Kodiak Island Boat Tour

Our first full day on Kodiak Island had us up early (for us, 6:30 is early) and off on an 8:00 AM boat tour to Whale Passage. The weather did not bode well right out of the box, as it was very cloudy, foggy, and rainy as we headed to the boat harbor from our B&B. Most of the stuff we would be looking at would be down near the water, and we brought our rain gear, so it did not matter that much, but we would like to have some sun shine to help us get great pictures. Well, at least the water was not too rough, as we would be going mostly through sheltered areas, and the rain let up shortly after we got out onto the Gulf of Alaska.

Soon we were seeing sea birds, kittiwakes, puffins, and pigeon guillemots and were snapping up a storm. I thought that Ken, one of our traveling companions, had super photographic equipment, but two of the guys who came with us on the boat had Nikon D3s and two huge 200-400mm zoom lenses. They spent most of the trip sitting on the bow of the boat and, from the sounds of the shutters, probably took more than 2000 photos each. I thought I came back with a lot at 640. The boat’s captain was pretty good at being able to stealth up on the sea birds, so we were able to get closer than we had on other sight seeing trips. Also, this trip was just for this purpose, where as the others we had taken were mostly to see glaciers, so ocean life photos were just lucky.

As we got out into Whale Passage, the sky actually started to lighten up and we even got to see some blue sky off in the distance and the sun peeked through at us briefly. Strangely enough, although we were in Whale Passage, there were no whales sighted until we started out. Then we did spot one Humpback making its way slowly along the mouth of the passage and feeding lazily. It would float on the surface for a bit and then flute gently for a deeper dive. It did make some rolling motions later on and show its pectoral fins and slap its tail once.

We also saw some Dall’s Porpoises. We had seen them briefly on other tours but this group followed the boat longer than any of the other times. They are very difficult to catch on films as much more than a brief flash of black and white and a splash. Geoff took some video of them and then just pointed the camera over the side and took dozens of pictures as fast as the camera would take them. These are the best.

The stars of the show were the Sea Otters. We caught up with a large raft of them around a small rock island in the middle of Whale Passage and stayed with them for some time. They mostly seemed to be just relaxing and floating. We did not see much eating going on and we did not see any pups.

Finally, when we got back to the harbor, we visited with the Sea Lions who have taken over one of the docks there. They were a little vocal as we cruised around the dock but for the most part, they did not mind our passage. As we exited the boat and walked down the dock, the rain started coming down again. We went to dinner with Ken and Martha and then bid them a fun journey on their next adventure. They are off to the Katmai Peninsula for an expensive tour to see the Kodiak Bears feeding on salmon. We are staying in our B&B, relaxing, and we will go around the island to see whatever there is to see. If anything exciting happens, you will be able to read it here in a later post.

Seward’s Rainy Side

After a good start to our time in Seward, the weather turned miserable again. We were there for 5 days total, and 3 of them were pretty much rain. We did a couple of indoor things, but mostly just stayed in the RV. From Seward, we move on down the Kenai Peninsula to Soldotna and then on to Homer.

The one indoor thing we enjoyed in Seward was the Alaska Sea Life Center. Here they not only have aquariums with nice examples of Alaska sea life, but also rehabilitate injured marine mammals and birds, and return those to the wild that they can. We took their Behind the Scenes tour, which took us into their rehabilitation areas and showed us their labs and tracking center. And of course we had to make a visit to their sea bird enclosure and visit with the Puffins.

We tried to get out and see some of the far reaching areas of the Seward area. On the far side of Resurrection Bay is a repair facility for ships. It also looks like a bone yard for old ships which didn’t quite make it to repaired status.

We also investigated the northern side of the bay, south of Seward and found, not much. There is an RV park way out there, and some houses, but not much else. However, on the way back, we found a sea otter munching away happily on what appeared to be an octopus. It looked to be a very chewy meal.

Alaskan Fjords

Finally the weather has turned our way, at least for a while. We arrived in  in Seward, Alaska, under blue skies, and headed out on a cruise to the Northwestern Fjord and its spectacular glaciers. This was an 8 hour boat ride, filled with views of humpback whales, orcas, stellar sea lions, harbor seals, puffins, gulls, and other sea birds. Except for some foggy areas where we got closest to the Pacific Ocean, we had clear weather and sun the whole time. While on that cruise, we booked another one for our second day here. Sadly, the weather did not hold up on the second day, but the glacier we visited was actively “calving” while we were there. The activity is hard to capture on film, since you are bouncing around on a boat and it is very hard to anticipate. On top of it all, one part which had been quite active while we were there, decided to totally let loose as we were leaving and I was not able to get any video. It was quite something to see though.

Below are the best of the pictures I did get on our two days of cruising.

The Sun Comes Out In Girdwood

On Sunday, July 15, when we drove from Anchorage to Girdwood, down the Turnagain Arm of Prince William Sound, we were not happy campers. The rain was coming down pretty hard in Anchorage in the morning and we had to slog through a pretty big puddle right outside our RV to get ready to get on the road. The weather was a continuation of the rainy, overcast, yuk we had been stuck in since we left Fairbanks. We had been seeing weather predictions showing slight clearings, but nothing seemed to want to materialize. So on Monday morning, when we woke up to no rain and a bright spot in the sky, we made plans to get out and see what would happen.

We started small, going to the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center. They take in injured and otherwise endangered animals and give them a new lease on life. It is kind of anti-climactic to see these animals in captivity after seeing others of the same in the wild. It was fun to watch the brown bears playing in the pond but after seeing a mama with four cubs in the wild, it loses some of its impact. Of course we were able to get much closer to some of the animals, like the elk and moose, than we have so far in our travels.

When we left there, the sky was clearing quite a bit, so we went back to the RVs for lunch and then headed down the Portage Glacier Highway towards Whittier. We made a short stop at Portage Lake, somewhere we had been the day before, but the weather was windy and rainy then. Now it is clear and calm and there are ice flows in the lake so a photo op beckoned. Then we headed on toward Whittier, which required us to go through a one-way tunnel that the cars share with the Alaska Railroad. Until 2000, the only way to Whittier over land was by the train, but they modified the tunnel to allow cars and trucks to make the trip. There was a toll and we had to wait 40 minutes for our turn to go towards Whittier. Now the weather can be totally different on each side of the mountain, but on this day we lucked out because it was as nice on the Whittier side as on the Portage Lake side.

Whittier is very small and not much more than a sea port. Most of the people who live there live in a large concrete bunker style 14-story building. We walked inside on the first floor and it was pretty depressing. It looked very institutional. I think not too many people live here year round. The woman at the tour building we stopped in said they had 42 feet of snow on the ground this past winter. That’s not the amount that fell, but how much was on the ground at the height of the winter. That means the lower 4 stories of the main apartment building there were under the snow. Ouch!

As good as the weather was on Monday, Tuesday turned out to trump it. Both days started with some overcast and cleared slowly, but on Tuesday it cleared to an almost cloudless sky. We decided not to go back to Whittier, which our traveling companions did do, but to stay and go on the Portage Lake cruise to the Portage Glacier. We rode our bikes down the mile and a half trail to the lake and then another mile to the cruise port. The Portage Glacier used to completely cover the area which is now Portage Lake as recently as 1900, but now the glacier has receded far enough to not be viewable from the Visitor’s Center. However, there is a cruise to be taken which goes right up to the face of the glacier and, on as clear a day as we had on Tuesday, this was quite an experience. The tour people said it is rare to be able to see the top of the glacier but we had that view and more.

After the cruise, rode to the Byron Glacier Trail Head and walked the 0.8 miles to the end of the glacier. We could only get as close as the snow field at the end of the glacier but it was a nice walk and a beautiful view. There are actually many glaciers in this area. I think we counted about eight of them just on this side of the mountain from Whittier. Geoff feels like he is a short-term memory photographer. Each time he takes a photo and looks down and then back up, he thinks “Wow, that would be a nice picture”, and he ends up with several that are very close to being the same.

Our next stop is Seward on Resurrection Bay. The weather predictions for the next two days are looking good right now. We are hoping they hold up as well as they have for these past two days. The trip from here to Seward is supposed to be spectacular scenery, if the weather is good. We could take a long time to drive those 80 miles if we are stopping every couple of miles to say “Wow, that would be a nice picture”.

Coldest Alaska Summer Ever

I don’t know if it is but even the locals are bemoaning the weather here. We have been in Anchorage for 4 days and have seen the sun for about 4 hours. It has rained for more hours than that, but fortunately, not too hard when we wanted to be out doing stuff. We took in the Anchorage Market today and the sun was out for most of that time. And the temperature got up almost to 65 degrees. Then the clouds came back and the evening ended with rain. We tried to get some sight seeing done along the Turnagain Arm yesterday and we drove all the way to Girdwood, but the sun only came out for a few minutes, just as an Alaska Railroad train was coming along. We jumped out for a photo op.

Tomorrow, we will be driving the RVs down that way, on our way to Seward. We will be stopping off in an RV park down past the end of the Turnagain Arm and we will continue to pray for a break in this overcast weather.

Valdez to Anchorage

Three days from Valdez, we are now parked in Anchorage for the next 5 nights. The weather continues to be on the cloudy, rainy side, although last evening in Palmer the sun came out briefly before it set. We back-tracked out of Valdez on Monday, past the turn off to Kenny Lake and Copper Center and then turned onto the Glenn Highway at Glennallen. We drove from there to Palmer, Alaska, home of the Alaska State Fair in August, and the site of the attempted colonization of Alaska in the 1930s. In the height of the Depression, families were recruited in Michigan, Minnesota, and Wisconsin to relocate to Alaska and set up homestead farms. They were given free passage, set up in tent cities in Palmer, and given tracts of land to farm and resources to build homes for themselves. We watched about an hour of a 2 hour film on it at the Visitor’s Center. These people were true pioneers. We also got some first-hand info on this from a women at the Colony House Museum. She actually grew up in the house which is on display there.

In the evening, as I said before, the sun came out for a while, and Geoff took some pictures of the mountains which our RV Park, named Mountain View, had a view of, finally. In the morning, in the rain, yet again, we left Palmer and drove all of an hour into Anchorage. Here we will stay for 5 nights, praying for good weather, against the odds.

Valdez, Alaska, Some More

Saturday and Sunday in Valdez, our last two days, turned out to be pretty busy for us. Saturday was Pink Salmon Festival Day in Valdez. They had an all day series of events going on at the Civic Center. The weather was not great, although it was not an entire wash out. They had several different things going on for the kids. I think it is hard to keep kids occupied during the summer here. They had fish throwing games and fish carrying games, and fish printing (putting paint on a fish and then putting paper over it to transfer the colors). They had a cook off event that we went up to check out and got some samples after the judging was done. Then we went inside the Civic Center to check out the auto show. Ken made a joke about seeing “all 3 cars” and then when we got inside, that is exactly what we saw. The person watching over them said the other eleven cars did not show because of the rain.

Then they had a free dinner featuring pink salmon. This is the third free meal we have gotten in Alaska, the second in Valdez. Apparently these things are sponsored y the city due to the large amount of money that comes into the city from the pipeline. After the dinner, they had free entertainment. A comedian who did a lot of physical humor, geared towards the kids in the audience put on his show in the Civic Center Theater.

After all the free entertainment, we headed back to the hatchery, hoping for some bear viewing. However, no such luck. We hung around for about an hour but there was nothing going on. So we headed back to the RVs for the night.

On Sunday, the commercial fishing was opened up in the Port of Valdez. Also, the sun came out for the second time since we got here more than a week ago. Most of the fishing was going on near the hatchery, so we headed over there yet again. This time, rather than photographing eagles or bears fishing, we were going to watch the professionals. The fishing they do here is called “purse seine” fishing, where they put down a net that is pulled around in a circle, and then is closed at the bottom before it is pulled in. Our goal was to be able to see fish in the net as it is pulled onto the fishing boat. It seemed most of the time, the boat would swing around so the net was on the far side just when they were about to pull it up. We did get some good pictures though, and it was well worth the time we spent watching. It was a great finish to our week plus in Valdez, Alaska.

 

Valdez, Alaska

We pulled into Valdez, AK, on the last day of the first half of 2012. Sadly, the weather was not so good then, and was not predicted to get much better for a while. The mountains rise sharply up out of the water all around the Port of Valdez, but they are difficult to see with the clouds hanging so low over them. We were going to make the best of it though and settled in for 5 nights, staying just through the 4th of July. However, we found out later that the pink salmon were due to start running up the inlet to the hatchery on the other side of the bay. Currently, the hatchery is using local fisherman to do “cost recovery” fishing, and are monitoring the fish being caught coming into the bay. Once they have caught enough to recover their cost of running the hatchery, they will open the bay up to commercial fishing.

Our first night in, we got tips on things to see and do around the area. At 6:00 PM the sports fisher boats usually come in with their catches and bring them up to the cleaning stations on the dock. We went down there and the very first boat we saw come in had a lot of big Halibuts and Rockfish. At least four of the biggest were over 100 pounds each. We watched them cut four big filets off each of them and put them into coolers. They also would cut the cheeks off the halibuts. Ellyn said she had seen halibut cheeks on the menus for inflated prices. They must be a delicacy.

The second full day in Valdez, we took a day-long wildlife and glacier cruise. The cruise left from the docks within walking distance of our RV park at 10:00 AM. We immediately got a close up look at a sea otter “raft” right in the harbor as soon as we got outside the sea wall. From there we went out of the harbor and stopped for a while to watch a fishing vessel. It was doing purse-seine fishing for salmon for the hatchery as I described before. We sailed into the inlet leading to the Columbia Glacier, but were unable to get very close because of many ice flows coming off of the glacier. Next we cruised past Glacier Island and they served us a nice lunch. After viewing sea lions and our first view of a whale tail, we reached the Meares Glacier. This one we were able to get a lot closer to. We saw some minor calving, but nothing spectacular. Soon we moved off and back into the main part of Prince William Sound. We did see some more sea lions and a group of three whales, which gave us more opportunities to see the tails (something on Ellyn’s bucket list), and even a few puffins. The cruise returned to port about 8:00 PM.

We have been waiting patiently for the salmon run, which we have been told can be quite something to see at the hatchery. We have gone there several times and, have seen a few salmon in the ladder at the hatchery, but nothing too spectacular yet. The activity around the hatchery by bears and eagles is supposed to be something to see. In order to increase our chances, we decided to stay on for four more days. On July 4th, the commercial fishing was opened up, although not in the port area. They are still doing some cost recovery fishing and will be reassessing things by the weekend. We are hoping to be able to see some fishing up close before we leave.

The July 4th weekend is jam-packed with events here in Valdez, mostly for kids and families, but also for the tourists. On the 4th, they had a small parade a few blocks from our RV park (almost everything that happens here is close to where we are parked) and, although it was drab and rainy, a surprisingly large number of people showed up for it. Even Valdez’s favorite mascot, Uncle Salmon, showed up for the parade, being stalked all the way by a brown bear. There were food and craft vendors and we watched the parade and walked around a little before making our way back to the RVs. In the evening, there was a free BBQ at the city pier, which we were happy to take in.

We were noticing that there are no movie theaters here, which it seems would be a problem when trying to fight cabin fever here in the depths of the winter. But then we saw a poster in one of the stores indicating they would be showing MIB 3 in the Civic Center, a large building on a hill overlooking, of course, our RV Park. So on Thursday, we walked up there and saw the movie, in digital 3D. Not too bad for this little town. Of course, not many tourists would be doing this, as they would probably only be in town for a couple of days, whereas we are still holding on for some better weather and the salmon run.

Now when the salmon do begin running in large numbers, this will bring the eagles and bears to the streams to feed. At the hatchery, there are signs telling you to beware of bears, because they will come right into the hatchery and try to get salmon out of the ladder. On our first visit to the hatchery, we saw lots of eagles, bald and golden, hanging out on the edges of the water, but no salmon, and no bears. We have discovered that the best times for viewing the eagles so far is as the tide is going out. As the rocks are uncovered on the shore, fish will get stranded and the eagles will have easy pickings.

On Friday we finally got rewarded for our patients when the salmon showed up in large quantities (to us) at the hatchery. Although they had not yet opened up the gates at the top of the ladder, the ladder was jam-packed with salmon trying to get through. The eagles, seals, sea gulls, and sea lions were feasting on the fish they could get ahold of. Although the weather continued to be cloudy and rainy, we were able to get some good pictures of the eagles feeding, fighting, and flying over the sound. Still no bears yet but maybe tomorrow after they get the word from the eagles.

Friday also marked the first sunshine and blue skies we have seen since arriving here. They were brief and you had to look quickly, but they were there. Geoff was up early with Jordy and was able to capture some of it with the camera before it disappeared again. The rest of our stay in Valdez will be covered in our next blog entry. Hopefully it will be filled with better weather, fishing reports, and some good wildlife sightings.