Saturday - Now I know I am a Tropical Girl!

I should have realized that today was going to be one of those days when I unplugged my I-phone this morning to discover that it is totally dead. Won’t turn on or off - just dead. I guess it has gone to the great cell lot in the sky, but not having it is making my trip a bit more difficult. After I paid respects to my phone, we headed into Homer for a bit. I stopped off at the Sourdough Express Bakery for my morning coffee and then we headed to the Homer Saturday Market. It was not very big but there were some great things there made by local artists. I purchased a necklace that is a round piece of wood with pieces of shells inlaid on it to make a mountain and stars. The artist was very nice and I am excited to have something very cool from Homer!  I took this picture for Tia - she loves markets as much as I do.



After the market, we headed toward the spit to go on our Halibut Cove trip. We arrived at the boat which was a smaller boat with very limited inside seating. The wind was blowing and it was SO COLD. Even tho I was wearing layers, I just could not think about spending another day freezing my, well, "you know what" off. There was the possibility of getting one of the few seats inside the boat, however, with the winds the water was sure to be rough. I get sea sick on boats and especially when seated in a confined inside area. This just did not seem FUN to me and especially since the cruise to Halibut Cover was 1 ½ hours each way. I sent Dave on the trip and I stayed behind. My first thought was to find a cab and head to the Spa, but after reading the brochure, they are closed on Saturday (weird). Then, I thought maybe I would cab it to the ATT store in Homer and see what is wrong with my phone. I found out that the ATT store is also closed on Saturday - what is up with that???? I guess I was surprised in the first place that there was even an ATT store in Homer. So, I shopped a bit, stopped for Halibut & Chips at lunch and now I am cozied up in the motor home until 4pm when I go back to meet Dave. We have pretty much checked out all of the little places here in Homer, but there are a couple of things that we saw that we want to go back and get. Since I don’t have many pictures from today - here are a couple of pics of the souveniors that we have found along the way.

This is the fish print that Dave picked out for his Birthday Present

My purple hat that I purchsed the first day here at the Anchorage Saturday Market.

I got these bracelets at the Homer Market, they are woven out of Cedar.  I thought they were unique!

This is the pendant that I got today at the Homer Market.  The mountains and stars are inlaid chips of sea shells.

I got this Hoodie at the Sourdough Express Bakery.  I thought it was cheerful.

When I went back over to the pier to meet Dave, the fishing boats were coming in.  We have been watching them hang fish all week, but this time, they brought in a HUGE Halibut!  I had to take a picture of it!  You can see, it is almost as tall as the fish monger - it weighed 132 lbs!

I have learned a few things about myself on this trip. I already knew that I enjoy exploring new places, I love mountains, water and seeing wild life. I also love taking pictures and shopping for unique treasures. BUT it is now official, I am NOT a cold weather person. Never have been and never will be. I hate being COLD!!! I pretty much knew this before, but after trying to embrace it on this trip - I know it for sure. I actually think I knew this many years ago after spending a week in Steamboat Springs, Colorado tyring to learn to ski. I hated it then, but I guess I have forgotten over the years. The Bear viewing yesterday was incredible. I know that I will never be that close to a wild bear ever again in my life. I am glad I decided to do it, but the being wet and cold part was miserable, especially since I was wet and cold for about 4 hours. I just could not face more of being cold again today. Never thought I would say this while on vacation, but I think I am ready to come home. I hope my gray cloud decides to stay here in Alaska because I would really like to soak up some of the warm sunshine that has found its way to Seattle since I have been away.

Will I ever come to Alaska again? My first inclination is to say absolutely NOT - but then I think maybe I would if I had a nice warm cruise ship waiting for me and it took me to some places that I have not seen before. I’m a warm weather tropical girl, that is all there is to it. Next year I will be spending two glorious weeks in Hawaii….. It can’t come fast enough for me!

Halibut & Bears!

Wow - what a day! We are both pretty whipped tonight! It all started way too early for a vacation day at 5:30am. We got ready, Dave dropped me at the RV Park office and he headed out to the docks to catch up with his charter for the day. I had a coffee and waited until 7:10 when a cab picked me up to take me to Homer Air for my Bear Adventure. The cab driver was Russian and has lived here for many years. He told me that his wife doesn’t like it here so she lives somewhere else and the travels back and forth because he loves it here in Homer.


I arrived at Homer Air, the pilots/guides were all very nice and each of them had their dog with them there in the office. One was a beautiful Akita who I visited with and fed treats to while I waited for the other passengers. The other passengers arrived, we all put on boots provided by Homer Air (this should have been my first clue), then we went out to the plane. My new friend, Emily and I sat in the back and the other couple sat in the middle two seats. We had two pilots/guides, Skooter & Morgan.

 The flight to Hallo Bay in Katmai State Park was about an hour. The scenery was beautiful we saw Mt. ReDoubt and a couple of glaciers along the way.

Once we got closer to Hallo Bay the clouds rolled in and our sunny day turned gray (should have been my second clue). As we came in for a landing, we could see the bears. Emily and I looked at each other in dismay….. There were a lot of them! We landed on the beach and got ready to walk in to see the bears. It was very windy and raining. The other passengers didn’t have rain pants, so I figured that I wouldn’t need mine (BAD DECISION). I left them in the plane with my back pack.

We walked up into the valley and immediately saw at least 4 bears. The first bears we came across were hanging out together - there was a male bear on the other side of the river. They were much more interested in watching him than they were in us being there close to them.

As he walked closer to them, he went down a hill where they could no longer see him. One bear moved closer to the river so that he could see him, the other bear sat straight up so that she could see where the big guy went.

The big bear finally made his way across the river and he walked up to the first two bears…. Keep in mind, we are standing not too far away from all three of them. Skooter told us that the two bears we started out watching were a male and female. Now with the big guy there - we had two males who both seemed interested in the female. The boys actually scuffled a bit and growled at each other YES WE COULD HEAR THEM!!!

After that the three of them just decided to hang out together and eat grass….. We decided to move along and see what else we could find. By this time it was POURING rain and the wind was blowing like crazy!!

Next we crossed the river (the reason for the boots!) and happened upon a mother bear and two cubs. Well, really we didn’t happen upon them. Skooter & Morgan visit this area sometimes 3 times per day, so they knew where the mom and cubs were. Unfortunately, the cubs were cold and wet too so they were bedded down right next to mom. We really couldn’t see them very well.

We decided to continue on to check out three more bears that we could see in the distance. We crossed another, deeper river and got really close to one of the three bears that we had been watching. She didn’t really mind us there and as we stood there, she slowly made her way toward us. Eventually Skooter asked us all to slowly back up and he moved in front of us. He made kind of a growling type of noise and the bear casually turned and walked the other way.

We stood there for quite some time and we counted about 8 bears all around us. Again, none of them were paying any attention to us - they were mostly just eating grass and hanging out.

The weather was continually getting worse, so Skooter decided it was time for us to head back toward the plane. We crossed back over both rivers and on the way back we visited another mother bear with one cub. We couldn’t see her too well as she had taken up residence behind a small hill. I think we were all ready to leave we were very cold and wet!!! It was quite a walk back to the plane - I would guess we went about 3 miles total.

We piled into the plane. The take off was pretty exciting at least for me, having never flown in a small plane before. It was very windy and visibility was not great. Skooter & Morgan did a great job, but we did notice that they were wiping off the windows to see. The hour flight back was very, very cold…. BRRRRRRR. We landed back at Homer Air just fine. We went back into the office took our boots off, took our socks off, rang the water out of them (I think I had an inch of water inside each of my boots) and put our shoes on.  I guess I am glad that I went on this adventure.  I think I would have liked it much more if the weather had been a bit better.  The bears were amazing and even more amazing was the fact that we could get so close to them and they were not bothered about us at all.  In fact, they paid no attention to us.  Would I do it again?  No, I don't think so....

Emily offered to drop me off at the Spit before she headed home. Dave and I had discussed where he would park the motor home and my plan was to find it and change my clothes…. Well, that didn’t work so well. I couldn’t find the motor home. I was SO WET and SO COLD. I found a restaurant, went in for coffee and chowder. While there, I had decided I would call a cab and have them take me to the Day Spa - all I could think about was a nice warm massage bed….. But then I would have to put cold wet clothes back on. UGH! I crossed the street looking for somewhere to buy some dry clothes - that is when I saw Dave and the folks from his charter waiting for their fish to be weighed. So there went my Day Spa Dream - LOL!

We took care of the fish and the shipping info. He had a great day, he caught 6 Halibut, but could only keep 2. He let 2 small ones go and he caught 2 more for the captain and first mate of the boat (they each get 2 fish). It totaled up to 26.8 pounds of actual fish that will be shipped to us! YUMMERS!!!! The fishermen had great weather, no rain and wind. I am really glad because he has looked forward to this for a long, long time.

I finally was able to take a nice HOT shower - wow did it feel good to be warm and dry. After that we went back to the spit, did a bit of shopping and had an early dinner.

Now - Dave is snoring away and I am uploading pics and watching Medium. It is raining again…. At least last night and this morning had some sunshine so that I could take some pictures of the mountains around us.

Tomorrow is our last day here in Homer. We have reservations to take the Ferry to Halibut Cove for lunch. Halibut Cove is a small town with a couple of Art Galleries and one restaurant. It should be a pretty ride and a relaxing day……

Thursday - The Road to Homer

We said farewell to Stony Creek RV Park this morning and headed toward Homer. The drive was about 165 miles with not really a whole lot to see. We stopped in Soldotna at lunch time. We visited a Fishing store where I purchased a pair of Helly Hanson Water Pants - LOL! They go nicely with my hot orange Helly H long underware, which by the way, I have worn every day since I bought them! On the way out of Soldatna, we stopped at a corner stand where a guy was selling hot dogs. It seemed like a popular place and the dogs were GREAT! This guy has 8 kids. He drives a school bus during the school year and in the summer he sells hot dogs and vegetables.

Shortly after we left Soldtna we drove thru Clam Gulch where I finally saw a Moose!!! So many years of going to Montana and other places, I have never seen a moose! Today was the day!

As we got close to Homer, the mountains re-appeared and were much prettier and closer than before.

Our RV Park is on Homer Spit which is a very cool place with lots of charter companies and little shops. Dave stopped into Bob’s Trophy Charters to check on his fishing trip for tomorrow. Unfortunately the season has been slow for the charters here and because of that they had to juggle customers around to fill the boats. Dave wanted to fish for Salmon & Halibut, but so far, the Salmon have not shown up here in Homer. He will be fishing for Halibut tomorrow.

We had dinner at a restaurant on the spit - I had peel and eat shrimp (YUM) and Dave had a Halibut Reuben sandwich. All this time I was trying to decide if I really wanted to spend a lot of money to go Bear Viewing….. I had decided not to go, then I talked with a few people who had been on the trip. I still wasn’t sure…. There is a really nice day spa here, and that would cost less money. Or I could spend the day shopping on the spit…… I also found out that the Bear Viewing trips are in the total wilderness. What exactly does that mean? Well…… NO BATHROOM. Now I have hiked, etc before so I have experience with this problem, but do I want to “rough it” in bear country with a bunch of strangers???? What to do, What to do…..

While I was contemplating this, we stopped into the Salty Dawg Saloon. It is famous here in Homer and we definitely saw some of the Homer locals there. They say that there are more than 10,000 $1 bills hanging on the ceiling & walls. We didn’t stay here very long as it was very crowded and I guess that smoking is allowed in the bars here in Alaska. I had forgotten how miserable it is to sit in a smoky place!

Last stop of the evening was a Charter company recommended by a couple of local ladies. I talked once again about Bear viewing and once again was told how amazing it was. So I took their advice and booked the trip!!!

As we were driving along the strip, we came upon these two guys who were hanging out on top of the Tsnaumi warning sirens....

Our spot at the campground is AMAZING!!!  I almost wish we could have stayed here the entire time.  Here is the view from our campsite.

Tomorrow morning I have to get up at 5:30am ARRRGGGHHHH!!! Dave has to be at the dock for his charter at 6:15am and I am being picked up for my flight at 7:10am….. It should be an exciting day!! And tonight is the first time in the entire week that I have seen a lot of blue sky and finally some sunshine! It is 10:00pm and the sun is shining and the sky is blue.  Maybe, just maybe, tomorrow will be a nice day.  Just remember, if I don’t come back at least I was having an Adventure! Tune in tomorrow for the bear story and pics!!

Wednesday - Last Day in Seward

Wow - each day is just so much FUN!!! We started today out with breakfast at Nellie’s Roadhouse in downtown Seward. The view out the front window of the restaurant was amazing and the food was good too.

Next Dave dropped me off at the Iditerod Kennels & Training camp. I thought that I had had enough of the sled dogs and the Iditerod, but this was different and a lot of fun! Our guide was Dan Seevey, brother of Dallas who hosted us at the Dinner Show on Saturday. We go to tour where the dogs sleep, play with more puppies and then ride two miles on a cart pulled by a team of Iditerod dogs. I think riding in the cart is probably the highlight of my trip so far! We also go to see how the Mushers take care of the dogs on the trail and how the sled works too.

After the Iditerod, Dave picked me up and we went back into Seward to finish checking out the town. Next stop was the behind the scenes tour at the Sea Life Center. We were both disappointed with the tour. We thought that we would get to see some of the animals that the researchers are working with, but mostly it was a tour of hallways with pictures being explained by the guide. We did get to go into a room where a woman was monitoring an island where the Stellar Sea Lions live. She explained to us that she knows every single one of them and she tracks when they eat and what they are doing each day. She also explained how they go to the island and “mark” the pups so that they can follow their travels. It was extremely interesting!

After the tour we visited the displays at the Sea Life Center and took some pictures. We watched their Stellar Sea Lion, Woody, as he swam around in his tank.

Dinner was at a restaurant on the waterfront called Chinook’s. We watched the boats coming in and unloading their catch. Of course, Dave had to go out and see what was going on first hand.

Tonight it is POURING rain. We are nice and comfy in our little home. We are both really glad that we went on the boat tour yesterday. I don’t think it would have gone today - the fishermen told Dave that the sea was really rough. It has rained on and off the whole time we have been here, but we have been fortunate that the rain was lighter during the activities that we had planned for outside. Tomorrow we are on the road exploring our way to Homer. Homer is our last stop before gong back to Anchorage on Sunday. Dave will be going on a charter fishing trip Friday and if the weather is good, he may go Saturday too.

Tuesday - Kenai Fjords Boat Tour

I’m new at blogging, not sure what I did to get the posts out of sequence. It is bugging me but I can’t figure out how to fix it…. Sorry!!


Today we woke up to drizzle, fog, etc which I am finding out is normal summer weather here. We were afraid that our boat trip to tour Keani Fjords would be cancelled, but the wind cooperated and we were able to go! It was a really fun day despite the cold. I am glad that I stopped and purchased long underware yesterday because I really needed it!!!

The boat was warm when we were inside so that helped too. The first wildlife that we spotted were sea otters playing not far outside the Seward harbor area. As we continued to cruise toward Holgate Glacier, we ran across a Humpback Whale that entertained us for several minutes, pretty soon he dove deep and disappeared.

As we traveled around the point - the captain asked us all to sit down inside because the waters would be rough. Luckily I had taken my Dramamine and even luckier - IT WORKED!!! So many people were sick. I have been there myself and I felt really sorry for them. As we got closer to the glacier we saw many waterfalls coming down the mountainsides. I love waterfalls and too way too many pictures of them all.

The crew served a really good lunch buffet - roast beef, copper river salmon, rice, salad and bread. YUM!

Holgate Glacier was awesome! I never realized that a glacier is a blue color and that they make noise! The captain turned the boat off and we drifted at the glacier for about ½ hour. You can hear the ice cracking and falling - they call this “claving” we saw a couple of really good ones. The Ranger on board pointed out a black bear but it was really far away and not many of us could see it.

After the glacier we headed back toward Seward and we saw a pod of Orcas. There were a lot of them and we followed them slowly for quite a while - it is so hard to get pictures of them! We stayed as long as we could, but it was time to head back so we left the Orcas. Next we came upon a group of Dahl’s Porpoise. They played tag with the boat racing under our bow. They look like mini orcas and they, too, are difficult to get pictures of! We also saw Puffins and a lot of other sea birds. The day ended with a large group of Stellar Sea Lions on a rock near the shore and a dessert buffet! Life is good on the Kenai!

Tomorrow - Iditerod Kennels

Saturday - Exploring Anchorage

I’m having trouble with the campground network, so I will blog in word and then upload it when I get a connection….. We explored Anchorage today and had a lot of fun! We started out at the Saturday market which really wasn’t a “food” market at all, but we discovered a lot of fun stuff. It was sprinkling rain and I had not grabbed my hat when I left the motor home. I found a booth that was selling suede, waterproof hats, so I got one that will be great in rain or sun and also will pack easily for my upcoming trip to Nova Scotia! Dave purchased some items for family members (Julie - we are keeping to the rules, so far - LOL).

For lunch? Well what else but Reindeer Hotdogs (Dave) and a Buffalo burger (me). Both were yummy! After the market we headed to the Alaska Wild Berry store. It was not really that great, but we did get to see the reindeer family (I hope it wasn’t their uncle that Dave ate for lunch). I am sure that Santa will never visit Dave again…..

On to downtown Anchorage, we stopped first at the Alaska Mint which isn’t really a mint but a store that sells commemorative coins and jewelry. The jewelry was very nice - the first ring I looked at was $1000+ I moved quickly away from that counter! But I did find a ring that I really liked and yes, Julie, it is a gold nugget.  It is my souvenior from Alaska. Then Dave went to the museum and I did more shopping. I visited the mall, and of course, took a picture of Nordstrom.

Then more gift shops, I think I have now seen every single souvenior of Alaska ever made… The next stop was Ship Creek. It really didn’t look like a creek, it is more of a river that runs right thru downtown Anchorage. On a good fishing day, people line the banks side by side by side by side and fish for Salmon. There were a few fishermen there today, but they didn’t seem to be catching anything.

Later, we went to the Iditarod Dinner Show. There were only 7 of us having dinner which was very cool because Dallas Seevey (I had no idea who he is before tonight, either) ate dinner with us. Dallas is the youngest person to ever participate in the Iditarod . He ran the Iditarod the day after he turned 18 which is the lower age limit for competitors. Since then he has finished 4 Iditarods and is the youngest person to ever finish in the top 10. We had a lot of fun hearing his stories and he answered all of our questions. The Iditarod is 1049 miles long, the top finisher usually does it in about 9 days.

 The competitors are not allowed ANY help, they must run the race, care for their dogs maintain their sleds, etc. totally by themselves. They usually run 6 hours and rest 6 hours. The dogs eat dinner (the musher makes them a warm dinner) and then bed down on beds of hay to sleep. The musher checks every dog, takes care of their sore muscles and other injuries. By the time he/she finishes this they are lucky to get 1 to 2 hours of sleep before it is time to race again. The musher starts the race with a team of 16 dogs and must finish with at least 8 dogs still pulling the sled. Mushers plan for this by swapping out dogs at “checkpoints”. They know which dogs they want to keep for the whole race, so they rest those dogs more (they can have one dog on the sled with them while the other dogs run). Slow or injured dogs are left at the checkpoints, cared for by Veterinarians and then shipped back to Anchorage where they will wait for their musher to finish the race. Dallas is hoping to be the youngest person to ever win the Iditarod. He has 4 more years to achieve his goal.

The show after dinner was kind of silly but there were interesting parts where they talked about the dogs and their gear. Many people think that Iditarod dogs are huskies or malmutes. That is because the movies always use these breeds in films about dog sled races. In reality Iditarod dogs are mixed breed dogs who love to pull. It was fun to watch how excited the dogs were - they were hooked up to the sled and they could not contain themselves while they were waiting to run with the sled. One dog (Cessna) pulled a wagon of bricks that weighed 500 lbs - 10 times his weight!

The show ended with a team of 16 dogs pulling a truck about the length of a football field. Amazing!!! The best part of all was afterwards when we got to hold the puppies! We also got to meet the dog who played the lead dog in Snow Dogs. He was so pretty, great blue eyes. Now I am really looking forward to visiting the Seevey’s homestead in Seward where I will get to tour the kennels, ride on a sled pulled by a team of dogs and play with more puppies!

Phew! Busy day! Tomorrow? Wasilla (I’ve heard you can see Russia from there) and Palmer. Maybe some July 4th celebrations along the way!