I know it's been awhile since our last blog post, but we are currently in Canada with very limited internet!! This has been somewhat of a challenge, but we are working through it. More on that in the future. But for now, back to ALASKA...
Our schedule brought us to Quartz Creek Recreation Area for the July 4th week. We wanted to be somewhere quiet for the holiday and this place was top notch. It isn't far from Cooper Landing, but sits directly on Kenai Lake. Our site had a lake view, through the trees, and a path directly down to the lake.
The weather was warm enough for kayaking, "the first of this journey". The surrounding mountains were beautiful and the crystal clear water was blue green in color. We enjoyed several days on the water, visiting the local brewery, sightseeing in the jeep and catching another fish (which we have no clue as to the species, LOL🤪). We did return this one to the lake to grow up.
Moving south down the highway, we ended up close to Seward and decided to spend an extra week there. We found a great place right off Resurrection Bay, Miller's Landing. Our campsite was adjacent to the creek with a view of the Bay.
Upon our arrival to Miller's Landing, we noticed (2) large camping rigs wrapped with advertising for the YouTube channel, "Deer Meat for Dinner". The Arrington family is from Jupiter Fl, where we lived for many years. Rob went to school with my nephew and his family worked/played with many friends of ours. Visit their YouTube channel! It's amazing how small our world really is!!
Seward was a mixed bag of tricks for us. Resurrection Bay is beautiful, but the weather did not cooperate for most of our stay (cold, windy & wet).
The town has a few very unique restaurants, including one in a school bus and another in train cars.
We did enjoy a hike at Exit Glacier. This is an amazing hike which reaches very close to the glacier. The entire trail is marked with year signs to show how the glacier is shrinking. We found one as close as we could to our birth year!
The second week of our visit, we had reservations at a campground right on the bay in the downtown area. We had a gorgeous view of the Bay, but the weather interfered somewhat. We were also overrun by tourists walking right beside and in front of our motorhome day and night. One of the things we disliked about the town was the amount of people there. Most of this is from cruise ships, sometimes 2 a day. Nothing wrong with a busy town, just not our "cup of tea". Wish we could have stayed at Miller's Landing, but that's the major problem with having reservations.
We booked a fishing charter and headed out to sea on another blustery rainy day. It turned out great though, as we caught halibut, cod, black rockfish and one comical looking yellow-eyed rockfish. That's what happens when you come up fast from a depth of 500ft 😳. We came back to the dock with well over 100 lbs of fish and then had to clean/package them for the freezer. We ended up with over 60 lbs cleaned.
We also had a sightseeing cruise here, but really thought it would be cancelled, due to fog, rain & wind. Sound familiar?? But cancellations don't happen often and this day was no exception. We donned our foul weather gear and boarded the boat for an adventure. We were limited as to where we could go because of weather, but the captain made the best of it. We were delighted by eagles, otters, puffins, kittiwakes nesting on the rock walls and most of all, the sighting of a Humpback whale. It turned out to be a pretty good day, considering the dismal skies.
Interesting tidbit of information...at the end of our cruise, the captain informed us she was due at her home in an hour for a video interview with ESPN. Turns out she is one of the coaches of Lydia Jacoby, the first Alaskan swimmer to win gold, during the last Olympics. She is definitely Seward's sweetheart and hero!
We became aware of the fact that Seward is considered the mural capital of Alaska. We took a day to drive around town and find as many murals as possible. There are a lot !!!! Here is a sampling.
After 2 weeks in Seward, we headed back down the highway to Soldotna and Chuck & Val's house. We were looking forward to more salmon fishing during the late Sockeye salmon run. We went bank fishing on the Kenai River several days and enjoyed an evening boat ride to watch the dip netting fishing process. Alaskan residents are allowed to dip net salmon during certain days of the fishing season. Some dip net by boat and others stand in the water by the shore. The process is fairly simple; hold the net in the water and wait until a salmon runs into it!
We were not allowed to participate, but we enjoyed watching the process. The 2 people on our boat caught 23 salmon in the largest hand held nets we have ever seen.
Chuck and Val's house sits up on a hill above a creek that leads to the Kenai River. It is a beautiful spot, with a long path down to the water (boardwalk & steps). We are so thankful for their hospitality and hope to see them at Southern Tides in Florida this winter.
Throughout our stay, we spent some time processing the fish we had caught and ended up with filets, burgers, patties and even 2 cases of canned salmon.
Chuck and Val hosted a fish fry our last night for everyone, and we had a great time. Good food and new friends...It doesn't get any better!!!
In addition to our motorhome, Chuck and Val also hosted friends from Switzerland, who come every year for the salmon run. We really enjoyed meeting Rudy, Hans and all the others from Switzerland who joined the fish fry.
One of the amazing things about Alaska is how the wildlife live and exist everywhere, including residential subdivisions. We had a bear visit one day as evidenced by its scat, a moose meandering around the boardwalk one night, and a gorgeous caribou dining and trotting through the streets.
Needless to say, after all the fishing we have done, we have fully stocked freezers. We looked into shipping some to our kids, but at almost $300 for 10 lbs, forget it!!! We even shopped for additional freezers but couldn't find anything small enough. We fit everything in our 2 freezers and stopped salmon fishing early, as we had no more room!! We probably needed a break anyway. LOL
On a final note, our North America map is filling in nicely and our sticker collection is growing like crazy. We collect them from other RV'ers we meet on the road, national parks we have visited and unique stops along the way. We will post pics again at the end of this journey.
Until next time...which hopefully will be sooner than later...😊
NEXT UP: ALASKA - PART 4 "BACK TO THE SEA, INTERIOR ALASKA, AND ICE ICE BABY"
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