled today. Our lodging reservation is in Whittier tonight so we have nowhere else to go. We make it through the tunnel, check with the hotel (Whittier Inn) and they hope they will have some rooms available for check-in about 1:00 pm.  The guy at the desk says the problem is that none of the people currently there want to leave in that weather.

There is no sense dragging this out. We do the five minute drive around town and the only point of interest is the skeleton of a building that housed 1000 soldiers and sailors in the 50’s.  Now it is only a shell.  We read until we can get into a room at 1:00 as promised.  Then we have some really good smoked salmon chowder with a beer.  Then we read.  Then at dinner we have some really good smoked salmon chowder, a bottle of wine and a flatbread.  The we go to bed.

The evening news tells us that we had 4 inches of rain today with a brutal wind. One of the front desk guys says his other job is on one of the cruise boats and they have never cancelled—today was the first.  The only boat that would have gone out would be an Ark piloted by Noah.  It was biblical.

More News:  The “Slam’n Salm’n” fishing tournament has been cancelled because there are no fish.