Matt and Chelsea's Alaskan Summer

Last stop- Seward!

2010-08-13T12:36:00.000-07:00

On the way to Seward we stopped to view the salmon spawning. Their bodies have turned bright red and after they spawn they will die.

Spawning Salmon Video

We heard that we had to visit Exit Glacier before we left, so on our day trip to Seward we stopped at Exit Glacier. It is part of the Harding Ice Field, which is the largest ice field in America. And Exit Glacier is the smallest glacier in the field.We drove close to the glacier and then went on a ranger led tour up to the edge of the glacier. We ended up being the only ones on the tour, so it was like a private tour. It was great.It was very cold and windy at the edge of the glacier. The sounds of running water under the glacier were very loud and tiny waterfalls on the glacier were constantly running.The ranger told us that as the ice runs down a valley it picks up rocks and they get rubbed over the mountain. This causes these scratches in the mountain rock itself which you can see below.We went into the downtown area after that and there were many beautiful views from the marina. Here you can see the famous fireweed. When the blooms are at the top of the stalk, apparently that signals the end of summer. We had some yummy fish and chips and then walked around the piers.We got to watch the fishermen filleting their freshly caught salmon, halibut, and irish lord. Exit Glacier video

Halibut Fishing

2010-08-13T10:56:00.000-07:00

One thing that Matt and I wanted to do before we left Alaska was go halibut fishing. We had heard that the halibut out of homer is some of the best in the world. We felt very lucky when some of Al and Calle's friends offered to take us out on their boat to go halibut fishing with them.

We drove down to Homer and on the way saw a beautiful bald eagle nest. It was huge.We went out in Kachemak Bay during the low low tide to a spot that was about 11 feet deep. I guess normally people go out to the deep ocean and have to pull up halibut from the bottom of the ocean floor 150 ft below. They describe it as pulling a large piece of ply wood up. So 11 feet was a very nice depth. We put halved herring on the end of a 4 inch hook with 100 lb line. We dropped them to the bottom of the ocean and waited. First, we caught two Irish Lord fish. I guess their spines are poisonous and so we unhooked them and sent them back to the ocean. We had to keep putting bait on the line because the fish were nibbling it off without taking the hook. But finally, as the high tide was coming back in, (the fish ride it back into the bay), we started catching some fish. Our boat caught a total of 4 fish, though Matt only caught one and I didn't catch any. It was still super fun to watch them reel in these fish. Especially the 55 inch 80-pounder. The fish had to be harpooned and clubbed several times before letting it in the boat. I guess the big fish can end up breaking legs if it is brought into the boat still alive. Usually the larger fish are shot before being brought into the boat. We didn't have a gun though and so every five minutes the fish would flop around in the cooler and knock the lid off.Too heavy to lift for a photo opp.Doesn't fit in the 4 foot cooler...Matt reeling in a big one!A huge 15-pounder!They were expert fillet-ers.

Reeling in the big one video

Denali National Park

2010-08-10T16:11:00.001-07:00

Definitely one of the highlights of our trip were the 8 nights we spent in Denali National Park. We drove down from Fairbanks on the Parks Highway and stayed in Riley Creek Campground on the edge of the park while we packed our backpacks and got our food together.

We decided to spend 3 nights at the end of the road at Wonder Lake campground, then 2 nights in the backcountry in unit 29 north of igloo creek campground, and 2 nights in unit 8 in polychrome glacier. Since we were spending 4 nights in the backcountry we had to register our trip and use bear resistant food canisters to store our food and toiletries.

The park is broken down into 87 units and almost half of them have a limit on the number of overnight backpackers that can be in them. We asked the rangers their suggestions and they told us that unit 29 and 8 were two of the most popular.

You are only allowed to drive 15 miles into the park, otherwise you have to take one of the park buses. They make it really easy, since the buses will drop you off where ever you want on the road and you can flag them down anywhere on the road to get a lift.

We took the bus into Wonder Lake at 11am and it was about a 6 hour drive including many stops.

We stopped at Polychrome Overlook to take some photos.The rivers here have lots of braiding to hold all the water that flows when the snow melts.At Eielson Visitors Center they have a set of moose antlers from two bulls who died while fighting. As they clashed antlers, one antler impaled the eye of the other. They got stuck as that moose died and they both died together, antlers entangled.It was very stormy as we got to Wonder Lake. We set up our tent and stored our food in the bear lockers. The mosquitos were pretty bad. I think we both got 20 or more bites. They told us it actually was a good year for mosquitos- not too many...The next day we set off for Kantishna where all the resorts are for a day of hiking. On the way we picked a bag full of wild blueberries, tart but fun!Our hike led us all the way up a steep ridge.The views were great!The top was a really interesting flat tundra. We felt very small on the top.Some of the area was covered in moss that went down a foot when you stepped into it.On the summit was a set of caribou antlers and some weather tracking material. We had a great view of Wonder Lake from the top that made it look tiny and the clouds were beginning to clear.On the way back from Kantishna our bus driver stopped to let us take a picture from the north end of Wonder Lake where Mt. McKinley would have been had it not been cloudy.About an hour after we got back to camp the clouds cleared completely and we got our first view of the mountain. It was enormous!!!We went for a hike with some friends we met, Quentin and Ally, to see the reflection of the mountain on reflection pond. It was after 11pm, and we didn't make it for the sunset, but we did get some nice views. Matt had run ahead to get the pictures in time and gave us all a great scare as we arrived. Thanks Matt...

The next day we went for a hike to the McKinley Bar, a river about 2.5 miles from the road. It was actually pretty hot.The water was ice cold.I took the opportunity to rinse my hair.Matt set up a great shady area with our emergency blanket and we read and took naps along the river bed.The next day we caught our bus to Igloo Campground to begin our backpacking experience. We had stashed some food there for our trip so it was easy to pick up. That way we didn't have to lug around food for 8 days. Our packs were heavy enough.

Here are some pictures from our bus ride. We also saw lots of wildlife, but the next blog entry is entirely devoted to that.We had a pretty strenuous hike to where we wanted to camp. We had to go through a forest, large blueberries patches, many piles of bear scat, over a small stream, and up a mountain.We found a great flat place to sleep. The requirements are that the tent cannot be visible to the road and we had to be at least 1/2 mile from the road. I think we were about 1.5 miles from the road and we could still see it from some places around where we slept.It rained every night we were there. It was little eerie on the mountain with all the bear scat around and we had seen 4 bears on the bus to Igloo, so I was pretty freaked out while we were here.Bear scat with berry seeds in it. Our bus driver told us that in berry season the bears can eat up to 20,000 berries in one day.It was very comfy in our tent, though our sleeping pads were not quite thick enough.The next day we went for a hike to find water. We had to find a moving creek to filter our water. Matt was excited to use our water filter. I guess giardia is prevalent in the area.We had spotted a little pond on the other side of the mountain, so we headed down there. Unfortunately it was pretty stagnant and smelled bad, so we headed back up the mountain and walked along the ridge and back down to Big Creek- a nice big, fast moving creek. So, we ended up hiking down the mountain, back up, down and then back up. It was a five hour excursion.Us filtering the water. It was very easy and really fun to try. And the water tasted delicious!The next day we packed up camp and headed back to the road to catch a bus to Polychrome- our next destination. On the way we saw several areas that looked like large animals had laid there. Maybe a moose, or caribou... maybe a bear...This is a view of where we camped near igloo from the bottom. We were in the little crest between the left two peaks.This is a view of the ridges we had to go over to find water.We had many more beautiful sights on the way to polychrome.Some places on the road are really steep.This is a view of Polychrome Glaciers, the second unit we stayed in.This place was really pretty because it was flat and had great views. But this also made it really hard to find a place to set up our tent. We spent two hours trying to find places where our tent would not be visible to the road. Matt found us the perfect spot though.We stored our food 100 yards from our tent and cooked our food 100 yards from that.You can see Matt's bathroom bush and him behind it in this picture.We found lots of signs of animals in this area. Here is a moose antler.There was wolf scat everywhere. It was a strange white color and when we took a closer look we realized it was white from the bones and fur in it.At night we could hear a pack of wolves howling. They sounded super close, but we figured the sound probably carried pretty far in the wind. We heard them about 4 times and one time we hear strange whimpering and groaning noises with some barking. Maybe after a kill...It was really cold at this place. At night we woke up cold and ended up in a lot of our clothes, fleece pants, hiking pants, two pairs of socks, a couple shirts, 3 jackets and a down vest, beanie... it was cold!We filtered water again at this unit, this time it only took an hour though- after a nice stroll down the creek.We loved this unit and were sad to leave!

Denali Wildlife

2010-08-10T12:13:00.000-07:00

Since Matt and I spent 7 nights in the backcountry of the park, we had a lot of opportunities to see wildlife. Some of the best chances were on our bus rides. We spent at least 10 hours on the buses between all of our trips. The bus drivers have a keen eye to see the animals and as they pass eachother they use hand signals to tell the other drivers what animals they just passed. The drivers talk about the "big five:" bears, wolves, caribou, dall sheep, and moose. We got pictures of all of them except the moose, though we did see one and about a million hoof prints. Besides the bus trips, we had some lucky encounters with animals while hiking as well- and no, no bear encounters from the ground.

A lot of the pictures are from far away, so you may want to click on the pictures to see a bigger version.

The dall sheep like the steep cliffs. They were also the reason the national park was first created- to protect them from poaching. The only sheep we saw were from the bus.We saw about 18 sheep on the top of this hill. They always just look like tiny white dots.This cliff is near vertical.There are zillions of arctic ground squirrels in the park. In the winter they hibernate and their body temperature can drop to below zero. We're still not sure how they do that! We also heard that the one species of frog found in the park survives by freezing solid in winter... try to figure that one out.We're pretty sure these were willow ptarmigans. They were in a group of about 20 and they moved around the ground from bush to bush making funny little clucking sounds. They lived right where we ate our meals in the polychrome glacier unit.

Ptarmigan video.

There were caribou all over the place. We saw many from the buses, sometimes they would walk right in front of the buses to cross the road. But we did have some walk right past us when we were camping.This caribou saw us when we were out for a hike but paid us no attention and walked right past us- eating grass and drinking from the stream. It looked like she was molting also, we found clumps of brown fur in a few places.

Caribou video.

We followed this wolf in our bus as it ran down the street towards a visitor center where a healthy population of arctic ground squirrels resides. When we were staying in the mountains near Igloo Creek Campground on our trek to find water we came across a wolf laying at the top of a ridge. We had just come over the top of another ridge when we saw it. It was so black I couldn't tell if it was an animal or not at first. He just laid there, yawning, eyes heavy. Not really caring about us, until he decided to walk off, down the hill.Our first night in the polychrome glaciers this red fox ran by us. He ran by, then stopped, sat and stared at us, then continued until he was past us.On our way to the road, back toward the bus to go out of the park, a small animal poked out its little head and proceeded to scurry around us for ten minutes. He was the cutest thing we saw, hopping back and forth, wanting to get close to us, but not having quite enough courage. We looked at our animal guide and we think he was a short-tailed weasel, maybe a baby.

Cutest little weasel video!

Yes, we did see several bears in the park, but luckily only form the bus. I think we saw maybe 7 bears total. We were still pretty paranoid about them, since we saw maybe fifty piles of bear scat. It was everywhere! Especially in the Igloo Mountain regioun where we stayed in the backcountry. It is eerie to see it. This sow was eating berries with her two cubs in the polychrome glacier unit.After getting tired of eating berries, the mom laid on her back and pulled her two yearling cubs close to her and began to nurse them. It was pretty awesome to see.

On our bus drive out of the park, we came across this bear in the road. He was in the unit we had been in, at the base of the mountains near igloo campground. The bus driver said that because he was darker and larger it was probably a male. Did you know that bears live into their 30's? We didn't know they lived so long. Here is a short video Matt got of the bear:

The morning we were supposed to leave the park, we woke up and saw that we were swamped in with a heavy fog. At first we felt really bad for everyone entering the park because they would never get to see anything in the park past the fog. But as the morning went on, the fog burned and a bright blue sky began to peak through. Once we were all packed and heading to the road we saw the tip of a rounded white mountain. We wondered if it could be Denali and by the time we got to the road we knew it was. So instead of heading out of the park, we took the bus back into Eielson to get a good view of the mountain. It was only the second time in 9 days that the mountain came out and we really wanted to get another good view of it. We were sure glad we went back into the park. The views were spectacular. Apparently only 5% of people who go on the buses get to see the mountain with no clouds in front of it. We considered ourselves amazingly lucky to see it twice.

We stayed right near the ridge next to the river- never knowing that a nice view of the mountain was right there.After arriving back at the entrance to the park, we went to the dog kennels they have for winter dog sled runs into the park. Dog sleds are the only method for getting into the park in winter, so the rangers use them to patrol and to do work around the park. These dogs are bred for size, thick coats, and tough feet. They love to work and as soon as a couple dogs were hooked to the sled they all started to bark and they could barely wait to run. The trainers bring the dogs out on their two hind legs because otherwise they would pull the people over. I guess they are the strongest freight hauling animal in the world pound for pound- each dog is able to pull about 100 pounds when they only weigh between 60 and 80 lbs. They have pretty long lives also- about 15-17 years but they get retired at around age 9. After that they go to a home in a cold climate where they will still be able to run. This is important because they still love running and are used to running about 1000 miles a year. We knew that Teak would totally fit in here, since he's so tough and brave and never tires on a run... The dogs loved sitting on top of their kennels.

Dogs being hooked to the sled video.

After watching the show we returned our bear canisters, ate some delicous hamburgers and drove home. Then we took long overdue showers and washed our bodies twice to get rid of the filth. It felt great and our bed felt even better!

Roadtrip Day 5- Fairbanks to Denali

2010-08-09T18:27:00.000-07:00

Before leaving Fairbanks, we went to the Large Animal Research Station which is affiliated with the University of Fairbanks. They have muskoxen, caribou, and reindeer which they study.

The muskoxen were the most interesting animals there. They survived the last ice age and are relatives of the wooly mammoth. They migrated to North America between 200,000 and 90,000 years ago. The adults weigh on average 600lbs with males being about 200lbs heavier than the females. They live in herds of about 10-20 and during mating season the males compete to be the top bull. They ram heads until one male wins. The males can be extremely aggressive. At this facility the workers only go into the pens on tractors. They said that the males have broken the fence a couple of times and that one time a particularly aggressive male broke every single wooden post in the fence and head butted a huge tire all the way across the field.

The muskoxen only have 3 natural predator: wolves, grizzley bears, and polar bears. If threatened, they will form a circle with the adults on the outside facing out and the babies on the inside. Then if a predator attacks they will head butt it over the whole group. You can see the difference between the male and female heads. The males have huge, thick horns to ram heads.The caribou were pretty cool also. We learned that reindeer are a type of caribou.

Roadtrip Day 4- Chena Hot Springs

2010-08-09T18:08:00.001-07:00

Chena Hot Springs is about one hour outside of Fairbanks. It was discovered more than 100 years ago and used by prospectors and miners to relieve their aches and pains. It is about 105 degrees and smells like sulfur. It was a fun experience, but the pool was completely natural- which I guess means a little dirty as well. And of course, after weeks of cold weather and rain, it was clear and pretty warm the day we went. On the drive over there, we spotted a moose in the middle of a pond, eating grass off the bottom of it. He would stick his head completely underwater, except his ears were still sticking out above water to listen for signs of danger. He was pretty entertaining to watch, but I think we got too close and he swam off. Yes, swam.These ducks took a swim in the 105 degree pool outside.We ate a gourmet meal of BBQ short ribs and veggies over the campfire. It was delicious!

Roadtrip Day 3- Talkeetna to Fairbanks

2010-08-09T17:37:00.000-07:00

Before we left Talkeetna, we ate breakfast at the roadhouse, again. Pancakes were so big they fell over the edges of the plate, and there was enough food for four between the two of us. We met some census workers who told us they go around on ATVs with guns in the back to take the census. Either that or helicopters. A lot harder than in socal. We stopped by the ranger station for a talk about climbing Mt. McKinley. It was more for kids, but it was still informative. Oh, and this is the size of a grizzley bear paw. My hand starts at the bottom of its paw.Here are a few pictures from our drive to Fairbanks.We passed by a fox with a big hare in its mouth right in the middle of the highway. This was the best shot we got of him.

We arrived in Fairbanks, set up camp and ate dinner by the campfire.

Roadtrip Day 2- Wasilla to Talkeetna

2010-08-09T16:35:00.001-07:00

The next part of our roadtrip took us from Wasilla to Talkeetna.In Wasilla we went to the Iditarod HQ. We saw a video about the racers and dogs and got to hold the Alaskan Husky 7-week old puppies. The Iditarod is the longest dog race in the world. Covering 1,150 miles from Anchorage to Nome, a musher and about 16 dogs typically cover the distance in about 10 days. There is a really cool short video about the race at www.iditarod.com Its pretty mesmorizing.A family from Italy came to see the dogs. I don't think that their two sons had really seen dogs before. The older boy was too scared to come see the puppies, but the younger son just walked into the kennel and sat down. The puppies immediately climbed on top of him and started to lick his face. It was pretty funny, but after a couple minutes the boy said in English, "I want out." So I helped him out. His mom came running back from the car with a huge bottle of hand sanitizer and she sanitized his whole face.All over Alaska there are these drive-thru coffee houses. Lots of them have very creative names. We liked the Aroma Borealis the best.We arrived in Talkeetna, the staging town for climbers who attempt to climb Mt. McKinley (Also called Denali- Athabascan for "The High One"). At 20,320 ft it is the tallest mountain in North America and it is also one of the most challenging mountains to climb because of its location near the arctic circle which causes crazy weather patterns on the mountain. I guess in summer it can still reach -40 degrees on the mountain and in winter it has been recorded at -100 degrees fahrenheit. I guess that at the top there is only 47% of the oxygen found at sea level. Because of the high latitude, altitude illness is a huge problem.

About 1200 people attempt to climb the mountain each season and only about 50% reach the summit. There are usually several deaths each year, mainly due to avalanches and falls through crevaces. Climbers must be flown onto the glacier with all their stuff- over 100 lbs of food and gear. They set up a cache of food and then bring half their stuff up to the next station. They are roped to their climbing partners, so that if one climber falls into a crevace hopefully the others can stop the fall. Once they reach the next station, they go back down, spend the night and bring the second half of their stuff the next day. The climb high, sleep low method helps with the altitude sickness- as most climbers do not use supplemental oxygen. But it also means that the climbers pretty much end up climbing the mountain twice. Climbers usually take about 3 weeks to climb the mountain. After the grueling trip to the top, the trip down from the summit only takes about 2 days.

Its a pretty serious mountain that is covered in clouds about 2/3 of the time. They say it is so big that it creates its own weather, as storms approach the mountain range they butt up with Denali and get caught there. Weather on the mountain can change in just a couple minutes, from sunny to whiteout conditions. We learned all this from our knowledgeable bus drivers and also the park rangers. We were totally going to climb the mountain, but we forgot to bring our mountaineering gear. And our climb up Flattop was pretty much equivalent to climbing Mt. McKinley anyway... ;)

Talkeetna was a really cute town. Lots of shops and restaurants. We ate at the Roadhouse. It had great food and free wifi. We pretty much hung out in there the whole night chatting with a woman from Maryland. We slept at a campground at the end of main street.

Roadtrip Day 1- Anchorage to Wasilla

2010-07-30T22:46:00.000-07:00

Matt and I started on our trip to visit some of the cities to the north of Alaska. These are the places we went this past two weeks: Eklutna, Palmer, Wasilla, Talkeetna, Fairbanks, Cheena Hot Springs, Denali National Park.During the first part of our trip we drove from Anchorage to Eklutna, then to Palmer and over Hatcher Pass back to Wasilla. Just about 25 miles north of Anchorage lies the oldest native village in the Anchorage area: Eklutna. The inhabitants of the Dena'ina Athabascan village settled in the area over 800 years ago and the Russian Orthodox missionaries didn't arrive until the 1840's. There is a Russian Orthodox church in the village and many of the customs reflect that influence. The graveyard is especially interesting as the families will create a wooden building to house the departed's soul. The Athabascans put their own spin on the tradition by including blankets to make the spirit comfortable and other subtle changes.This is the inside of the new Russian Orthodox church which still holds a service for the people of the village.We found it really interesting that the religious pictures contained images of the native people in their tradtional native clothing.We ate our lunch at Eklutna Lake nearby.We passed through Palmer in the Matanuska-Susitna Valley (Mat-su Valley). This area is known for its gigantic vegetables which they show off at the state fair in August. Palmer farmers holds the world record for a 42 lb beet, 39 lb broccoli, 64 lb cantaloupe, 19 lb carrot, 63 lb celery, 105 lb kale, and 25 lb mushroom just to name a few. We went by a musk ox farm, and though we didn't pay to see the animals, we did go into the gift shop to look at the qiviut products. Qiviut is the wool of the musk ox, stronger and 8 times warmer than sheep's wool and softer and finer than cashmere. It is extremely expensive- around $300 a pound. But sorry mom, it doesn't felt.After that we went up to Independence Mine- a once booming gold mine built in the early 1900's but now a deserted ghost town.

We drove over Hatcher Pass from Palmer to the Parks Highway in Willow, which is about 49 miles and the views were amazing. The only thing is that about 20 miles of the road is composed of dirt covered in potholes. They call it washboarding when you drive over it because it is so bumpy. You end up driving 30 mph max.We drove back down to Wasilla, ate at a Chili's, and stayed at a campground nearby. Here are a couple more cool mushrooms we saw at the campground.

Week of Fishing

2010-07-23T22:35:00.000-07:00

Matt and I just spent the last week fishing on the Kenai River. The sockeye salmon were running last week which means that they were swimming in from the ocean to begin their journey to the spawning grounds where they were born. Some salmon travel over 1000 miles to their spawning grounds. We were fishing during the second run of salmon, which are much bigger numbers. On monday there were almost 83,000 salmon that entered the river from the ocean. And over 1 million salmon make up the entire second run, lasting a week or so. Thats a lot of fish.

The sockeye salmon (reds) are supposed to be the strongest fighting of all the pacific salmon pound for pound. We saw many people snap their lines and even their poles trying to get these fish in. An average size is about 6-8 lbs.

So the limit is 3 fish per day that you can catch. We caught 12 fish last week. We filleted them and froze them. Now we have like 50 lbs of alaskan sockeye salmon sitting in our freezer. We are planning on smoking most of it although we're also thinking about lox... yum. Yes. We did dissect this fish. The egg sacs are huge! The gills are on the left, the heart below it. The esophagus is attached to the stomach, the small intestines are those strings, and the liver is next to the small intestines.We've seen a bunch of moose, they're like deer up here, but huge! A mom and her baby walked through the backyard at the kenai house right next to the window. She was the size of a large horse.This boat is parked on the beach behind the kenai house. Behind it you can see Mt. Redoubt- a volcano which erupted last year.More pretty views driving home to Anchorage.

Dip-netting

2010-07-23T21:09:00.000-07:00

Last weekend we went dip-netting with a family on the Kenai River. Dip-netting is for Alaska residents only where they may get 25 salmon plus 10 extra per additional family member for personal use each year. The family we went with had 3 kids so they could get a total of 65 salmon per year just from dip netting, it doesn't include pole fishing. You're still allowed to catch 3 per day with your pole.

So they go down to the river, some families will spend the weekend on the river fishing. Many families camped on the river with the whole family, dog included. They use a 5ft by 5ft net on the end of a long stick and walk in the river holding the net out. They keep the net in the water until a fish gets caught. Then it is brought onto shore, killed, and the net goes back out.
In this way, you can catch like 30, 40 fish in a day. Sometimes even more.

Its interesting because there are native Alaskans speaking their languages, Russian Alaskans in their long dresses and skirts speaking their language, and then lots of english speakers. Five-year-olds driving ATVs, people killing the salmon with mini baseball bats, rocks, their fists. Fish heads and guts everywhere you look. Its just a spectacle. Not to mention that there were like 500 people on each shore. It was a really fun experience. Since we weren't residents we couldn't help them dip net, couldn't even touch the net by law, but we helped kill and clean the fish. Lots of fun. Very interesting.

Russian River Campgrounds

2010-07-15T17:32:00.000-07:00

We went down to the Russian River for a couple nights, which is also along the Kenai Peninsula. We took our time driving down and stopped at the Portage Glacier turnoff to take a look. And we were so glad that we did because we saw some of the most spectacular views we have seen yet.This one was the absolute best thing we've seen so far. Tons of tiny waterfalls falling of the mountain right next to a glacier.It was really windy here because of the glacier winds, currents of wind that are formed from the melting glaciers. There was an especially strong wind here because there are three glaciers in the area. Unfortunately we couldn't see Portage glacier because you had to take a boat onto the water to actually see it, but what we did see was awesome. Everytime we come across a river I try to get a picture of it because they all are such a pretty shade of blue. As the glaciers melt, they scrape the mountain underneath and this glacial silt ends up in the water. These pictures finally do them some justice.We stopped at a little town called Hope that was a gold rush town back in the day. We ate some fireweed-honey icecream. Fireweed is a flower that grows wild here, they make it into jams, syrups and I guess icecream. It tastes like honey. It was really good. Matt finally got his fishing license around 8 pm on Monday night. At 9:30 we went out with our neighbors at the campground to try out some fishing. Its fun that you can go fishing at 9:30 at night. Both Dave and Wade caught rainbow trout but they got away as they were getting them to the shore. And we saw our first bear! It was on the shore opposite us, bearly visible... Matt didn't get any fish but it was a fun outing.The next morning Matt went down to the Russian river again with our other neighbors for some more fishing. As we got down there a female brown bear was wading in the water on the other side of the shore. There were several fishermen and the bear could probably smell the fish. Ok, warning moms, the next part gets a little scary. If you don't want to hear about the bears, then skip to the next section. When I returned with lunch around 1, Matt wasn't at the river but up in the parking lot where you walk down from. He said that he had to stop fishing because of all the bears. Several more bears came, including another sow and her cub and Matt and the other fishermen had to keep running across the river to get out of their way. This part of the river is much more narrow- maybe 20 yards across. This means the bears were like 20 yards away. They stole several fish that people had caught, even sticking their paws underwater and getting to the fish that the fishermen tied up. The bears didn't seem to care about the humans being there at all, they just knew how to get an easy meal. People were telling us that if the bear keeps going around humans and it habituated to them, it will be put down. Too dangerous. I guess there is 1 black bear per square mile in the kenai peninsula, some places are even closed for fishing because of the high population of bears.This is where the Russian river and Kenai river come together. There is a russian ferry to take you from one side to the other.This is our campsite at the Russian River. We had a great view of the mountains in the background and could even see a little of the Kenai River.That night we went for a hike up to the Russian Falls and Russian Lakes. It was about 9 miles round trip. We set out to do just a little stroll, but ended up walking the whole way. We started at 6pm and got back at 9.The Russian Falls are famous for the salmon that jump up the waterfall to get to their spawning ground. As we got to the waterfall, I walked out to the viewing plank and couldn't believe what I saw. There was a brown bear on the shore eating a bright red salmon. The sea gulls were swarming around, hoping to get the scraps. After the bear was done with the fish, it got into the river and proceeded to go fishing. There is a video for you to watch. It is amazing!!!

In the next picture you can see the dark shadows of the fish in the water. They are resting in the more calm areas of the current before heading farther upriver.
So, as we continued on our hike Matt got pretty hot. So he rolled up his pant legs to cool himself off. We had put bug spray on, but Matt didn't have any on his legs. I kept telling him he had mosquitos on his calves and swatted them a couple of times. Just looking at the mosquitos around him made me shiver. Also, he had a small following of gnats around his head. He must have smelled pretty tasty.This mushroom was bigger than my face!Here you can see some of the glacier behind Matt. It looks like a very still lake. I guess it kind of is.When we got back from our hike, it was pretty late, but still light out. So Matt decided to go fishing. A couple of hours later, when I was about to go to sleep at midnight, Matt returned and asked if I was hungry. He had been the only fisherman down at the river, where all the bears had been earlier. He caught a fish and filleted it right there. The seagulls came and he kept waiting for the bears to arrive, but they never came. We grilled the fish and ate the whole thing. Delicious.The next day I noticed Matt's calves. They were covered in mosquito bites. We counted 58 mosquito bites! But lucky for Matt, he doesn't feel the bites and they didn't bother him at all. It was still pretty disgusting.Driving to Kenai from the Russian River, we passed by a medical clinic owned by one of the guys Matt was fishing with. We recognized it by the sign he had been telling us about. Cheaper and faster than going to the ER.We passed by a Sawfest, wood carving done by chain saws. It was a festival and we stopped there to watch the guys at work and grab some food. We had a delicious reindeer dog (big juicy sausage with, yes, reindeer meat) and homemade cheesecake. Best we've ever had!We arrived at Kenai and it was a bright beautiful day.

Jog up Flattop Mountain

2010-07-10T21:12:00.000-07:00

When we first arrived in Alaska, Al drove us up to a trail head in the Chugach State Park. The drive was so foggy though that we couldn't see anything but we got out to the empty parking lot and walked around a bit. He told us about some trails that started there and we kept it in mind to return soon. About a week later one of Al's neighbors told us about his friend who runs up Flattop Mountain and back down in about 45 minutes. That was one of the hikes that started from that trail head, so we thought it would be a great workout to do.
Yesterday we decided to go for a jog up Flattop. We put on our running clothes and drove to the trail head. When we got there the parking lot was completely full (like 70+ cars) and we had to wait for a spot. We knew that it was the most hiked mountain in Alaska, but this- we were not expecting.
We started our run on a steep incline and almost immediately realized that running may not be possible. People were in full hiking gear and I've never felt my lungs burn so bad (from breathing so hard). I stopped running after about 30 seconds or so. We continued to jog a little on the flatter uphill parts and walk up the super steep parts. It got steeper and steeper, there were places with narrow stairs, lots of loose rock and a sharp drop off the edge. The last half of the hike you have to actually climb the mountain- with your hands to make it up. Climbing up steep rocks and crevices.
But we did see lots of kids, older people, and many dogs- even little dogs making the climb.
We did make it to the top. It took us 40 minutes (1 hour 20 minutes round trip) and I don't know if it would even be possible for us to EVER jog the entire way up or down- too steep.
It was a really pretty hike! Great views of Anchorage, the Kenai Peninsula and even Mt. McKinley on a clear day. The top is very flat and rocky and windy. We are so glad we went, even if it wasn't the nice easy jog we were expecting. We hope to do the hike several more times.

Fourth of July in Seldovia

2010-07-09T21:45:00.000-07:00

After we had been in Alaska for several days, we realized that the fourth of July was getting pretty close. So, I googled what there was to do in Alaska on the 4th. One of the several options that came up was from a town called Seldovia. Only accessible by plane or boat, it was called charming and Alaska's best kept secret. With a population of only 286, the entire town participates in the fourth of July festivities which include a 5k run in the morning, pancake breakfast, parade, games like canoe jousting and log rolling, food boothes and arts and crafts.

We took the boat over early in the morning. It was about an hour and a half boat ride where we saw several sea otters floating on their backs with their feet out of the water watching all of us pass by. We arrived in Seldovia around 9:30am with all of our hiking and camping stuff in our backpacks. We didn't want to head out to Outside Beach where we were going to camp just yet so we asked the Harbor Master if we could store our stuff somewhere. She told us she didn't know of a place, but that we could walk up the street and put it in one of her cabins that she rents out. we couldn't believe that she would show strangers such hospitality. So we thanked her and stashed our stuff there. After that we watched the parade, set up camp on the beach, ate some food and watched the canoe jousting.

So... we were really cold, put on our beanies and down jackets and still people were volunteering to go out in a canoe and potentially be dunked in water. That was when we realized that Alaskans are tough, and we are not. We must have watched for a couple of hours, it was actually really entertaining to see people knock each other into the water with oars wrapped with heavy styrofoam. There were lots of soaking wet freezing people, some hot tempers, a little blood... The winners were some local boys from seldovia, go figure they knew the strategy. After the games, one of the local churches had a potluck and service. We went, even though out-of-towners totally stick out like sore thumbs. We ate a lot of great food and went to their service. There were lots of traditional American songs and a short sermon. Very nice, only a handful of people. And I have to admit that I might have done a head bob while trying desperately to stay awake. I know that is so rude and I really did try my hardest to stay awake, but it had been a long day... We went back to the beach after that, ate our canned beans and tomato soup, and slept relatively well.

To get to and from town, except for the first hike where we walked a round-about way along a road, we took the "Otterbahn" trail- a 3/4 mile trail through the forest, tall trees, berry fields, wooden planks. It was a great walk everyday. No bears.
The next day we slept in and hung around the beach. We walked around the tide pools and when the sun came out we took a nap on the beach- very nice. I guess there are supposed to be 12 different species of sea stars in the tide pools, but we saw none. We had lunch and then walked into town. We checked out the nature center/ small museum and read about the history of Seldovia.
The town area was inhabited by native people until the Russians established the area as a fur trading post because of the high populations on sea otters. Many of the areas in Alaska are influenced by the Russians, since many of the first explorers of the region were Russian. Thats not hard to imagine considering that the distance from mainland Russia to mainland Alaska is only 59 miles and from any part of Russia to any part of Alaska is only 1.2 miles. I guess Seldovia used to be one of the most important fishing hubs in Alaska since it was the farthest northwest seaport that didn't freeze over for the winter. But then there was a 9.2 magnitude earthquake which decimated the city. Since the tides in Seldovia can rise over 26 feet every 6 hours, much of the town was flooded and had to be completely rebuilt. During that time, the fishing industry was moved to Homer and the population fell from 2000 to less that 300. After learning all about Seldovia's history, we tried to find a place to eat. We checked out several places which were all closed or expensive and as we were leaving one of the shops, a woman ran out asking us to come back in and chat with her friend. Her friend asked us if we had been looking for a place to take showers, and we told her we were just looking for a place to eat. This woman was the MC for the canoe jousting games and we had chatted with her and her husband at church the night before. She invited us to dinner at her inlaws house and insisted we come. Her husband had grown up in Seldovia and she was from Fairfield in northern California. They met at Biola University in socal, had six kids, and now lived in Colorado. We felt awkward at first but she and her family were so kind and friendly that they made us feel right at home. Her inlaws were both from LA, but moved up to a small town above the arctic circle to teach english. Before they knew it, they had fallen in love with Alaska, had adopted an native Alaskan daughter and were calling Alaska home. When they found Seldovia they knew they wanted to raise their family there. We ate a delicious meal and before we knew it, the woman's father-in-law was offering to give us a tour of Seldovia Bay on his boat. At first we refused his offer, since they had already shown us so much kindness, but they assured us that he loved to go out on his boat and that it wasn't an inconvenience, that they'd love to. So we accepted.

So long story short, we got an amazing boat ride around Seldovia bay, a history lesson, saw a half dozen bald eagles and sea otters and the many jelly fish currently residing in the waters. I even got a boat driving lesson where he showed me how to bring the boat on top of the water, since it was a planar type of boat and sat on top of the water rather than plowing through the water like V-shaped boats- much faster he assured me. It was really fun and we will never forget Seldovia nor its kind and generous people.

The next day we ate some delicious fish and chips from the Madfish Restaurant and took our boat back to Homer. We drove up to Kenai, saw another moose plus moose prints in the sand at the house then spent the night.

On the way home we stopped in Ninilchik, a russian village, and saw the russian orthodox church there.In Kenai, we saw our first sunset. It was over the water, on the beach. It was beautiful.

Down to Kenai and Homer for the Weekend

2010-07-09T13:15:00.000-07:00

The city of Seldovia has a great fourth of july celebration. So we decided to go down there for the weekend. The only way to reach Seldovia is to take a boat or plane across the Kachemak Bay from Homer. So we planned to drive to Kenai and spend a night there and then drive to Homer and spend the night before going to Seldovia the next day. Al has houses in both Kenai and Homer, so it made it very convenient to travel down the Kenai Peninsula. Its about a 3 hour drive from Anchorage to Kenai and another 2 hours to Homer.The drive down to Kenai is really pretty, I guess you can sometimes see Beluga whales along the coast. We didn't unfortunately. When the tide is low, there are huge mud flats which become exposed. Apparently, when this mud mixes with the ocean water as the tide comes back in the mud becomes like quick sand and if you get stuck out there, it can be impossible to become unstuck. I guess the locals will never forget when a young newlywed couple got stuck in the mud on their ATV. The woman hopped into the mud and got stuck. Her husband worked for two hours to free her and managed to free one leg. A rescue team was called in and worked to free her as well, but they had to stop the attempt as the tide came in and had to watch her drown. Terrible story... and we've been warned by several people not to walk out in the mud.Here is the view from the back door of the house in Kenai. It is right on the beach.Matt set up our new tent in the backyard and we slept in it that night.The next day we drove down to Homer.When we arrived, as we drove up the hill the fog got thicker and thicker and we almost couldn't see the turnoff to the house.This is the view from the front of the Homer house across the Kachemak Bay. You can see one of the glaciers that make it impossible to drive to around the bay to Seldovia.We drove down to the Homer Spit which is a large protrusion of land, with the longest road in the world into the ocean- a drive which takes about 15 minutes. It is a place where fishing boats come in and out and we even saw a gigantic cruise ship that docked there. There are many shops, restaurants, boat tours, and fishing excursion places along the spit. I guess it is world renowned for its halibut and oysters. We tried the halibut, thought it was ok, but loved the salmon, shrimp, and scallops. Best seafood we've ever had. These guys can fillet a halibut in about 15 seconds.
The spent the night in the Homer house and set out the next day, July 4th, for Seldovia.

Eagle River Hike

2010-07-09T11:52:00.000-07:00

The first hike we went on was out of the Eagle River Nature Center in the Chugach State Park- which is the third largest state park in the US. It was about a 45 minute drive from Anchorage. Everywhere we have seen so far is incredibly green with tons of wildflowers blooming. There are lakes and rivers all over and mountains in every direction you look.

I guess there are lots of bears and moose around, though we have yet to see or hear any bears. But we have bear bells and bear pepper spray just to be safe. Its funny, the pepper spray for bears is less potent than the type used for humans. I guess the animal rights people insisted that it be somewhat humane. Although if a bear decided to attack me, I'd rather have the strong stuff.

Here are some pictures of the plants and fungi we saw on our hike.

The Cottonwood trees are in bloom right now and everywhere we go these white seeds float through the air.

On the drive home we saw our first moose and her calf right on the side of the freeway.

Arriving in Anchorage

2010-07-09T11:01:00.000-07:00

The flight over to Anchorage was very easy. A quick five hours and we arrived at 1 am. The best part of the plane ride was that around 11:30pm we looked out the window and the sky looked as if it was dusk and the sun was setting. It stayed that way the rest of the flight. It was really beautiful.

Al surprised us by picking us up, which was a really nice surprise. From there it was a quick drive to their house. The sun sets here around 11:30pm and rises around 4:30am. Even so, there are really only a couple hours of actual darkness. I think we really only saw it dark when we first arrived. This picture is taken out their front door at 11pm.

The weather has been overcast since we arrived. Drizzly and in the 50's and 60's.

We had a few days with Al, Calle, and Taylor before they left. We went to a lake where we saw lots of people with their dogs. Made me think of how much fun Teak would have in Alaska.