Alaska Trip - Whittier & Portage Glacier

 July 13, 2018

Driving north 20 miles from Seward, we stopped in Moose Pass for breakfast at Trail Lake Lodge.  Across the road from the Lodge is an old water wheel with the sign, “Moose Pass is a peaceful little town.  If you have an axe to grind DO IT HERE.”  There’s a working lathe run by the waterwheel for your grinding needs.

downtown Whittier

It was a gray, cold, blustery day with intermittent sprinkles.  We were headed north to Anchorage and from there, east to begin our circuitous way back to Canada and then Michigan. Twenty miles north of our breakfast stop, we turned off Seward Highway for Portage Glacier and Whittier. We thought we’d visit the glacier first, and, if we felt we had time, we’d drive the 10 miles more to Whittier. However, with a little confusion over road construction signs, we took a left fork instead of a right, and there we were in the line going through the tunnel to Whittier.  I guess that inked our decision.

Whittier condo building

Downtown Whittier

The tunnel one must drive through to get to Whittier was originally a train tunnel. The Anton Anderson Memorial Tunnel was built in 1941-43 as part of the effort to safeguard the flow of military supplies from the port of Whittier. Until 2000, the only way to get to Whittier was by train. Trains still run through the tunnel on a regular basis, but because of upgrades to the tunnel’s road surface, cars can use it, too, one direction at a time, straddling the tracks, when no trains are scheduled. Vehicles line up in the staging areas and wait for the computerized system to give the go-ahead to each direction of traffic. It takes about 6 minutes to drive through the tunnel at 25 m.p.h.

Whittier, set on the edge of Prince William Sound, closed in by mountains, is a small village of a couple hundred people, most of whom live in one of two condo buildings.  There are no houses. There is a busy harbor on the Sound for cruise ships, the Alaska State Ferry System ferries, fishing boats, charter boats, and boats off-loading to the train. And there are parking lots for all the cars belonging to people on the ferry and other boats.  There are a few businesses crammed along the waterfront – a restaurant, a small hotel and gift shops and there are a few fish processing buildings. It was very much a place for coming and going, not staying.

So, we took a few photos, got fuel for the Siesta, let Nina run around on a grassy area and then we got back in line to go through the tunnel the other way.

Glacier ice

This time we stopped at the Visitor Center near Portage Glacier.  The US Forest Service operates the Begich, Boggs Visitor Center. Portage Lake sits behind the building.  Across the lake is Portage Glacier which, a woman sitting at the viewing window told me, reached down from the mountain to the edge of the lake 20 years ago when she had last visited.  Now the glacier only stretches a short way down the mountain cut. A chunk of glacier ice was floating in the lake. 

Visitor Center

Nearby Byron Glacier

Alaska Trip - Seward Part 2

 July 12, 2018

Our 2^nd full day in Seward and it looked like our rainy weather was done. With a forecast for sun on Thursday, we walked down to the marina Wednesday morning and booked a Resurrection Bay wildlife tour with Major Marine to depart the following morning at 9:00. It would be a 3 and ½ -hour tour to the end of Resurrection Bay and back, slowing down and/or stopping for whatever wildlife our boat, the Orca Song, would come across.

So, Thursday morning we hastily said “See you later” to Nina and the Siesta and hustled back down the Iditarod Trail to our 8:15 check-in date with Major Marine.

Sunny it was! But oh, so cold!! Once the boat picked up speed after clearing the marina and stopping to watch a couple of sea otters swimming/floating in the shallow water near the harbor, the wind felt frigid. Taking photos with mittens on is impossible, so it wasn’t long before my fingers were too cold to press the circle on my phone, and I had to vary my on- deck time with inside warming times.

However, what a great tour we had! Besides sea otters here and there, we watched puffins and murres swimming and diving and hundreds of kittiwakes flitting about and roosting on the island rock wall faces toward the end of Resurrection Bay. Also, we saw two harbor seals on a rock ledge with another waiting for a wave to propel it onto the ledge. We saw Stellar sea lions hauled out in Emerald Cove and, most fun of all, three humpback whales at different locations, one of which was lunge feeding. It surfaced and resurfaced with open mouth several times. Our captain cut the boat’s motor, so we could stand in quiet and watch the action. Add to those sightings four adult bald eagles and a very brief glimpse of a harbor porpoise as it “humped” out of the water. It was a very good morning!

Alaska Trip - Seward

 July 11, 2018

It was raining when we drove into Seward Monday afternoon. We pulled into South Resurrection Campground, a wide paved parking area that runs along the Resurrection Bay waterfront. Provided and operated by the city, it accommodates a couple hundred RVs parked side by side. We took a “front row” spot that was vacant and “dry” (without water and electric hook-ups.) For those amenities, you would need to find a place to park in the 2^nd and 3^rd rows behind us. We were happy to have ring side seats to watch the ever-changing clouds moving over the Bay and the occasional sea otter or two playing out in the water in front of us.

A steady rain fell all through Monday night and into Tuesday. Monday evening, tired of being inside, I donned a rain jacket and walked a while on the paved hiking/biking trail that also runs along the Bay waterfront right in front of where we were parked. It’s the National Historic Iditarod Trail that keeps going north out of town. Happy to be outside, I didn’t mind getting a bit soaked while walking past the assortment of RVs parked in the campground and the small memorial gardens planted along the trail.  

Tuesday was rainy-like i.e. heavy and gray, damp and misting, but not outright raining. We drove north and west out of Seward 15 minutes to Exit Glacier, part of Kenai Fjords National Park. It is the only part of the Park accessible by road. From Exit Glacier Visitor’s Center, we hiked to what’s

juvenile eagle in the campground

left of this once massive valley glacier. The 2-mile round trip hike on the developed Park trail through the lush forests, up and over black rock outcroppings to the edge of the glacier was most interesting. Every so often along the trail, markers have been placed showing the glacier’s recession over the past 120 years. Of course, the marker for 120 years ago was back down the road about a mile. Wikipedia states that in one year from 2013-2014, Exit Glacier retreated 187 feet.

Back in Seward, after lunch we walked from our campsite along the waterfront to the Alaska Sea Life Center. This 20-year-old sea animal rescue center and aquarium has 3 floors of interactive displays to educate the public. We learned it is the only facility in the world specifically dedicated to studying the northern marine environment. A couple of areas I found particularly fascinating were the sea otter nursery and the aviary room. Looking down on the sea otter nursery, I could watch a tiny sleeping sea otter (an orphan) in a small pool of water floating on its back being gently pushed by its caretaker. In the aviary/pond room we spent some time with gulls, puffins, king eiders, oyster catchers and a pair of smews from Asia all flying and swimming about or perched on rocks.

Exit Glacier

Exit Glacier

Young Otter in Sea Life Center

King Eider

Puffin

Alaska - Homer to Seward

 July 10, 2018

I can’t leave the Sterling Highway and this part of the Kenai Peninsula without mentioning a couple of places we stopped on our drive from Homer to Seward. The community of Kasilof south of Soldotna was originally a settlement established in 1786 by the Russians as St. George. More recently in the late 1800s and early 1900s inhabitants made their livings from fishing the Kasilof River and canning the fish they caught. Fox farming, big game hunting and trapping were other means of subsisting there. A few local buildings, cabins, a fish cannery hospital, a school, and remains of a fox farm were moved to what is now called the Kasilof Regional Historical Museum. A very worthwhile stop to anyone interested in Alaskan history.

In Visitor Center

Another stop we made was at the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge Visitor Center located in Soldotna. The 1.73-million-acre refuge was created in 1941 by President FD Roosevelt to protect moose, Dall sheep and other wild game. The Visitor Center houses interesting displays about animals of the region and, in back, the Keen Eye Nature Trail leads to an observation platform on Headquarters Lake.

National Wildlife Refuge Visitor Center

In Refuge Visitor Center

And then there are the many Beautiful Aqua Blue River photo ops along the                                               Sterling Highway that require frequent stops. 

Cooper Landing

Cooper Landing

Cooper Landing