Alaska Trip 2011: June 27 to July 4 - Anchorage to Seward

This is page 30 of our Alaska 2011 trip journal. Click here for the first page. If you want to bookmark this journal, http://jeanne-travels.blogspot.com always links to the newest page.

After leaving Trappper Creek, we made our way to Seward, on the east side of the Kenai Peninsula. This is the peninsula south of Anchorage, and is a favorite weekend spot for people who live in Anchorage. Knowing that the holiday weekend was coming up, we decided to stay through the 4th, so we would not end up having problems finding a place to stay after the weekend crowds settle in.


View Larger Map

Seward Highway

The Seward Highway runs from Anchorage to Seward, and is a very scenic drive. We drove parts of the highway two or three times while we were there.

A whole field of lupines, and in water lilies in some of the wetlands.

Tidal Bore

A tidal bore, or bore tide, occurs when the incoming tide rushes in so quickly that the leading edge is basically a wall of water. This occurs most often in areas where there is a narrow inlet and a large difference between high and low tide. The Turnagain Arm, south of Anchorage, is one of the few places in the world where this occurs on a regular basis. The actual height of the wave varies depending on weather conditions, and the phase of the moon, which affects how high or low the tides are. The wave we saw was probably about 3 feet, but they can get as high as 6 feet in this area.

You can't see the wave very well from the high vantage point in the first picture, but it's still a pretty picture, so I included it anyway. The second picture was taken a little farther down the road, and shows the wave a lot better. It was a rainy, misty day, so the pictures came out a little gray.

The next two shots give an even better sense of the size of the wave. Besides the eagles and gulls milling around looking for fish tossed out by the wave, there is a guy who decided to try to surf the wave. Surf's up, eh?

Seward

Seward is a small town on the eastern side of the Kenai Peninsula. It is partially tourist town and partially seaport/fish harbor. There was an interesting story behind the waterfall - apparently there was a mountain stream that was flooding areas of the town often enough that it annoyed them, so they dug a tunnel and diverted it out the other side of town into the bay.

Lowell Point

South of Seward is a place called Lowell Point. Along the road here, we saw a couple old railroad cars that looked like they might have used it for something else for a while, but now they seemed pretty much abandoned. Nearby, we saw one lonesome wild iris.

This boat was a bit of a mystery to me. It was near low tide, so there would definintely be enough water to float it when the tide comes back in. If it's seaworthy enough to float, that is. It didn't really look like it had been underwater or sunk here, but I don't know. Sometimes people will use the tide to give them a drydock of sorts, if they need to work on the bottom or something. Don't know if that's the case here, or if it is really just an old wreck. But the pile of stuff behind it is another story. It is definitely junk - an old engine, drive train, and prop.

Nash Road

We took a ride around to the south side of the harbor, where we found an old boat yard, and some nice views of the harbor. Look closely at the reddish building - it's made of old shipping containers, with a roof on top.

The flowers are goatsbeard and daisies.

The Lake Erie

We spotted this ship, the Lake Erie, docked in the harbor on Wednesday. A couple days later, we spotted on its way out of the harbor. After doing a little research (Google is your friend!) we learned that it is a guided missile cruiser, and it was passing thru here on its way south after completing some exercises farther north.

Fourth of July

We wondered how they did fireworks in the land of the midnight sun. Even though we are a little farther south than before, it still doesn't get very dark at night. Certainly not dark enough for a good fireworks display. Of course they do fireworks anyway, typically at 12:01 a.m. on the fourth. If you ask people about it, they agree the display is not the best, but they are sure to point out that the fireworks are great on New Years Day.

We decided to pass on the fireworks this year. Partly because we were likely to be disappointed in a semi-dark show, and partly because Seward was going to be a zoo. They have a really big festival over the fourth, and the little town of 2,000 swells to about 20,000. Sounds like a good place to avoid.

Kenai Fjord

We also went to Kenai Fjords National Park while we were here, once by land and once by sea. But this page is getting kind of long, so I'll do those on the next page.

---