Tag: Homer

Homer and then to Seward

We had a great time on our wildlife tour on Monday, 15 August. We went with Coldwater Tours, but I bet the same basic tour is available from other vendors. The boat was quite nice, and our captain Zach knew a lot about the birds. It wasn’t a narrated trip with him talking about the history or geography, but he pointed out animals along the way, and he really seemed to enjoy discussing the birds. He was very cautious not to disturb wildlife, and I appreciated that. We also absolutely lucked out with the weather! It has been raining for days, but we didn’t get rained on even once on the trip.

First some basic landscapes.

Old homesteads on the inlet
Don’t you think this could sail to the south?
Very spooky clouds covering the mountain tops
Lots of rocky outcroppings
A moment of clarity to see a mountain top and glacier
To give you a feel for the boat size

Now to the animals. Our first was this bald eagle posing for us.

Picturesque perch

We saw a harbor seal who got stuck on rocks at high tide and could get safely off at the lower tide we were in. We stayed well off the point he was on so as to not scare him. The only picture I took just shows a blog of light color on dark rocks, so I won’t insult you with it. We also saw lots and lots of sea otters. Most were just floating on their backs to watch us.

What ya doing?

We saw a bunch of jelly fish, all orange like the one below. They ranged in size from a small 2-3” to 9” plus. This one was about 6” in diameter.

Big jelly fish

And then there were the birds! Lots of birds. All kinds of gulls plus puffins! There were two rocky outcroppings used as nesting areas for a variety of gulls and other birds. The eggs are just laid on the bare rock in a crevice just big enough to hold them. The captain said the eggs are not round but pointed so they don’t roll off as easy. You can see the spots where the nests had been by the droppings and sometimes a dab of seaweed.

The smaller of the two outcroppings
A bit closer. That’s a lot of birds!
Closer yet!

More exciting than gulls were the puffins! We saw both a crested puffin and horned puffin. However the only good picture I got was of crested puffins. The horned ones always had their back to me when trying to take a picture, and from the back they are just a black bird.

 

Puffin on the water
Puffin on the tiny island

It was our first time seeing a puffin in the wild. They are rare enough that the captain says he doesn’t always get to show them to passengers.

We saw no large mammals – no moose, no bear. Sigh.

On Tuesday I finished up the baby quilt for Baby Lucy, scheduled to arrive this month. At least I thought I finished. Turns out I forgot to quilt the middle medallion! I was pretty irritated with myself since I was so excited to finish the binding and thought it ready to wash and mail. Oops! I also didn’t have enough of the color of thread I needed, so I had to wait until this afternoon to buy some along the way. Thank goodness for nice, small town quilt shops with a good selection. I guess it will be a few more days until I get it in the mail.

Today we drove to Seward. It rained pretty steadily, and we didn’t expect to see much along the way. Surprise! We found a nice cow and calf moose. Moose have a tendency to hide in the brush, and these two did their best.

We are now settled in at Stoney Creek RV Park outside Seward. Nice place with more room than we have had recently plus 50 amp power! That is unusual in Alaska. Most places have 30 amp, and it doesn’t always work well even at that level. We had a fabulous dinner at the Gold Rush a bistro in town plus did exciting things like go grocery shopping including getting some sea sickness preventatives – Dramamine, candied ginger, and peppermint. We go on another much longer wildlife cruise in a couple of days, and the water could be rough. Hope it calms down some before then as it is very rough right now.

We did some sightseeing to the literal end of the road and saw this fabulous waterfall.

Lots and lots of water rushing down

The rain is forecast to continue, and we are almost surely going to miss the strong aurora forecast for tonight. Oh well.

The Turnagain Arm bore tide and into Homer

The forecast for Friday was a strong bore tide in the Turnagain Arm, so we headed out to see it. A bore tide is when the tide comes in without the gradual increase usually found; instead it comes in as a surf wave. The only places in the US where it is found is in the arms of Cook Inlet, the big inlet where Anchorage is situated. Big bore tides happen every 7-8 days when there is a particularly low low tide and a particularly high high tide. We just got lucky with our timing that one was forecast to happen while we were in Anchorage.

The tourist information locations identify a number of places with good viewing possibilities, and we went to one known as Bore Tide Viewing Spot #5, pretty far up the arm and between Girdwood and Bird Point. It had great parking and a flat spot to view. We got there early, and it was a good thing. We were the third vehicle in the lot, and before the tide came in there were people double parked and out on the highway! along the way the clouds were very low, and it drizzled off and on.

Clouds were very low

We knew the ride was getting close when the surfers showed up.

First one
Then three

Then came the surprising wave. Just a single, arm-wide wave that eventually curled over. The surfers (yes, they were all in heavy wetsuits), tried to surf it.

Everybody tried to catch the wave
Not all were successful
And not everybody kept on it very long

It was really great fun to watch, even in the drizzle and haze. Here are a few iPhone videos. You can leave the sound off; you mostly just hear the wind.

This one shows the early part of the surfers catching the wave.

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This one is when the last two lost it.
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After the wave passed us by we had dinner at a nice BBQ place called the “Turnagain Arm Pit BBQ”. Cute name, and nicely smoked meat. I got a half rack of St. Louis ribs and a half rack of baby back ribs while Kevin got brisket. We had enough left overs for two additional meals! BBQ is good for that.

The next morning we left Anchorage to head to Homer. It rained and rained. Not just the standard Alaskan coastal drizzle, but lots of real rain. We lucked out into the most beautiful site in the campground (the Homer KOA) IMHO. It took some maneuvering to sit us almost sideways, and Kevin had to haul every foot of power cord we had, but he did it! The tiny dot center left is one of the fishing charters headed out from the Homer Spit. The distances are deceiving. It is over 5 miles across the water.

Fireweed framing a Cook Inlet view

Homer is famous for fishing, but neither of us are anglers. We decided to go wandering along the Homer Spit, the remnant of a lateral moraine left over from the last ice age. Want to see what a Spit looks like?

The very skinny bit of land in the distance

The spit is mostly RV parks, tiny businesses (mostly marine related plus some restaurants), and the harbor with its hundreds of boats. The docks float up and down the poles based on the tide. You can see how much it varies by the dark markings.

It was low tide
Looking at the mountains and glaciers
Showing the larger businesses on the Spit

And about those glaciers… Glacier National Park in the US has NOTHING on Alaska in regards to glaciers. They were all over the place. You can spot them easily because the ice in them is blue – compressed so tightly that no air exists in it and only blue light is reflected. I wish the gray skies didn’t fool the camera so much or the blue would be easier to see.

Can you see the blue?
Definitely glaciers

We saw 5 or 6 of them in a 30 mile scenic drive. There were probably more hidden by the clouds.

We have scheduled a wildlife boat tour for tomorrow, taking off from the Spit. I am hoping for lots more pictures, though we have rain in the forecast. Sigh.