Valdez, Alaska

Dick fixing one of our favorite meals. Salmon on the grill. Look no winter coat. We had a day of sunshine in Valdez...This area is surrounded by the Chugach Mountains, the tallest coastal mountains in North America, rising from seal level to an elevation of 7,000 feet.

We cruise in the 55 foot LuLuBelle for a 7 hour trip through Prince William Sound, one of the most spectacular and unspoiled wildernesses in the world. Through the many fjords of the Chugach National Forest, we observed fishermen at work, the terminal of the TransAlaska Oil Pipe Line, glaciers, ice fields and many sea animals.

Valdez has 5 accessible glaciers: the Columbia, Meares, Worthington, Shoup and Valdez. This is the Columbia glacier, the second largest tidewater glacier in North America and largest in Prince William Sound. It is close to a mile wide and rises 300 ft from the waterline.

You get the picture. We're having a great time.

Average summer temp in Valdez is 53 degrees. Today, its much colder with the wind off the glacier.

Our fascination with sea otters is rewarded with this group of 23

little guys swimming together.

Can't resist one more pic.

Our boat in the middle of the icefields as as we go around Glacier Island. Glad that Captain Fred Rudolf has over 30 years of exploring these waters. He got us home safe.

These huge chunks of very blue ice surround us.

The ice fields were so thick with floating masses. Amazing trip through these waters.

Our hike to Worthington Glacier was well rewarded with beautiful views.

A researcher fires up a water drill to bore a hole into the Worthington glacier . A camera is placed in the bedrock to discover the effect of temperatures on ice slides.

Mount Drum is part of the Wrangell Mountain Range and is located between Valdez and Copper Center.

We're in Tok, Alaska. We're fortunate they have a RV repair with a welder. The plate holding our RV tow bar to our jeep broke through. Thank goodness Dick is so observant and recognized the jeep swaying and got us to a stop. Otherwise, the jeep could have beat us down the hill. All repaired and on the road again headed to Haines. Life is good.

Valdez

Beautiful views on our trip to Valdez.

Wrangell Mountain Range. Mt Sanford is the tallest at 16,237 feet. Mt Wrangell is the largest active volcano. Since the 9.2 earthquake in 1964, Mt Wrangell has been warming up the ice and snow that was 160 feet deep.

Dick's view as we travel. Visibility at about 50 feet. Seemed like even less to me. This through the curvy mountain roads with many frost heaves to add a little more excitement. .

Horsetail falls. Great area with lots of falls. Many ribbon falls.

Valdez is often called a little Switzerland . One of Alaska's prettiest spots with glaciers galore, wildlife, and lots of snow covered mts.

The view from our campsite in Valdez. We haven't been in a commercial campground since Salmon Arm in Canada. Great views, again. Valdez is a large fishing village with many commercial boats at the harbor. It is also an oil town with the Alaska Pipeline terminal. We have followed this pipeline from Coldfoot above the Arctic Circle to Valdez.

More flowers..Lots of begonias in every color of the rainbow. Some as big around as a dinner plate.

Bear fun. A trip to Allison point was quite interesting. Momma bear and her 3 cubs put on a show: fishing for their dinner.

Two of the cubs playing. They must think this is great fun reaching into the stream for those swimming fish.

The next photo is a video. Press the arrow to play

Seward/Alyeska

Alyeska resort. 900 + inches of snow each year. This is Alaska's largest ski area. We rode the 60 passenger tram to the top. No skis this time of year.

Horse and rider statue that reflects the history of the native Alaskan sits in front of this elegant hotel.

Beautiful flowers surround the statue and are everywhere on the grounds of the resort. Amazing colors and the size WOW. These peonies were huge.

Great views from the ridge over the ski area. Amazing amount of snow.

Lots of snow still on the ground. Enough that Dick and I could have one more snowball fight. No contest here. Dick knows my aim even at 10 feet, he was safe.

Seward/ Kenai Fjords National Park

Exit glacier. We hiked to the area but could not climb it unless we wanted to risk falling into a crevice as the glacier is considered unstable and unpredictable. .

.

Exit glacier is about 3 miles long. It is believed that this glacier once extended all the way to Seward

Scenic waterfall just outside of Seward. A great hike from our campsite.

All of the trash containers are painted with great artwork and memorable remarks. "Do the right thing every dog gone day"

Kenai Fjords National Park

KENAI FJORDS NATIONAL PARK

We boarded the Glacier Express for a day long tour out Resurrection Bay through the Harding Gateway, the Chiswell Islands to the Holgate Glacier, Aialik Peninsula and back to the small boat harbor at Seward.

Aialik Glacier views. After so many days of rain we picked a great day to get on the water.

We saw lots of sea otters, murres, puffins, Kittlitz's murrelets and seal lions.

Stellar sea lions grow to an average 8 feet long and weigh about 1500 lbs.

Gulls circle and gather in the middle of the waters awaiting their fish feed.

Whale boil. 5 to 6 whales travel together and gather large amounts of fish. The whales surface for these amazing views.

My camera could not capture this phenomena.

Six whales surfacing.

My best whale tail.....

Glaciers galore in the 700 square mile Harding Icefield, the largest icefield located entirely within the United States.

Another great summer day in Alaska

Peaks of the Holgate Glacier.

This glacier has been receding since the ice age 800 years ago.

There is constant activity at the glacier, sounds of popping and the roar of Calving of the glacier.

Our crew picked up ice from the glacier to make these special blue margaritas. Yes the ice actually is blue.

The end of a beautiful day.

Seward is located on Resurrection Bay, east coast of Kenai Peninsula. We camped at the start of the Iditarod Trail in the City Campground looking right out at this view. .

The campground is next to Small Boat Harbor. Lots of cruise ships and small boats in and out of this harbor.

The town is filled with beautiful gardens. These tiger lilies were seen in front of many of the homes.

View out our front window of these little sea otters. They float on their backs and hold their shells in their paws to crack for a tasty meal.

They are so darn cute.

The town has murals painted on many of the businesses. I loved the wildflower scenes.

Another mural . All of the trash cans in the town were also painted and had great inspiring messages. Seeing such artistry, makes you want to clean up the area.

A trip to the Seal Life Center, an ocean wildlife rescue center houses nearly 2000 invertebrates, fish, seabirds and marine mammals. These little moon jellyfish just free float.

The horned puffin is such a cutie. He dives to get fish and then keeps consuming food until he can' t fly and if he does, he may drop from the sky like a potato. They actually fly better underwater. It was fun to watch them diving for food.

We spent 4 days in Sodotna on the Kenai Peninsula. The Kenai river runs right through town and has tremendous fishing spots. In this pic you can see how close the fisherman stand next to each other. Casting and snagging their lines. We were fortunate to camp at a spot just a 5 min. walk to the Kenai. Yes, another free campsite.

Hoping for the big one. Visitor Center in Soldotna. You can fish right behind the center on one of the fishwalks.

A big smile....After standing in thigh deep freezing water, I finally got my salmon.

What a thrill to land this one.