Today is a day of driving to get us to our next "camp". We are leaving Talkeetna for a decent drive to Soldotna/Kenai/Kalifornski... It looks a bit like this with Anchorage obscured by the "5hr 3min" banner... what is interesting/unique about Alaska is that when you type something into the fancy Google maps, there aren't "options" like there are stateside. Oh sure, there are some options to get thru Anchorage, but other than that, you have one road to take.
It's sort of cool but also a little bit disconcerting when it's raining hard in areas where it's been dry for a long time!
So here's our path for the day.
First are the photo's from the AirBn'b that we stay at in Talkeetna. I always take pics after we've loaded up and cleaned the place so if we ever have a dispute, I have a record to refer back too.
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| The critters sleeping. |
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| That window was well placed and appreciated! |
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| There were two of these units that had been built fairly recently. They weren't far apart and there wasn't a ton of room to drive around somebody in the first unit depending on where they parked. There was some decent trepidation about getting stuck in a remote town in Alaska and so on... As it turns out, there was no need to be nervous as the loop that linked the main road to our "driveway". |
We hit the road with idea of getting gas in Willow (the dog sled/atv place from the previous post) but we got squirted out the South side of town before we even knew what was going on. No worries as we certainly had petroleum distillate to get to Houston , Wasilla, and even Anchorage if needed.
Eventually we got to Anchorage and proceeded to drive thru a town that was not as I expected. It was smaller that my expectations and fairly easy to drive thru the first time! Oh, don't get me wrong, I still cussed, both under my breath and sometimes out lour at my fellow humans who did not meet my expectations. We were headed towards Earthquake Park before we continued on South.
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This was at the Turnagain Heights slide of Earthquake Park in Anchorage.
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| You can't really tell in the pictures but the "stair stepping" of the land from the earthquake is quite apparent. |
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| It's like a mirrored image of the The Beatles Rubber Soul album. lol |
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| Back on the road... |
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| On the road again! This is highway 1 along the Turnagain Arm betwixt Anchorage and Alyeska. |
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| Low tide... |
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| There are common whale sightings in this area but alas, we did not "sight" any of them. |
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| Caleb appears to be antagonizing Rob, which is not an uncommon event. |
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| The landscape suddenly changed to look like this with a lot of swampy vegetation and such. |
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| I cut this from the fancy Google Maps and if you take special notice of the parking lot and the puddles, it was just like this when we were there except that the puddles were much larger and the parking lot appeared to be a small world map where you had to step from country to country without falling into the ocean. |
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| The Hightower Pub where Caleb and I split a salmon dish that is not on their online menu. But, it was fan.tas.tic! Probably some of the best seafood that we had on vaca. Rob had a cheeseburger that he was not fond of and mama had... I don't remember, but I do remember that the salmon and it's sides rocked! |
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| After filling our bellies, we stopped off at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center to sample their offerings. They did not disappoint. |
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A Brown bear that most people were not paying attention too. More on this critter later.
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| These next pics are from Mama's phone as her and Caleb went up above on the walkway/viewing platform while Rob and I stayed behind to advance our vessel and see our own stuffs. |
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| This is back to Rob and my perspective. Not the elevated walking path the Mama & Caleb are on. Also note the bear in the (near) middle of the picture as well as the dark colors of the one on the very left of the photo. |
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| Workers throwing various food to the critter. Grapes, carrots and other stuff. This critter seemed to like the grapes the best. |
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Note the bear in the middle of the pic.
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| Here he/she is now. |
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| And our little critter feeding? Just happy eating his currently provided kibble. Rob and I had this dude to ourselves for quite a while but we're starting to attract a crowd at this point. |
Back into our vessel we go and drive on down to Soldotna where we hit a grocery store before we get to our next hideout at our AirBn'b.
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Caleb and his love for jerkey has been banished from the car due to the smell. This became law of the land after the visit to the place South of Talkeetna where he bought Salmon jerkey. It was pretty tasty, but it smelled horrible and had bones in it. Rob revolted and was likely right as it smelled horrible! When we got to our next house, Caleb got out and was dancing on the landscaping while Mama was trying to figure out how to get inside.
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| This is when he discovered that I was recording him! LOL |
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This is at the back of the yard of this AirBn'b overlooking the Cook Inlet.
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| That's the lean to that Carl, who owns the joint, built to sit on or at, a picnic table or a love seat with recliners and to watch the waters, sunsets, sunrises and so on! |
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| From the same back yard. |
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| From the back door/deck of the house overlooking the Cook Inlet and the Redoubt Volcano across the waters. That will figure into the story later. |
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| Mama took the varmints on a walk along the beach once we were somewhat settled in. |
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| Senior picture alert!!! |
Super cool place and glad that we have a few days to spend here!
