June 21st, 2024 - Road Trip to Homer

On Friday, June 21st, we did a road trip to the Homer area.  On Monday, Andy has an bloodwork appointment at the Homer Hospital Lab so that was our first stop - just to check where it is.

The view from the hospital:

From there we wandered around Homer and the Homer Spit - What a beautiful place.

Heading to the Spit:

Interesting House/Boat?:

The Docks:

Beautiful Mountains all around:

Small boats heading out of the harbor:

LOTS of seagulls and they were noisy - LOL!:

Many nesting - if you look closely, you can see babies:

The City Campground - we hope to be there next month:

Art on the beach:

Fishing boat coming in:

Cool Mosaic: 

The fishing hole by the campground - we did see a few seals roaming around but couldn't get them on camera:

A nice place to relax - looking out on Kachemak  Bay:

A little Homer History:

"Tiller digs indicate that early Alutiiq people probably camped in the Homer area, although their villages were on the far side of Kachemak Bay.

Coal was discovered in the area in the 1890s. The Cook Inlet Coal Fields Company built a town, dock, coal mine, and railroad at Homer. Coal mining in the area continued until World War II. It is estimated that 400 million tons of coal deposits are still present in the area.

Homer was named for Homer Pennock, a goldmining company promoter, who arrived in 1896 on the Homer Spit and built living quarters for his crew of 50 men. However, goldmining was never profitable in the area.

Another earlier settlement, Miller's Landing, was named after a Charles Miller, who homesteaded in the area around 1915. According to local historian Janet Klein, he was an employee of the Alaska Railroad and had wintered company horses on the beach grasses on the Homer Spit. He built a landing site in a small bight in Kachemak Bay, where supply barges from Seldovia could land and offload their cargos. Miller's landing was legally considered a census-designated place separate from Homer until it was annexed in 2002, but has always been locally considered part of Homer."

We stopped at Fat Olives for a great pizza and then headed back.  Since it was such a nice day, we finished the evening with a campfire.

What a great day - Thank you Larry and Peg.