Catching Up

Tues, July 12                            Another Moving Day to Soldotna

A  rainy day was forecast for this area, but it turned out to be fairly light showers this morning, with cloudy skies until mid afternoon when the sun came back out.  What a difference the sun makes up here!  We got to Soldotna about 11:30 and met Paige’s Uncle Jon at his ice cream stand, which is next to the carousel with hand-carved animals (Jon carved the fish and caribou).

  Here we are, two old people in a rocking chair.

Jon gave us a tour of town, as well as the town of Kenai.  He had a campsite held for us at a friend’s place that is right on the banks of the Kenai River – a prime spot when the salmon are running.  The fishermen are waiting for the red salmon run to begin any day now.  The guys in the campground check the river fairly often.  We’re anxious to see what happens when they spot the salmon!!

While following Bob in the RV who was following Jon to the campground, Paige saw a moose in someone’s back yard – right in town!  It was a Northern Exposure moment and she didn’t have time to stop and get the picture!

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Mon., July 11                           A Day-trip to Whittier

We took the car for a day-trip into Whittier which is on the eastern coast and was not accessible by highway prior to June of 2000 when the railroad tunnel was modified to allow cars, trucks, and RVs to straddle the tracks.  They have quite a system in place to make sure traffic is one way only, and to sort the vehicles by priority.

 We had been told that a sunny day in Whittier was rare, but we got a beauty: mild, sunny, and warm.  We saw one of the state ferries come and go while we had an early lunch and chatted with a couple from Tennessee

Later in the day we took a boat ride to the face of the Portage Glacier.  When Paige was here in 1968, the glacier could be seen from the parking lot.  It has receded so much that you need to go on the boat to see it now.

The evening’s entertainment was sitting around a covered campfire sharing stories with other travelers.  The campfire was a nice thing to have as there is no TV here and it was a rainy evening.  We met many of the campers at this fire pit.

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Sun., July 10                             Moving Day

We moved out of Anchorage only 52 miles to Portage Valley, closely following the same railroad tracks we were on yesterday.  The nearby town of Portage was destroyed during the 1964 earthquake, but quite close by is a small RV park nestled into a hollow in the mountains.  There were very beautiful views of the mountains just looking out the front window of the RV.  After getting setup we back-tracked with the car to Girdwood and the Alyeska ski area.  Paige rode a chairlift to the top over 40 yrs ago (when she was very young) but today that has been replaced by an enclosed gondola.

At the top of the ski area we watched people parasailing down (we chose to ride the gondola both ways).