Seward

Kenai Peninsula Part II – Seward, Alaska

August 10-12,2013

Days 28-30 of our Alaska Adventure, still moving along! Leaving Homer we saw more of the same beautiful roadside scenery today; the mountains were cloaked in what looks like beautiful green velvet, they are accompanied in their splendor with more picturesque waterways; the Kenai River was full of fisherman. The views were postcard perfect for many miles of our travel today. Arrived in the town of Seward mid-afternoon. Our campground was right on Resurrection Bay, looking across at some rugged mountains topped with clouds. It is fishing derby week, so there are a lot of fishermen out on the bay trying their hand to win the big prize. Little boats are constantly zigging and zigging across the water to go to their fishing sites. Our afternoon activities included visiting the Alaska Sea Life Center – a nice aquarium and rehabilitation center for sea life, built after the oil spill in the 1980’s.  We completed our downtown visit with a sample of suds from the Seward Brewery and a couple blocks stroll to check out the local tourism shops and stops.

Kenai River

Kenai Lake

The weather changed from gray and a bit dreary to WET and gray and dreary.  That did not stop us from taking a short hike up to see the Exit Glacier in the Kenai Fjords National Park.  About a mile up the trail we stood within a few feet of this beautiful blue ice flow.  You could feel the cold blowing off of her as we stood staring at her.  This is a spectacular view, even though she continues to recede several hundred feet a year on warm years.  As we stood at the view point we wished that there were a way just to “freeze” time so that all who travel this way will be able to take the majesty of this sight.  Exit is a relatively small glacier off of the Harding Ice Field above, but it is the only one that has a road that you can drive up on to get close to on a hiking trail.  We returned to camp to dry out and warm up.  The tour arranged a boat trip out on Resurrection Bay to Fox Island for dinner and some wildlife viewing.  Dinner was good and we enjoyed a presentation about the area by a local park ranger.  The wild life viewing was negligible because of the weather conditions – Mike did his best to take pictures of few sea otters, sea lions and birds in the distance, but the rain was really not very cooperative, he got soaked trying to snap some pics off the deck of the boat.

Exit Glacier

Seward has a deep harbor and as such is a docking location for some cruise ships.  There were two in town while we were here.  It not the glamorous sort of town that you picture ships coming into, but there still is a lot of fun to be had.  We drove down to the Mile 0 of the historic Iditarod Dog Race – it traveled over 2000 miles from Seward to Nome in the early 20^th century.  The race now starts In Anchorage and goes to Nome – shorter safer run for the dogs and mushers.

Seward River and Port

another broken down cruise ship

We will be leaving the Kenai Peninsula and heading east to our last 4 Alaskan stops: Palmer, Valdez, back to Tok, and eventually to Skagway, (after traveling through a part of the Yukon Territory again). This continues to be a fantastic trip!

Miles for the day: 175   Total miles for the AK Adventure: 2354.2