Our rest day proved longer than anticipated: we stayed out visiting the Dog Kennels in the park and hiking around the Denali Visitor's Center until close to 7pm. So despite resting all morning, the day wasn't lost.
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| Beaver Dam |
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| Horseshoe Lake |
The hike took us on a grand tour of Horseshoe Lake, right by the Visitor's Center. It was billed as Easy/Moderate but M&D contend that easy was the wrong word.
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| Post-hike |
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| Snowshoe Hare |
We saw one more Bull Moose (a young one, by the size of his antlers) on our way out of the park for the evening.
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| Horns vs Antlers: Horns continue to grow for an animal's whole life, antlers are shed each year! |
The next day was our final long drive of the Alaskan portion of our trip, so we wanted to be well-rested. We grabbed pizza at Prospector's Pizzeria in McKinley Village, right outside the park, and it was SO GOOD. Noteworthy good. Brought it back to the B&B for dinner and headed to bed.
The drive to Homer was, as usual, longer than anticipated because we're slowpokes. The wildfires on the Kenai Peninsula finally started making themselves known (apparently the day we left Denali the smoke ended up spreading that far north, so we'd have noticed them anyway) and we had a really smokey drive down the peninsula. At one point, we were close enough to see tongues of fire in the trees, and there were signs everywhere thanking the fire fighters for doing their work to keep homes and families and businesses safe.
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| Near Beluga Point along the Sterling Highway |
As we got closer to Homer, though, the winds shifted enough that we had clear views of the town on our way in.
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| View of the mountains across Kachemak Bay |
Kachemak Bay, the body of water that Homer projects into, looks out over Kachemak Bay State Park which is only accessible by boat or plane (the trail markers are right at the water's edge so that water taxis can drop hikers right where they want to start from the water). The bay itself has a 28 FOOT tidal range, so the small boat marina off the Homer Spit (a projection of land that scoots right out into the bay and is covered in RV parks, restaurants, and people's homes) has a little section of ramp where you can dock your boat so that it settles onto the ramp for inspections and maintenance during low tides. Pretty neat idea.
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| Bald eagles nest in Homer! We saw these parents and their two eaglets while wandering the Spit. |
There's also a beautiful memorial near the end of the spit called the Seafarer's Memorial. It's dedicated to the memory of those who've lost their lives at sea and is filled with plaques naming those lost and the vessel's they were last seen in. One that hit me particularly hard was three sisters, the Andersons, lost in 1934 as they traveled on a postal boat, delivering mail.
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| "This bell tolls for all the souls set free upon the sea" |
The spit was filled with all kinds of kitschy tourist shops, along with store fronts for fishing charters and kayak trips into the bay, and we stopped for dinner at the Fresh Catch Cafe. The promise of fresh-caught seafood was just too alluring to turn down and man was it ever good.
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| Views from the Homer Spit |
Our little AirBnB cabin had a loft so I got to sleep in my "own" room again, and there was a beautiful view of the bay and mountains from a tiny path that led to the cliffs from our porch.
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| Home for the night in Homer |
July 4th dawned and we had to roll our by 10:30. Dad missed the eagles/chicks the night before, so we headed down the spit for a final viewing before heading out of town. Dad was driving and his knowledge that we didn't have to rush to get to Soldotna meant he was driving me insane. We stopped constantly at little overlooks before I mentioned that we were able to get into our next stay as early as noon, so he didn't need to slow roll it. I think he got my message, either way, because we stepped up the pace a bit.
Got to Soldotna and immediately realized the AirBnB was going to spoil us for others. It was a true 2 bedroom apartment with a great living room and kitchen. We settled in, got the food out of the cooler and into the fridge, and then opted to drive into Kenai, the next town over, to scope it out. Stopped briefly at Kenai Beach (the tide was so low that you'd have to traipse through about 100 yards of sand and sea muck to reach any real water) & then I called it quits. Poor Dad wanted to drive another 20 minutes up the road (putting us, at that point, a full hour's drive back to our home base for the night) and I put my foot down. When we got back to the stay, I abandoned ship for the local pub, about a mile's walk down the road. Brought my Kindle and my thirst and settled in. A few hours later, after they'd napped and decided I was no longer pissy, they joined me for dinner!
The drive from Soldotna to Seward was another quick one (the next day), but we're never happy keeping things simple, so we stopped to hike again! This time at Skilak Lake in the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge. Dad's research indicated there was a spot we MIGHT be able to watch bears fishing for salmon swimming upstream to spawn (spoiler: no dice), but there was DEFINITELY a trail that was labelled "easy/moderate" to Hidden Creek. So, obvs, we took it.
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| Excited about hiking |
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| Deep bark |
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| No longer sure he wants to do this (but too late; he's committed) |
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| "Why did we do that?" |
It was a lot of fun and filled with lovely views AND I got to swim in an Alaska glacier-fed lake. It was COLD. I am a lake monster.
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| Skilak Lake |
We got into our newest AirBnB around 7 and had leftover chicken fingers for dinner before hitting the hay. I have another lofted bedroom, so I get to channel my inner angsty teen yet again! Today we're thinking about hiking Exit Glacier (we hear you can touch it!), will report in later.
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