July 30, 2009 – Rain and Friends

We woke late (:-)) this morning to cloudy skies but no rain – Yea!  I cut Andy’s hair and then we both did stuff around the motor home.  At lunchtime, we had a surprise visit from Pennie and Dave who are staying in Soldotna.

So we took a walk on the beach and had a great afternoon visiting and getting caught up and hopefully we will see them again this weekend.

Some pictures from the beach (yes, it started to rain again):

 

Diane and Pennie:

Dave and Andy:

And the rain continued into the night.  I am posting earlier today – still hoping the rain will end so we can have a campfire.  If not, maybe I will do some beading – :-).  Tomorrow we may move to Kenai so stay tuned.

July 29, 2009 – Captain Cook Area, Rain, Sun, Moose, and Friends

As promised, here is a picture of our site:

How about all that vegetation!  Check out how tall the plants are:

The ones with the purple flowers are fireweed.  The real tall ones are cow parsnip which is member of the parsley family (they are much BIGGER than the parsley back east!). The peeled raw stems and cooked roots are eaten by the natives, however, the hairs on the leaves and stems can be irritating.  (From my reaction to a plant last August in PA, I stayed away – LOL!)

We took our walk down to the beach and were heading back to our site when we saw this fellow:

 

Oh! My nose is itchy – LOL!

We hung around near the dumpster for a while – just in case we needed a place to get behind – LOL!!!  But I did get these pictures as we passed him by:

Doesn’t he look like Bullwinkle – :-))):

Since the morning was still a little rainy, we decided to take a ride to Kenai and check out the Elks (where we saw Larry and Cheryl) and then the American Legion (where we will eventually move to after here – they have camping for $10.00 with electric).  After stopping by a few shops to pick up some items, we headed back because the sun was coming out – YEA!!!

The bluff we are on has a great view of Cook Inlet where they have some of the largest tides in the world.  So here are some shots of high and low tide:

 

 

 

WOW!  Amazing to see!

The ripples you see beyond the rock is the mud flats at low tide – VERY DANGEROUS!!  There have been many reports of people walking out on them, getting stuck, and then drowning when the tide came in – Yikkees!!

 

Since the sun was out, we had to sit out and enjoy it – :-))).  

I looked thru my bead stash for my next projects (haven’t been beading in a while and I miss it!):

Andy enjoying the fire:

And Larry and Cheryl stopped by and enjoyed the fire with us – it was great to see them and hopefully we will see them again this weekend.

Some last pictures:

Mount Redoubt:

A beautiful sunset:

What a lovely day – :-))

July 28, 2009 – Travel to Captain Cook

We left Homer this morning in the rain and took a slow drive up SR-1 on the western side of the Kenai Peninsula.  We made a stop at Fred Meyers in Soldotna for fuel and groceries and ran into Peggy and Larry (who we met in Ninilchik).  It was so good to see them and hopefully we will see them again in Arizona this winter.

We continued our journey up the Kenai Spur Road and stopped at the end of the road at the Captain Cook State Park.   If you look at a map, follow the road north of Kenai.  When the road stops, there we are!

I just love this place!!  We are in lush vegetation and sit on a bluff overlooking the Cook Inlet with a view (if it clears) of Mt. Redoubt and Mt. Spur. The rain, however, continued so no pictures – :- ((.   Tomorrow, I promise!

Miles Traveled:  117 miles

Routes Traveled:

AK: SR-1 (Sterling Highway); SR-490 (Kenai Spur Highway)

July 27, 2009 – Our Last Day in Homer

We woke today to some rain and wind.  The rain stopped but the wind continued…  And we were treated this morning to this fellow:

 

Today would have been my mom’s 81st birthday – so Happy Birthday, Mom!  I miss you!

We decided to take a walk down the Spit towards town.  It was a great walk out and a very windy walk back but at least we got some exercise by doing about 3 miles.

Our walk took us past the industrial harbor – this is low tide – they load up the barges and when the tide comes in – off they go:

  

We had seen tires marked like this throughout Alaska so we got talking to a trucker at the industrial harbor and he told us they are marked so in winter in the snow they can see if their tires are moving or if they are frozen.

The entrance to the industrial harbor at low tide:

We also walked by the “graveyard” – this one looks an old pirate ship – AHOY MATIE!!!

And on our walk back – the other side of the Spit:

A nice walk after all!

After supper this evening we stopped by the Elks Lodge and had a few drinks with Larry and Cheryl and Earlene and Bill (who we met in Congress, AZ at North Ranch in March of this year – what a small world!).  Back at the MH, we sat out with Bruce and Sue and just watched the beautiful sunset after the wind stopped.   Tomorrow we are heading out – not sure where so stay tuned.

July 25-26, 2009 – More Homer

Saturday , 25th, was a rainy, windy day so we just hung out and watched the tide roll in and roll out – LOL!!!

In the evening, we went to the Pier One Theater with Larry and Cheryl to see “First Friday” presented by the local Homer theater group.  It was about 2 sisters and their cousin set in 1938 New Orleans who made the required “nine First Fridays in a row” by attending Mass and being assured salvation.  Many of the scenes took place on the cousin’s front porch where all the “gossip” took place.  It was a great little play.  (Pennie, if you are reading this – Abyssinia.)   The author of the play was also there so that was neat!

Sunday, 26th, turned out to be a beautiful day.  So we took a ride on Skyline Drive and out to the end of East End Road.

We got some great views of the Homer Spit – that is the piece of land in the middle of Kachemak Bay.  This view is from the south side of the Spit

   

From the north side of the Spit:

A closer view – we are camped in the middle:

 

More views of Kachemak Bay – this is looking towards the south:

The north end of the bay:

Glaciers across the Bay:

 

At one of the lookouts:

And the fireweed that is just coloring the hills – Beautiful!!  Not sure if I told you the story on this but the fireweed blooms from the bottom up.  After blooming, it will go to seed from the bottom up.  The theory is once the blooms are done on the top, it will be about 6 weeks until it is winter or once the seeding goes to the top, it will be two weeks until it snows.  Hmmmm, maybe we will find out this year – LOL!!!

And from our campsite:

The neighbor near us was cleaning his fish and threw the scraps to the gulls and here they are yelling and squawking….

 

But it didn’t last too long until their food was stolen!

Here he comes:

 

Got it:

And away:

Check out this picture!:

Oh my! Oh my! Oh my!  What a treat!!!

And we had another great campfire night with Bruce, Sue, Diane, John, Larry, Cheryl, Bob, Jackie and our next door neighbors (forgot their names – sorry!!)

July 24, 2009 – Bearfooting and Friends

This morning we did laundry and dumped (grey/black) and filled (water) our tanks.  We were going to do the historic harbor tour this afternoon but the sun came out, the wind stopped and we decided it was going to be a “Bearfooting” Day! (Thanks, Pennie for that one.)

“ Bearfooting”

“Bearfooting” is a verb.  it means having a good time on the road.  But it’s also a state of mind, when your journey becomes more important than your destination.  You know you’re bearfooting when you find yourself holding a fishing pole and can’t remember the day of the week.  What’s more, you don’t even care.  (Copied from BearFoot, Alaska travel magazine.)

So Andy played Harbor Master:

While I took some pictures and got caught up with emails.

 

And we had a campfire party joined by Dianne, John, Larry, Cheryl, Bruce, Sue, Jackie, and Bob – what a great time chatting, watching the tide go out and keeping warm by the fire – :-)