Why we came to Alaska

We came to Alaska for the cooler weather, to see the wildlife and the scenery…

We took our time coming up through British Columbia, because we heard that June was a very wet month in Alaska, and the weather would be better in July and August.

It feels like it rained most of July.

We spent four days at small park called “Scenic View”, high above Cook’s Inlet. We know there is a good view. 

We got a short glimpse of it the day we arrived.

The top of one of the volcanos peaked out above the fog bank over the water for a few hours

This is the cliff at the back edge of Scenic View RV park. There was no beach access from the park, but we could have gone down another way. The curved beach is Clam Gulch. 

On Thursday we continued our journey by driving about 25 miles north to Soldotna. As I checked into the Best Western King Salmon Motel and RV Park, I mentioned how we had spent several days overlooking the Inlet, without seeing it.  The clerk said “Well, you won’t have that problem here.  We don’t have a view.”

Which was true. The RV spots in Soldotna were, like  many Alaskan RV parks, in a large parking lot, with gravel spots and just a bit of grass here and there between the rigs.

But, the sun did finally come out for a few days. We took advantage of the nicer weather by packing some lunch sandwiches and driving out to Captain Cook State Recreation Area,  the northern-most accessible park on the Kenai Peninsula. 

Can you have a Mackerel sky in Salmon country?

I had considered spending a few nights at the Discovery Campground in the Captain Cook SRA, but didn't trust the sunny weather to hold for the rest of the week. So we drove the Jeep up, and  enjoyed the fresh air and sunshine as we picnicked on a bluff overlooking the water that wasn't there. 

It reminded us of our time at the Bay of Fundy last year. The tide was out. Way out! We could not see any open water beyond the mud flats. Across the inlet we could see the snow capped mountain range that we had missed seeing at Scenic View.

While in Soldotna, Craig had time to replace the broken latch on our big bay door.

Days later, as we both looked at this picture, we did not know what Craig was doing. I think he dropped a screw or something in the grass! 

As you can see it is a full pass-through bay, that has doors on either side. Ever since the accident, if we needed something from this side, Craig would have to unpack it and crawl through from the other side. Needless to say, this was no fun. We had ordered a new latch by mail, a few weeks ago, but we waited for the weather to clear before doing the job. 

Our next stop was in Coopers Landing, just 45 miles up the road.
With the nicer weather, we were looking for some outdoor fun.  

The Kenai River rafting trips offered by Alaska Wildland Adventures sounded good. Unfortunately we were not able to get seats on their seven hour River Canyon trip, but were able to get onto the shorter "casual 2-hour Scenic Float".

I wasn't sure what we were getting into when we donned the rain gear they provided.

It did turn out to be a bit of "overkill" for the gentle ride we took down the Kenai River.

Each raft carried twelve passengers and one guide. He controlled the oars and told us about the river and the wildlife in the area.

Rivers and lakes that are fed by melting glaciers have an opaque blue to jade coloring. This is caused by the light refraction on the suspension of fine rock dust in the water. Near the source glacier the water is cloudy.

The river was running quite quickly. Not exactly white water, but a bit bouncy at times. Our sister raft was way ahead of us here.

This rock cliff was colored by patches of orange lichen. It grows where there is a lot of nitrogen. Eagles like to sit on the top of it, and nitrogen from their droppings seeps through the cracks of the rock. 

Speaking of eagles, they, along with a few ducks, were the only wildlife we saw. But we enjoyed every one.

The adult eagle had part of a salmon. The juvenile behind her was also tearing into the red flesh of the fish. The magpie was waiting for leftovers.

Eagles do not get their characteristic white head and white tail until they reach maturity at age four or five. This guy seemed to be working on his grooming. If you look carefully, you can see one of his feathers floating down below him.

And, of course, we saw many of them flying above the river looking for fish.  Based on the number we saw in the trees, they were having a good day of it.

All in all, it was a very pleasant day. I have never rafted before, and maybe next time we will be able to ride some rapids.

We came to Alaska for the cooler weather, to see the wildlife and the scenery…  We are not disappointed.

We saw PUFFINS and EAGLES!

In Baddock, Nova Scotia, Adventures East Campground had super slow internet and no satellite reception. But the beautiful coastal views and being able to go see puffins and eagles made it all quite bearable.

We have seen whales and lots of seals in California, but we have never seen puffins. When we were in Maine, we inquired about a wildlife boat tour that promised puffin viewing, and were told it was too late in the season to see any.

However, we were excited to learn that puffins were still around Nova Scotia, and that we could see them from a boat tour that left from St. Ann’s Bay.  

The Donelda Puffin boat tour was advertised in a promotional booklet I picked up at the Visitors' Desk on the ferry over. We called ahead, and were told that yes, there were puffins still on and about Bird Island. The tour cost was reasonable, about $38+tax USD each, for seniors.

Although it had rained during the night, Saturday dawned with only a bit of overcast, and by mid-day the sun was burning off the surface fog.

The boat seemed old but well painted. The 24 or so seats were pretty full.  After a cloudy start, the sun came out in full force, and the 40 minute ride out to Bird Island was smooth.

Our guide Donelda began by talking about the birds we would see.

Suddenly she stopped, and said to look out to the left because an eagle was coming to catch a fish.

What? How did she know this? Well, it turned out that the eagles knew the tour boat, and knew she would toss out fish for them to catch!

Going in for the catch:
taken with Merikay's point and shoot Sony RX-100,





Away he goes with lunch in talon: taken with Craig's Nikon D3 and Tamron 28-300mm lens.

He caught it, and soon there were three other eagles coming for a free lunch as well. Wow, I was so excited. They were so close we could see every feather. 

We passed a lot of really interesting rocky shores.

Once out at the Bird Islands we saw lots of different kinds of sea birds and seals. 

Puffins are very small, quick birds. We saw some in their hole-in-the-cliff nests, but without a monster telephoto lens it was impossible to capture decent pictures.

There were many of them bobbing around in the water like little black rubber duckies, or zipping away in flight. The above two images are the only ones we took that were worth sharing. 

But pictures or not, the experience of seeing them was wonderful!

There were many other birds on the Bird Islands. But again,  although we were close enough to see them, we were too far away for really good photos.

Nesting Gulls

Two Razorbills in their nest

Cormorant sentry

There were also many eagles on the island. Our guide did not seem to like the eagles here, because she said they were preying on the young of the other species. 

Some of the seals seemed interested in our boat, while others were just lying around on the shore rocks.

As we drift in and out of gift shops I always look at the socks on sale. It has been awhile since I have seen any that made me happy!

Puffins and lobsters, how good is that!

We met two other Alfa-owner couples in Baddock, but we left the morning after they arrived.

We are now 60 miles southwest in Linwood Harbour Campground. Happily we have good Wifi and full hookups, but despite a treeless location, our Direct TV cannot pick up a signal.

And cool breezes are blowing in the windows.  

[From Craig] The satellite TV situation is interesting for a techie like me.  DirecTV worked in New Brunswick and on Prince Edward Island.  In our last campground near Baddeck Nova Scotia, the dish simply couldn't see the DirecTV satellites at 99, 101, and 103 degrees west.  Today in Linwood (60 miles SW), the dish pretty much completed acquiring the 3 satellites, but the DirecTV receiver had problems receiving most channels within a few seconds.  I hope that we will receive DirecTV again at our next stop near Halifax.  I'll let you know.

National Eagle Center, Wabasha Minnesota

The Minnesota weather has been wonderful. Cool and not very humid. We had one overcast day up in Itasca, but we welcomed it and hunkered down for a rest day, cooking homemade soup and doing the wash. 

The tow package installations on our new Jeep were done by mid-day Thursday. I had not made plans for the night, but after a quick look in my reference books we got a spot at a private park in Wabasha MN. It looked like it was about half way between where we were and where we had reservations for Saturday night.

I have mentioned seeing many run down small town downtowns in our travels. Some of the more tourist-oriented destinations are overrun with souvenir shops.  Wabasha, Minnesota is different.  The small downtown is clean, the buildings are in good repair, and there are many "real" small business in addition to the usual eateries. It felt alive. A good place!

I would like to say we choose to come here for this attraction:

The National Eagle Center, but that would be a fib.  Instead, it was a very lucky landing at the Big River RV Park at the edge of town.

We really enjoyed our visit to this most excellent research, rescue, and educational facility.

Merikay compares her arm span with the wing spans of some raptors.

After enjoying some of the exhibits we sat in on the 11 AM presentation. A very perky intern (not the handler in the picture below) gave a fun and informative program about the eagles. Then the handler brought in one of the resident eagles and fed him lunch.

Today, fish was on the eagle lunch menu.  Sunday is Rat day and they love it!

After the program we got to view four of the resident eagles up close with no glass or barriers between.  The resident eagles are all "rescue" birds that have been injured and are unable to survive in the wild. 

It was great to see them so close and to learn more about how wild eagles make their living.

If we had wanted to hang around until 2 PM we could have gotten our pictures taken with a living eagle, but not wanting to wait, Merikay opted for a picture with this lifesize eagle statue. 

We left our Jeep parked there and took a nice short walk along the river. 

Lilies were among my favorite flowers as a child. Lilies blooming in the fields and along the roads meant summer and vacation to me.  Funny, how the sight of them again has brought back so many childhood memories!

After our lunch sandwiches, we headed out of town to a park that promised an easy 2 mile nature trail. 

As it happened, we almost managed to spend some time in Minnesota without being attacked by vast clouds of mosquitos. I had expected them when we visited Judy, but except for a few deer flies and the usual adult force of ticks, we were not bothered at all. We went for several walks and had no problems until Friday.  

We set out on the forested nature trail and although we had sprayed ourselves with "Deep Woods Off", we had to turn back because the mosquito were swarming over Craig.  I am one of the rare people who although I might be bitten by an occasional mosquitoe I rarely welt up or itch. I'm just not allergic to them. A blessing! Deer flies yes, chiggers yes, spiders yes.  But not mosquitoes.  I don't know why, and I'm not asking.

Finally, this was one of several river boats we saw on the Mississippi.

There were some very nice ones docked near where we had lunch.  Someday, I would like to rent a houseboat, perhaps with another couple or two to share the cost and fun, and cruise down one of the big rivers. 

Water RVing?

Anyone want to go?