Perkinson Family Alaska Holiday

Tuesday 16 July

Ross and Chris did business work and scheduled a Skype with Gemma for Maths-Whizz, while Danika edited photos and Tayla and Josh stained Carla’s front deck.  Carla got a call mid-afternoon from a friend who has an Air BnB on Pippin Lake (5 min away), where she also has kayaks and paddle boat so we re-scheduled with Gemma and headed out to the lake and met up with Gail, and then later her husband Scott, and spent a couple of hours kayaking around on the lake. Such a beautiful spot, can really see why people love it here in the summer. Don’t think we would cope in the winter when the lake freezes completely, temperatures are well below freezing, and there is a little daylight at all during waking hours. Scott commented that in winter, schools would shut when temperatures dropped to 50 below (F), (-450C). Apparently at this temperature your breath instantly freezes when breathing out. As temperatures drop further, Larry said that tires on your car freeze, and will shatter if you slam your door, then at around 60 below, cars are left running 24 hours a day. Different world!

Carla took us for the “grand tour” around Kenny Lake (which took about 5 minutes) before heading home where we saw main attractions like Kenny Lake Mercantile (general store), Kenny Lake School, Community Hall,  Pick and Post – the most unique store you have ever seen – if you are in need of hubcaps or an old washing machine, it really is the place to go. There is even a boat that is being converted into accommodation. So much character – so unique, and so Kenny Lake

Back at Carla’s, we had yummy fried pork chops and vegetable medley with ice cream and coffee (affogato) for dessert and after our Skype we played “Double Solitaire” again, this time Danika and Tayla being the winning combination with so many laughs!

Monday 15 July

We got picked up by Kennicott Shuttles to do a day trip to the Kennicott Mine near McCarthy.  Got picked up by the shuttle at around 8:15 – was supposed to be 8 but got a call to say that the shuttle would be late as the driver had to wake up some campers (4 Germans) as they were not ready for pick up when he arrived. Don’t think the driver was too impressed by his ‘eye rolling’ and body language when he picked us up.

It was a 3 hour drive out to McCarthy, great scenery, saw a bull moose and lots of beautiful rivers, lakes and mountains. The road very quickly deteriorated, and although the shuttle was $100 each, was so glad not to be driving the road. Jason, the driver, knew how fast to go, and ended up driving a bit faster than we probably would have, especially in Larry’s camper. 

Got to McCarthy just before 11 (we skipped a toilet stop to make up time), walked over the footbridge and got the 11am shuttle up to Kennicott mine. We signed up for the 2 hour 11:30 Mill Tour, which culminated in us entering the top floor of the mine building, and moving down floor by floor (14 floors in total), looking at all the processes involved in the extraction of high grade copper ore ready to send off to be smelted at Cordova.

After the tour we had a bit of lunch before walking around the rest of the mine site, and taking a shuttle back down to McCarthy where we walked around the old buildings and again got a bit of a feel for what life must have been like for the miners, especially during Alaskan Winters.

The shuttle departed for home around 4:30.  Jason stopped so we could walk across the Kuskulana River Canyon Bridge.  The Kuskulana bridge was a single-lane railroad bridge 238 feet above the raging Kuskulana River built during the winter of 1910  to service the Kennicott Mine. When it was converted to a car bridge, people had to drive across on 2 boards (one for each wheel) with no side barriers – it was the most nerve-racking part of their drive down McCarthy Road. 

We got back to Kenny Lake around 7:30pm and Carla was out at the local community hall where a visiting musical group from Fairbanks was playing so Danika did a great job of frying up the last of the cooked chicken with leftovers, before catching up againwith Carla. 

Sunday 14 July

Got up early and headed down to the dock to catch up with Sarah (Peggy’s daughter) and catch the ‘Lu Lu Belle’, a boat chartered by the First Baptist Church in Valdez, where every Sunday they head out of Valdez, and into Prince William Sound for a brief service, before their main church service back at their church at 11am. Great experience, awesome to sit in God’s creation, just looking at the scenery, singing some (old) worship songs/hymns, and then a short message on Integrity.  They stopped the message to point out the Otters and Sea Lions.

We had a wander around Valdez with Sarah.  The town had all been rebuilt following a 9.2 earthquake on Good Friday in 1964, 15 miles below Prince William Sound, halfway between Anchorage and Valdez.  The initial quake caused landslides killing 32 people and collapsing the town and the docks. Nearby, a 27-foot (8.2 m) tsunami destroyed the village of Chenega, killing 23 of the 68 people who lived there; survivors out-ran the wave, climbing to high ground. Evidence of motion directly related to the earthquake was also reported from Florida and Texas. 

We went to the information centre where we did some research and booked our trip to Kennicott Mine for tomorrow, and then went to the supermarket to get dinner.  We drove past the ‘old town’ as we headed out of town.

Sarah recommended a visit to Alison Point where the salmon were running and there were lots of RV’s and people fishing.  We then carried on to Bridal Veil falls. While we got ready for our walk, Chris went to attach the bear spray to the day pack but pressed the wrong button and released some bear spray which sprayed out onto the ground and on her hand (thankfully not directly towards her or anyone else).  She then went to the cab of the truck to get the wipes to wipe it off her hands but as she did that Tayla got down out of the camper and walked around the side of the truck and into the bear spray and got it in her eyes and mouth. Meanwhile Josh and Danika also walked around that area and felt the pepper in their throats.  Ross was a way off and came over wondering why Tayla was on all fours choking. Once she had recovered, we started our walk but Ross had touched her water bottle and then rubbed his eyes, which meant that he was escorted back to the truck with his eyes too sore to open so we could bathe them in water – oh dear – only something you can laugh at later!   Everyone recovered but had a pepper taste and tingly lips for a while. We continued our walk up the side of the canyon for nearly an hour, to a really nice stream where a previous flood had washed out a footbridge. This track was originally cut by explorers to gain an alternative access route into Valdez, rather than going over the Valdez Glacier. We ate Salmon Berries on the track.  Then back to the car and up and over Thompson Pass again where we briefly stopped at Worthington Glacier. 

We got back to Carla’s at Kenny Lake and Danika cooked roast potatoes and yams to go with the roast chicken and broccoli.  She kicked us out of the kitchen so we wouldn’t get bear spray on the chicken We sat down and played “Double Solitaire” and had pop tarts for the first time, for dessert.

 

Saturday 13 July

Headed out of Anchorage late morning then took the ‘Old Glenn Highway’ through to Palmer. It’s when you get off the beaten track that you see some of the real gems;  Chris loved making us stop to take photos of old cars in paddocks – and there were plenty. We often drove past lots of little cabins and lodges that the miners used in the Gold, Copper and Silver Rush Days, now abandoned.  It seemed so sad that these little buildings with so much history were now just deteriorating.  

Stocked up with some supplies at Palmer and followed the Matanuska River eastward through Chickaloon and onto Glennallen. Turned south onto the Richardson highway and headed to Kenny Lake where we caught up with Carla, a good friend of Peggy Hicks. Spent some time planning with her before continuing onto Valdez. Went up and over Thompson Pass, just stunning, with great views up into Worthington Glacier. Once over the pass we descended passing the stunning Bridal Veil falls, and Horse Tail falls. Had to endure plenty of roadworks and with subsequent delays, got into Valdez around 9:30pm. Decided not to try and book into a campground, save ourselves $50, and after getting some odds and ends at Safeway, camped overnight in their carpark … only to find the following morning that overnight camping was prohibited in their carpark (small sign on the Safeway door!).

 

Friday 12 July

There were only 2 spaces for the Brooks Falls Trip yesterday, and I (Chris) wanted to go so went up this morning.  Had an incredible time and saw a sow nursing her 3 cubs – today there were more fish running so also saw fish jumping into the falls and many bears catching the eating the salmon.  It was incredible to see the bears in their natural environment. After arriving back at the dock, as I was getting out, I dropped my phone into the water! Had assumed that after retrieval due to the cracked screen, the waterproof phone would no longer be waterproof, however, due to the photos on the phone, we thought it was worth trying to find it so Josh, the most willing of us all, jumped into the brown water to find it was pretty shallow and fished around the muddy bottom to retrieve my phone and claim the NZ$50 as his reward money.  We dried the phone out on the dashboard of the truck as we headed towards Anchorage. Surprisingly it switched on and we got the photos off first, and the phone has continued to work which was a relief.

Today, I (Ross), learned a great lesson in humility! It started yesterday when I went to buy a bottle of wine to have with dinner with Kay and Joyce. I got asked for ID!!!!!!! We called into Kenai to see what it was like, not really worth visiting unless you were there for the fishing. Decided to try ‘Arby’s’ for dinner …. I got asked if I wanted a ‘Seniors Discount’!!!!!!

Of course, I said yes – then thought about what I said!! Then I found out the reason EVERYONE gets asked for ID when purchasing alcohol in Alaska, is if you have a DUI conviction, then you have your licence re-issued with a red stripe through it, meaning that you are not allowed to purchase alcohol at all for the duration of your penalty duration.

We headed back to Anchorage, on the Sterling Highway. There was so much visible damage from the fires, with areas of burnt trees that went for miles. With the late getaway from Homer, we were not going to make it to Pam and Bruce’s while they were awake so we parked for the night.

Thursday 11 July

We were up early as Tayla and Danika were going on a flight to Brooks Camp to view the bears.   We had to have them down at Beryl Air’s office on Beluga Lake by 7:45 am. We met Stephanie, the pilot, who was just lovely!  Ross and Chris went back and worked in Kay and Joyce’s camper for the day.  

We flew for an hour and a half from Homer out to Brooks Camp in Katmai National Park. Just as we were pulling up to the shore, we saw a bear walk across the path up to the Ranger Hut and along the beach past the other float planes, and up into the forest. We realised that this would be the first of many up close encounters with the bears. We walked up along the same track the bear just took, up to the Ranger Hut where we listened to an enthusiastic guy and listened to a bear safety video. This means we gained our badge for Bear Safety Orientation for 2019 and we were ready to go out by ourselves. We were not allowed to take any food out on the track with us, as they didn’t want the bears to learn they would get any reward if they approached or attacked humans. We locked up our food in a food cache and out our excess gear in the gear cache. We then started our 20 min hike from the Ranger Hut out to Brooks Falls where it was likely we would see bears along the tracks we were also walking on.  There was a lot of evidence that bears had been there – with lots of bear poo on the tracks. We walked along an elevated walkway careful to close gates that keep the bears out. There were platforms off the walk-way where we could safely view the bears in close range. There are no words to describe the experience. It was INCREDIBLE. There were bears all along the falls including a sow and her three cubs which were 18 months old. We saw them sleeping, swimming and catching salmon (or attempting to). There were people fishing in the river, very close to the bears and sometimes the bears got a bit too close, causing the people fishing to move!  

We had an hour to be on the platform by the falls but had free range on the other platforms.  We walked back to eat our lunch in the locked area with an electric fence and then went back to the plane.  It was a lovely flight back with view over Aleutian Mountain Range and Katmai National Park.

Mum and Dad met us at the plane and we went down to the spit and caught up with Kay and Joyce. They showed us around a bit, where the fishing trips and commercial boats come in and saw them filleting the fish.  We enjoyed an Alaskan beer at the ‘Salty Dawg’, one of the original buildings on the spit, a small log cabin where the fishermen would go at the end of a long day at sea, have a drink, and often drown their sorrows when some of their colleagues were less fortunate and didn’t make it back.  Some of the fishing is at its best in winter (e.g. Dungenes Crabs) out in the Bering Strait! The walls and ceilings were lined with dollar notes with peoples names and messages on them. Although it was a real touristy place, most of the people were locals. 

We came back and had American hot dogs and salad with Angel Cake, cream and strawberries for dessert.

 

Wednesday 10 July

We headed out from the campground back into Seward and Mt Marathon. Weren’t completely sure of what the view would be like as there was a bit of cloud around. One of the campground managers wasn’t what you would call helpful, as we asked her if she knew what the weather was going to be like, and possibilities for clearing cloud to which she replied something along the lines of “I’ve got no idea, I’ve only just woken up!”.

The first part of the hike resembled Grouse Grind, a wider path, but just as steep and rocky. After the first part, the track leveled out somewhat and was a nice gradual climb, snaking up the mountain through some trees and then out into some subalpine bush with plenty of fireweed and great views back down to Seward and the port, with snow-capped mountains in the background.

One we climbed out of the sub-alpine region, the going got quite a bit harder with some steeper rocky climbs, and in one part a schist slope that was very steep and quite challenging. In this upper part of the climb, we were in and out of the cloud, and the temperatures dropped significantly. We climbed to above where there was snow, and the signpost at the beginning of the trail was certainly accurate, describing it as an ‘unmarked trail’. As long as we were going up, we must be getting closer to the top? Walking on this schist rock terrain, came with the saying “oh schist” when something went wrong or we were frustrated, and the saying became quite the laugh.

After a fairly tough 4 hours, we finally made it to the summit at over 3000 ft above sea level. The clouds cleared and the views did not disappoint, just stunning, and certainly enabled some of us to take our minds off our weary legs. Now for the downhill back to the truck.

Some say walking downhill is harder than uphill. We may have doubted that at the beginning, but towards the end, it certainly was tough going. 4 hrs up and 21/2 back down, all feeling pretty weary by the time we got back to the truck. Dani started off the hike saying “I hate this” but as we continued we heard more comments like “This is so cool”, so was definitely well worth it once it was all over.

We stopped into the supermarket to get an ice cream and iced coffee to reward ourselves afterward and to keep us going for the trip to Homer, and Tayla said “Can I sit in the trolley?” when we walked in the doors. Let’s say, it was quite a slow trip around the supermarket with our sore legs. We also used their bathrooms as we had gone the whole hike without using the bathroom! Well, the girls did anyway…

We got back on the road to Homer late afternoon, and when we turned off onto the Sterling Highway, the air was very thick with smoke from all the fires burning on the Kenai. Some nice scenery on the way to Homer but nothing compared to the road in and out of Seward. We got into Homer at 9pm just minutes before the campground office closed, and then headed out to get dinner and went out onto Homer Spit, which was really unique.  It is a lovely fishing village, one of our favourites so far. Found a cafe, Fresh Catch, on the spit, and had dinner which was Clam Chowder, Fish and Chips, and Bison Burgers. Our waitress was called Molly and had been to NZ and worked in Whangarei for a time. We went to the supermarket to stock up and by the time we got back to the campground, it was really late.  We had a site next to Kay and Joyce, and they had taped a welcome message to their windscreen inviting us for coffee and bagels for breakfast the following day.

Tuesday 9 July

We woke up and enjoyed some coffee with Pam and Bruce while planning more of our trip and mapped out a more detailed plan for the next few days.

We went to Fred Meyer supermarket to get some food supplies for our trip. Tayla made chicken, salad, cheese and chip croissant sandwiches which we ate on the road as we drove south towards Seward. 

We drove from Anchorage to our first stop at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Centre where we saw lots of different Alaskan animals, with our favourite still being the bear. We continued driving towards Seward where we stopped in at Exit Glacier. We did a hike around the area out to the glacier, where we had to cross several quick flowing streams. There was another part of the trail that was closed due to recent bear activity around the area. 

We arrived at Stoney Creek RV Park which was full, so we were glad we had booked earlier that day! We enjoyed a nice hot shower and cooked sausages and salad for dinner in the camper and enjoyed eating this on our picnic bench outside the camper. We tried to post some blog posts but the “high speed internet” was definitely not cooperating. After our big evening, we headed off to bed quite late for an early morning start

Monday 8 July

 We spent the morning packing our bags to head away on an overnight trip down to Hatcher’s Pass but after some discussion, we decided that we would go further and spend a few days away from Talkeetna on a road trip. We cleared out the camper and truck and packed up gear in case we needed to tent and supplies to camp. 

We stopped into the Hick’s to discuss options of flying to Brooks Falls and to outline more of a plan of our trip. Peggy contacted her sister who lives in Anchorage and said that she was happy for us to stay with her on our way down.

We had dinner at Royal Thai in Anchorage and then continued on our way to Pam’s house in Anchorage. It was only her and her black Labrador, Lupin, home as her husband is a firefighter and was at work. Her three daughters have all moved out of home but her youngest daughter Hannah (21) stopped into the house after work to say hello. She had baked some cookies which we enjoyed with ice cream and mango for supper before heading off to bed. Mum and Dad slept in the camper while Tayla, Dani, and Josh slept upstairs in the house.

Sunday 7 July

We woke up to Larry ‘buzzing the cabin’ with him and Robbie in the cub.  Ross drove the quad out to the airstrip to pick up a ‘spatula’ and some life jackets for when we go canoeing.  We made pancakes with chocolate sauce, strawberries, maple syrup, and our favourite lemon and sugar. We listened to a podcast of Church at CauseWay and chilled out.   We played ‘double solitaire’ that Larry taught us and Ross and Chris were the first to get to 100 points and then Danika and Tayla were the first to 200 points, so they won. We recreated photos that we had from 1996 with Chris cutting Ross’s hair in front of the cabin and us shooting a rifle from the log cabin window. We started watching “Fast and Furious” and we got a text from Larry telling us to only use the generator for water as with the generator running, the shed becomes really hot and with the tinder dry conditions, again a potential fire hazard.  He also warned us to drive slowly on the quads as they don’t have spark arrestors, and could also cause a fire. Then we started to get emergency alerts about the fires, coming through on our phones. We made the decision to cook dinner, pack up and leave the cabin after dinner as we didn’t want to be a fire risk.  Larry then decided to come out to the cabin to help us pack up and to clear a path to Wiggle Creek and Kelly Lake to improve access to water in case they needed it to protect the cabin from fire. We had chicken, corn and bread for dinner with watermelon for dessert. We then travelled in convey back home. When we got back Robin was shifting the sprinklers and wetting down the perimeter around the property.  It was really smokey. We went for a drive down to the airport to see the helicopters but they had stopped working but ended up talking with a friend of Larry’s. The plumes of smoke were growing. We are looking at going on an overnight trip to Hatchers Pass tomorrow.