Fairbanks' Babies

It didn't take us long to get to Fairbanks. We drove up through a canyon, along wide valleys, and also along high ridges where you could see for miles on both sides. We stayed out of the main downtown area, so we could bicycle to where we wanted to go and stay out of traffic. It finally got warm enough that we wore shorts! First time this year.

There were a couple of places in Fairbanks we wanted to see, but number one was the Large Animal Research Station. My granddaughter was disappointed that I didn't post the picture of the swans with chicks last post, so today I will post all the baby animal pictures.

This was the swan and chick that we paddled right by on Byer's Creek the time we saw the red salmon. Both parental swans stayed close by.

A baby muskox. The mother is beside it, but I couldn't get both in the picture. The males are kept in a separate enclosure with three (3!) fences around it. The inside fence is made of 9"X9" posts with a thick cable strung through them. About 3 feet away from the cable fence, the next fence is about 6' high, has steel posts and is what you see in the pictures. The last fence is smaller and mostly to keep the people from getting up close enough to the big steel fence that they get "butted" when the muskox get irate. There is a big tractor tire inside the compound for the males, and they "play" with it by head butting it. I understand that one male actually moved that tire about 20 meters, pushed it through the cable fence post and broke the post.

This is a mommy and baby caribou. They had both caribou and reindeer in the station. The males were allowed to mingle with the families, as caribou are very social and protect their young.



It rained on our second day in Fairbanks, so we did the "museum day" thing. We had picked up fresh salmon, so when we got home we did B's version of the "salmon bake" that's so popular in Alaska. As usual, it turned out fabulous!

We planned on leaving early this morning, but my eyeglasses seem to have lost a piece from the arm, so we will be stopping at an opticians before we move on the the next place: Chicken, Alaska!

W

Denali Parks

Denali Parks are split into two: the State Park, and the National Park. We stopped at the State Park for 4 days - 'cuz we couldn't get a campsite in the National one right away. The State Park campground was called Byers Lake, and it was great. B caught a lake trout off the shore the first night, and we paddled down a tiny winding creek later to catch 2 rainbow trout the next day. Food is not a problem here, and the wine is cheap!

We can just barely see the tall mountain from the lake, although the first day it was cloudy anyway so you can't see the top. The last 2 days were clear and sunny and we rushed to the south viewpoint on the highway to take pictures.

We also spent time on the other end of the lake and saw our first "red" salmon, and 2 trumpeter swans with little ones.

We were eager to get to the National Park, because that is where all the big wildlife is, so we left early in the morning. We had booked for the farthest campground into the park that you can drive into. It normally takes about an hour and a half to drive in, wildlife permitting. Well, half an hour up the road we met the welcoming committee!

Two caribou, with huge antlers, were walking directly down the road towards us! There is no place to pull off, as it is a narrow gravel road, so we just stopped as far over as we could. The two walked right up and past us. B could have put out his hand and touched them. For a moment he thought they were going to challenge the truck and come right at the front end! What a welcome.

The next day we took a bus. These buses are the only vehicles allowed to drive on the road beyond the campground. We went farther into the park and saw grizzlies, caribou, fox, and the white Dahl Sheep with the big round horns. The last part is where I ran into trouble. See, Dahl Sheep only stay in the highest parts of mountains, clear of predators. So to see these animals up close, the bus went up to 4,000' elevation on this narrow gravel road - along the mountainside with a very steep 2,000' dropoff. No guardrails, no shoulders even, and another bus coming the other way wanting to go by!!! If there had been another way home, other than walking alongside the bears, I would have taken it. But there was only the one "road", and after the day out, we had to come back it. It was worse going home, as we were on the side with the dropoff, not the cliff. Christian Science is a wonderful thing, as I could close my eyes and imagine the dropoff wasn't there. It got me back, anyway.

Over the next few days (we extended our stay) we got to see all kinds of things. Big bears on the other side of the river from our campsite, and flowers everywhere. B took the bus another time and saw wolves, too.

The river that we camped on was interesting. It was called a "braided" river, because it came from the mountain and there were so many rocks and stones in it that they kept rerouting the river. So the one riverbed held up to 5 streams of water, all fast and silty. They would twist, and join, and then split again. The riverbed itself was at least a kilometer wide, and the rocks were all different colours. Every colour except blue; all different reds, yellows, and greens along with the usual black and white. Even purple shades!

What an education being here. So many things to see.

W

Back to Anchorage...and beyond!

Fishing off the end of Homer Spit was good, B caught his first ocean fish (as shown) - and we were given a freebie from a fisherman on the shore who wanted only halibut and was catching cod. What a good lunch that was!

I had mentioned that Homer Spit was made of gravel and rocks from a glacier, and now you see what that does to tent pegs! The 3 on the right are what the pegs should look like.

On our way north from Homer we stopped at a place called Clam Gulch. It was perfect timing - low tide, and all sorts of people were there in their rubber boots and clamming tools. There was even a young bald eagle sitting on the cliff overlooking the bay.


We are now back in Anchorage for resupplying. Our next stop will be Denali Park, home to the tallest mountain in North America. We will be spending the next 7 days there, and I'm not sure what, if any, internet or cell service we will have. Fairbanks is our next city, and we expect to get there on July 24th. You'll hear from us there, for sure! For our "Spot" friends, we will continue to check in everytime we move to a new campsite.

W

Cook Inlet

Well, we got sidetracked a little from going south after Seward. That's the fun of having the whole summer to do this! Pick a road and see where it leads!

In this case it lead to the far west side of the Kenai Peninsula - still south of Anchorage, but north west of Seward. We drove along salmon fishing rivers - we could tell by the number of fishermen we passed. Some of the visitor booklets tell us about the "combat fishing" that is used in this area where fishermen in hip waders stand almost shoulder to shoulder along the river. Sounds to me like it's the fish that have to do all the fighting trying to get up the river! I'm amazed we still have wild salmon.

When we hit the west coast we turned north to the Kenai Spur Road that ends at Captain Cook State Recreation Area. It's a large state park that has several day areas as well as campgrounds, and is right on Cook Inlet off the Pacific Ocean. We were able to go down to the beach and rock hunt and watch the birds. We also took the bikes and rode to another small lake that was away from the coast and had a very quick swim (it's still cold here!) Altogether it is a very peaceful place, other than the bugs, and so we ended up staying an extra day.

The next trip was right down the western side of this peninsula, and I understand it is as far west as you can go on a road and still be in North America. I'm even in a time zone later than Hillary and Warren! But the neat thing is that the land mass that is to the west, is volcanic. As we drove down Cook Inlet we could see 3 active volcanoes, which were behaving themselves and staying quiet.

We ended up in a town called Homer. Now, Homer is beside a bay that they say was created when a huge glacier melted away many, many years ago. This glacier left a "spit" of gravel and rocks - kinda like a marine breakwater - sticking out into the bay. The amazing thing is that it is 5 miles long, and they have built a highway on it, right down to the end. It is so big that there are 15 restaurants, 3 private RV parks and 2 municipal campgrounds in between all the charter and boating businesses. And a ferry terminal at the end. We are now camped on Homer Spit, where there were absolutely no bugs, lots of seabirds, but also no trees or shelter from the wind and you can see the bear when it is approaching. Sounds perfect to me.

W

Anchorage

Well, it was raining when we went to leave Valdez, so we hunkered down and spent some time in town and at the museum. We got fresh salmon and "freshly frozen" halibut at a fishing boat place right on the waterfront.

There was a black bear reported in our campgrounds during the day. Everywhere we go to camp, there are big signs saying that we are in BEAR country. No food, cooking equipment, or even water containers are allowed left out in your campsite unless it is in immediate use. I've only seen one bear along the roads in Juneau, and B is really hoping to get a look at a grizzly, but so far I can only be grateful that we haven't gotten close to one.

We left for Anchorage and went straight to a Speedy Auto Glass. The missing chunk of windshield was repaired quickly and we stopped at a sushi place before getting a campsite at Eagle River, just north of the city.

The next day was devoted to getting Wendy a new BFF: a Bear Free Facility.
At last we can sleep in the Avalanche, like we had planned, without leaving all our gear and food out in the open for the hungry bears to get at. It also means we have room in the truck for a change! We seem to still need so much Stuff.

South of Anchorage is a little town called Seward. It has an amazing SeaLife Center, and so we are now spending a couple of days in this area. One day devoted to the Aquarium, one day for hiking and fishing.

This is the hiking trail next to where we are camping.

So far in Seward, we have seen a harbor seal and a sea otter - just floating and rolling around in the water off the shore!

We are heading further south over the next couple of days. Let's see what that brings us!

Valdez

On the way south from Tok, we pass a big mountain range called the Wrangell Mtns. There is a road into the interior that starts out paved, goes to gravel, and then degrades to potholes. We travelled this road past the first "creek crossing", which was really just a widening and deepening of the gravel on the road - it looks like a wash-out made of gravel: large gravel as far as you can see either way. The second crossing had water in it, and although it was not wide, the water was fast and deep. We could have "four-wheeled" through it, but we decided that discretion was the better part of valour and turned back. Along this road were several free campsites. We chose one not too far from the mainroad, as it had a fishing creek. During the day it had rained a bit, hailed a bit, and cleared a bit. But the bugs never abated! Black flies and mosquitoes are out in Alaska.

We stayed at this spot for 2 nights, having fresh trout and fresh bug bites both days.

The morning that we moved on was cloudy. We packed up early, but not early enough. It started to rain before all was taken down, so we bundled up faster as the rain came down harder. We saw a moose, trumpeter swans, and thankfully, sun on the way south. We also saw 26 miles of gravel on the main highway construction zone. A big motorhome spit up a rock, and now we have a stone chip in our windshield the size of the end of my thumb.

The road down to the port of Valdez passes 3 glaciers visible from the highway, and goes through a canyon with at least two waterfalls. It was beautiful and we promised to stop on the way back out. Our immediate concern was fixing our windshield before it started cracking. Did you know it was a long weekend in Alaska? Something about Independence. The town was full of visitors and partiers, but the auto glass people were gone. We found a nice campsite up towards the closest glacier, left a message for the auto glass guy, and crossed our fingers. As we were drying out our tents and shelter from our natural showers this morning, the campers beside us were roasting up a BBQ snack that smelled wonderful. We must have been too loud in our appreciation of the smells coming our way, because they soon sent over a plate!

We took a quick trip back to town for supplies. The man at the grocery was exclaiming about the sun and lovely weather they were having. I asked how long we could expect it to last, and he said "Twenty minutes!" Weather changes quickly here. Sure enough, it was starting to cloud over before we got back to our campsite. We finished putting up our dry tent. And before the evening was over, we repaid our kind neighbors by lending them a tarp for over their picnic table.

Rainy days are good for museums and libraries, which is why I'm able to catch up on my blogging today. Tomorrow we intend to drive on to Anchorage, which has a Speedy Auto Glass. Hopefully, we don't hit too many big bumps on the way!

W