bobanddenisewanderlust

We woke up and packed up to move. We had the motor home ready and I went looking for a site. Our back up was the Elks Lodge, and when I went past the other places, there were no sites available. I called Bob and told him it was the Elks. I started back and realized that a site had opened up in the City Campground, so I stopped Bob and had him turn into the park. We pulled into a nice site, right on the bay for $15/night, boon-docking. I walked over and gave a check to the ranger who showed up to check the campground right as I arrived at the kiosk.

We left at a little after 10 AM to go to the Farmers Market. It was packed! We lucked out as someone was just pulling out of a parking space as we pulled into a row. We met up with Margie and Wayne there. We purchased 4 containers of fresh homemade medium salsa for Tom and Marian; Tom had emailed asking us to pick some up for them. We will meet up with them in Soldotna on Tuesday to give salsa to them. I also purchased two Alaska themed pot holders.

We continued back to the Alaska Islands and Ocean Visitor Center to look at the exhibits. On the way, we spotted this Bald Eagle in the tree.

 

As you can see, his head is turning so he is watching his territory. The RV Park had a warning to not leave your small dogs( or cats) out has they are Eagle bait. Eagles are hunters!

We met back up with Wayne and Margie there. We looked at the nice exhibits, then took the walking path down to the Two Sisters Bakery for lunch. This place is hidden, back in the old town. The place was packed with locals, so you know it was good! Bob had a sandwich and mushroom/sausage cup of soup. Wayne had the same, with tomato bisque. Margie had a 1/2 turkey foccatta sandwich with the sausage/mushroom soup, and I had just the ham and cheese sandwich. All were terrific!

Typical of Alaska, you ordered at the counter, they delivered it to your table and tell you just to tell them up front what you had. No check, just get in line and tell them what you ate and pay for it. Lots of honesty systems in place in Alaska!

We walked back up the hill to the museum, then proceeded  about 2 miles to the Pratt Museum. 

The Pratt’s focus is different. They show the history of the Homer, about the earthquake, info about the spruce beetle, bears and birds.

We arrived and I had forgotten to bring our pass from the Visitor Center the other day. ( I had taken it out of my fanny pack on Friday and given it to Bob. When he did not use it, I forgot to put it back in the bag.) So I just told the gal at the desk that I had forgotten it, and she gave us the discount. Honesty policy again!

The museum had exhibits, artistry and quilts! The main floor is exhibits, you go down to the middle floor, which had the birds, and then down again to the basement, which had exhibits and bears.

Exhibits:

 

Most of the exhibits were hands on. One, where you open a door, shows the town by the homesteaders plots, with the names of the homesteaders. There was a Gray family and also a Holmes family! Neat!  

Here is Wayne trying on a cold water immersion suit. See the clock? You have 30 seconds to get into this thing to survive! Wayne barely made it! Then Margie had to help him get out of it. Notice the hands, they are paws and he could not remove the suit.

Another hands on was this exhibit displaying the shift in the earth, causing the light in the summer and dark in the winter. You  push the red button on the left which shines a light on the earth and shift the earth to show how the light and dark effect the area. It was interesting. Makes you understand why there are so many quilts and alcoholics!  You either quilt or drink!

Here’s one of the quilts. They had cards in the gift shop with the quilts designs.

Here is one of the carvings.

We watched, on live cam feed, birds on Gull Island. Bob was able to move the camera using the computer and mouse. I asked him to find a Puffin ( love those red legged puffins only found in Alaska!). He found one, but the little guy just looked around and took off! In the picture is a gull.

This is the first time I remember ever having seen a turtle skeleton!

We went down another floor and they had an exhibit on Valdez and the oil spill. Oh, so sad!

Then we sat for about 20 minutes watching a mama bear and her three cubs on the live cam from Brooks River Falls- you can go to “explore.org” to watch the bears. I have to remember to watch them when the salmon are running, as this a where there are great pictures of the bears catching salmon as they jump up over the falls.

Above are the three cubs, waiting for momma, who is in the water, fishing.

We left the museum, and went back to the Sterling Hwy. to stop at Safeway. We wanted to pick up a few items and to get some cash when checking out. Right after turning onto the road, a moose popped out of the trees. I flipped a quick U-turn, and returned to get a picture.

There was a couple on bicycles and the moose literally walked right out in front of them. They were within two feet of the moose. They had to jump off their bikes, as they were going up hill and had to stop quickly. They had obviously been concentrating on getting up the hill, and did not notice the moose until it walked right out. The woman quickly grabbed her camera, but they were in a dangerous situation, as they were so close to the moose! In the above picture, the moose had ignored the bikers and is walking away from them.

Then this young guy, strolled across the highway!

We knew it was a male, as the antlers were starting to grow. We had been told we probably would not be able to see a male as they are deep in the woods this time of year and usually do not come out until the fall for the rutting. We hung out until he went into the woods on the other side of the highway. Needless to say, all traffic was stopped for this fella!

We continued on to Safeway, then stopped at the lighthouse. There is a light in the top of this small lighthouse, but it is a private residence, so no stamp for our lighthouse passport.

From the lighthouse we could see the town campground.

We returned to the motor home, put away the groceries and went out on the beach. By this time, the sun was shining, but the wind was blowing so it was chilly.  Bob walked the dogs and Roxie was so excited to find sand! She just started digging and digging; getting in her digging fix! We were able to watch three guys para-sailing right in front of the motor home, in wet suits of course.

We finally got cold and went back inside. Bob took a nap and I read my book, until I fell asleep in the recliner!

We decided to go into town to pick up some fresh salmon for dinner. We went to one of the local processing plants and bought fresh sock-eye salmon, $14/lb. We bought a small filet, about 13oz, and returned to the motor home to grill it. Awesome! Fresh is always better!!

We settled in and watched some TV before bed.

Here is low tide then high tide in approximately the same location.

Our view of the mountains and glaciers.

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