The Fabulous Kenai Peninsula...

We arrived in Soldotna without incident. We had to stop in to take care of some business, and to let Craig try for a king salmon. Alas, he had fun but no salmon bake for me.

I, on the other hand, was off to the Kenai, Alaska to tour the old town. Another church and lots of historic buildings, some being used as homes and businesses. It was a nice place and since it was Saturday, the Kenai Saturday Market was going. Lots of cool things, but I digress.

St. Nicholas Memorial Chapel

Of course, I decided on the walking tour, since it was a beautiful day. There was a lovely park, historic cabins, and The Chapel of St. Nicholas.

Erik Hansen Scout park was a lovely spot overlooking the bay, named for the son of a local doctor who died of brain cancer.

I had lunch in one of the history buildings that now houses Veronica's Cafe. Coffee and a piece of coffee cake so big I had to eat it in stages, and still couldn't' eat all the lovely, crumbly topping. I needed the walking tour after that.

On to the the Kenai Historic Cabin Park, mentioned by the young man in the visitor center. When I arrived, he was the docent; and since it was a slow day, I had a private tour. The cabins were set up to represent how they would serve in the community. There was a school, a general store, a trapper cabin and a cabin that actually belonged to a local woman, who acted as doctor, midwife and counsellor to the community. The young man had met a few of the people he mentioned and has some interesting stories. There were artifacts, some of which I had never seen. 


Like Lydia E. Pinkham's Vegetable Compound, "for relieving hot flashes and certain other symptoms..." My ears perked up and I read the ingredients and instructions: 13 1/2 % alcohol, used solely as a solvent and preservative, Hmmmmm. And how to take this elixir? One tablespoon, four times a day. Again, Hmmmmm. How do you keep track? 

And after the "cure", should you really use this appliance? A Coleman brand iron that runs on white gas, a camp fuel that is a flammable as gasoline. The irons were manufactured from the 1920's til the 1970's. You filled the tank with gas, turned on the flow and lit it with a match. They improved with time, but I imagine there were more than a few mishaps. Notice the burn marks on the handle?








These kind of things always make me glad to live in the present time.

The blue color is nice, though.






South of Kenai, along the coast, they launch their boats with tractors. No docks, just a temporary building with 4 tractors out front. These people are ingenious and won't allow a little thing like a lack of a dock slow down the fishing. This picture was taken from another waterfront state campground with magnificent views of several mountains that make up part of the Ring of Fire. 

These Alaskans are really spoiled.

Signs You Don't See Very Often...

I wanted to do a post about some of the signs we've seen along the way. Some of them are just a little different, some of the are funny and some make you go, "Hmmmmmm."

In no particular order:

Would love to see this.

Only in Alaska.

Signs you hope you never use...

This would constitute a bad day.














Who doesn't like cupcakes with their gold?

This sign was on the side of the pipeline, outside of Fairbanks. Is it just me, or is it common sense not to climb on something you don't own that is filled with millions of gallons of oil? I think the more amazing thing is that they feel like they need to tell you that you could be injured, since climbing on a huge, round pipe is "difficult".

You can't fix stupid...

The Russian Connection...

We are off to Soldotna, for a little salmon fishing. Hail to the King, Salmon. But on the way, I had to make a trip to the top of Skyline Drive. It was our first clear day, and like we were told, you could see forever. The whole city, the spit, mountains and glaciers. It was beautiful, and as usual the pictures don't do it justice.

We stopped at many more viewpoints on the way. Each view more amazing than the next. As usual, I wanted to lallygag along the way, so I stole the truck and went looking for old, Russian churches. Craig headed into Soldotna, but he tells me that he did stop at the view points. I knew he could do it.

The first stop on my drive was Nikolaevsk, Alaska, just outside of Anchor Point on the Sterling Highway. The town was settled by Old Believers of the Russian Orthodox Church, and remains that way to this day. I stopped by the small church and then, a sign that read "RV, Cafe, Gifts" led me to the Samovar Cafe and Nina Fefelov. I had some lunch and learned a lot about Nina and her town. The food was excellent and the experience was a hoot. I left without any Russian souvenirs and I did not dress in the traditional costume, but did take some of her special tea. I only hope I can do it justice.

RV Park

Samovar Cafe

Pelmini, Russian Dumplings

The next stop was Ninilchik, Alaska and the Transfiguration of Our Lord Church, on a hill overlooking the bay. It was a quiet walk to the top, and an amazing view. It is still an active graveyard, with a section devoted to the American Legion.

I could see that being laid to rest near a quaint church overlooking the sea and surrounded by wildflowers wouldn't be a bad place to be.

Spittin' in Homer...

We are in Homer, camped on the famous "Homer Spit". Staring at the water, again. I've gotten used to this and don't know how I will manage when we head back home. I expect everywhere to have amazing views and cost $12. Sigh.

Homer is a small fishing village, but has some interesting things. We caught up with Bob and Pam Nodine there. They've been on their own in Anchorage and found lots of fun things to do there. We wandered out to Lands End Resort for drinks at the Chart Room. Then we managed to squeeze in dinners at Captain Patties Fish House. Don't miss the halibut. Yummy and what a view.

And we wished Bob a belated Happy Birthday. Cake and ice cream are always a hit with this group. Bob has turned 70 years young. Check out his blog as he reflects on that milestone.

The group is headed north tomorrow to take care of a little coach maintenance. An Aqua-Hot tale of woe. Ask Tom and Paula about that one.

Craig and I will hang out another day to see some more of Homer, and maybe go fishing. We'll see.

Alaska: The Last Frontier

So we were looking around for something to do for our last day in Homer. We first thought of visiting Seldovia, AK. Another quaint Alaska village accessible only by air or water. But a 45 minute ferry ride and slightly inclement weather caused us to rethink the decision. So I'm back on the hunt and discover that the Kilcher Homestead Living Museum of the Discovery Channels Alaska: The Last Frontier is only 12 miles east of Homer. Who knew? I would have thought something like that would have been in some literature around town but no. And they give tours. We love the show, so that was right up our alley.

We called the number and headed over. We find out that there has been so much rain that the road is bad and we had to walk the last 1/3 of a mile. In the mud. That's probably why our tour group of 10 ended up a tour group of 2.

On the way in we pass a truck, and the driver is Otto Kilcher. And he really does love junk. We walked past rusted cars, old trailers and a house in two separate pieces. On the was back out we were passed by Otto's wife, Charlotte, in her cute orange Subaru. She waved and we waved back. 



All star gazing aside, the homestead was just as they picture it on TV. You can see the Barn and the cabin where the 8 Kilcher children were raised. We thought it was interesting that only the two boys are featured on the show. Hmmm.

The young lady that gave the tour was a  relative from Switzerland, come to spend some time on the farm and intending to stay the winter. Good luck to her.

Then I was on to the Pratt Museum. There was a bear art exhibit along with a fully articulated skeleton. They have a lot of local history, including the Exxon Valdez spill. I remember when that happened, but like anything that happens far away, was not really on my radar. So imagine my surprise when I discovered how large the spill was. I used their plastic model and laid it over Tennessee. Wow! 

Can you imagine?

Happy 4th of July...

From a small town in America. That's just about the best place to be on the 4th.

We spent the 4th of July in Seward. They are known around Alaska for having one of the best celebrations. 

It starts with fireworks at 12:01 A.M. on the morning of the 4th. It doesn't get dark so it feels like the sun has just gone down. Boats came out onto the water, a group of kayakers paddled out and rafted up and we sat by a warm fire. It was a perfect evening. 

Next morning we watched the Mount Marathon Race. The race is 3.1 miles overall, up and down the 3,022 ft tall Mount Marathon. We watched the mens race from the campground. The course looks like it is straight up and even straighter back down. I don't know if you can see it in the picture, but many runners slid part way down the mountain on the patch of snow. Brrrr. 

Tiny colored dots are people

Tiny dots are people on the snow.

The Mount Marathon Race is one of the oldest foot races in the U.S. and as is the way of anything fun or interesting, started as a bar bet. The bet was that you couldn't run up and down Mount Marathon in under an hour. I would not take that bet. But many have. Like these ladies to the left. The front three are the 1st, 2nd and 3rd place winners. 








First place went to Christy Marvin, winning for the second time with her personal best time. That in itself is amazing. And she doesn't even look that tired at the finish line. 


We rounded out the day with a 4th of July meal and some time to reflect on where this country is going. 








I am feeling pretty good. While watching the parade, oh, didn't I mention a parade? With floats, boy scouts, Smokey the Bear, classic cars and pirates. Pirates? Not sure what they were doing but it looked like they were having fun. As did this woman, walking her salmon.





Our feel good moments came when one of the floats filled with children went by and one of the boys was trying to hand out small flags. In his excitement, he tossed it to someone, who could not catch it before it hit the ground. The young woman next to us was a little upset and remarked that he shouldn't throw the flag. We agreed, but knew the boy didn't understand. Before we could get out from behind the barrier, a young man came out between the floats and picked up that flag and another one. 


I think the young folks get a bad rap sometimes, but maybe they aren't so different from us.

Happy 4th, ya'll.

Some Cool Sights...

We went out to see the only glacier in Kenai Fjords National Park that can be accessed via hiking. It was a little cloudy but we went anyway. It started to rain just as we reached the trailhead. By the time we reached the glacier we were soaked. We didn't spend any time there and just hurried back. Redo next day for the ladies. It was beautiful, sunny and warm. Tom remembers when you could touch the glacier, but it has receded to the point where that is not possible. We enjoyed ourselves anyway, and got in our 10,000 steps.









Next, we decided to explore the Park via a cruise with Major Marine Tours. Luckily we had another beautiful sunny day. We spent about 7 hours cruising the park on a nicely appointed catamaran, with a park ranger to narrate the tour. Ranger Chad was great and we learned a lot. We've all seen glaciers before, but Craig and I had only seen them from a cruise ship. Our viewpoint was from above the glacier. It was much more impressive seeing them from the water. And they are that blue.  




We saw humpback whales, lots of them, and one breached about 100 yards from the bow. That was cool, but of course I have no photo. I get so excited that I forget to take the camera or forget to take a picture. After that, I just didn't take the camera and watched as the whales splashed, slapped their tales on the water and pushed their noses out of the water as they took in a big meal. I think that is a good thing, though. I don't want to miss the experience while trying to document it. The pictures will never show anyone what I saw and they are never the way I remember. Does that make me a bad blogger? 

In the same area where we saw the whale breach, we also saw a pod of orcas. That was not something we had seen before.








Trying to redeem by blogger status, I did include a couple of pics, puffins and sea lions. Just cause they are cute. 

Only two more days until the 4th of July and the Mount Marathon Race. Stay tuned.