An underwater petting zoo.

This morning we caught our train to Seward. This four-hour train ride was WAY better than the trains to Denali and Fairbanks. We rode between sheer cliff faces, parallel to both the shoreline and a river, over river gorges with sheer drops from the sides of our train and surrounded by snow-capped mountain peaks. There were even several glaciers visible spilling down the valleys, and the melt from the glaciers carved its way down the mountains in streams and waterfalls. We also saw a bald eagle hanging out in the trees very close to the train.

Sunrise reflections on the Alaska Railroad.

Buildup of glacial silt, visible when the tide is out. It becomes very dangerous as the tide comes back in, turning into something like quicksand!

The beautiful views kept me awake on this ride, despite the early hour!

Getting closer to the mountains...

Reflections on the glassy water.

The Trail Glacier, named because it has the black trail of silt in the middle where two glaciers crashed together to make one glacier.

Back of our train.

Another glacier - the closest one to the railroad at only a half mile away!

We arrived in Seward to lovely, warm, sunny weather. We hopped on the free shuttle to see the sights of Seward and also see if we could get a bit closer to our bed and breakfast, but the shuttle took us downtown, which was actually AWAY from our bed and breakfast. After making the full loop of the shuttle's route, we got back off at the train station where we had started, then dragged our bags more than a half mile uphill to the Bear Ridge Bed and Breakfast. I was sweating for the first time on our entire trip. :)

We settled in to our room at Bear Ridge B&B, which was a bedroom right off the owner's kitchen with a bathroom beside it; it felt a little like staying at our grandparents' house since the owners were right next to us. The owners were kind enough to leave homemade buttermilk doughnuts in our room - yummy! After settling in, we walked back down to the train station and caught the shuttle downtown for lunch. We stopped at a little place called Nellie's that boasted fresh fish and chips, and that sounded pretty good to me! Gavin and I shared fish and chips (where the "chips" were onion rings - yum!) and were REALLY surprised at our bill of over $25; I guess we should stop being sticker shocked by the prices in Alaska as we have already been here almost two weeks, but the high prices never cease to amaze...

After lunch we walked to the Sea Life Center, Seward's aquarium. It had lots of nice little displays of Alaska sea life, and had an underwater "petting zoo" where I touched various sea creatures like starfish, a sea cucumber, anemones, etc. (though I avoided touching the available shrimp and crabs - too much like bugs... :) ) They had a sea lion and her REALLY cute calf. They fed the adult sea lion and had it do various tricks. The baby (still nursing, so not being fed) followed its mom around and tried to attempt a few of the tricks itself, like jumping/crawling on the rocks. When we went downstairs to see into the bottom of the mammal tanks, one of the workers held a red ball in her hand and a cute seal followed it around for a bit. We also got to see the swimming birds diving into the water. I learned that the vibrant pink salmon I had seen a few days ago near the Mendenhall Glacier were only bright pink for spawning; other than spawning time they are silver!

After the Sea Life Center, we walked a path along the shoreline all the way back to the bed and breakfast. This route lined with dozens of tents, campers and RVs parked there to spend the night. We scoped out places along the dock to have dinner with a good view, and we also found a place on the dock where fishermen were cleaning their fresh catches. I got my first look at my new favorite white fish "in the flesh" - halibut are HUGE fish and almost square in shape. We took a little nap in the bed and breakfast, then headed out for dinner.

The Seward harbor, filled with hundreds of boats!

We once again walked the more than half mile back to the dock and went to eat at Ray's, which had a nice view over the docks. I once again had some tasty halibut while Gavin mawed down a big plate of ribs. We saw people taking pictures off the dock outside the restaurant window, so we headed down to see what they were looking at - a cute sea otter was frolicking and eating in the water less that ten feet from the dock! After getting a few unfortunately blurry photos, we went back to our B&B to turn in - tomorrow, our last day in Alaska, is another long day of travel!

 

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Alaska is big; so are its veggies.

The Alaska State Fair.

The Alaska State Fair ticket booth: close until noon...

Today we drove our rental car up to Palmer, AK, the home of the Alaska State Fair. We were looking forward to the people watching and the "cultural experience." :) We arrived at about 11:30am, and we noticed we were one of only about twenty cars in the parking lot. We wondered if we had mistaken a local county fair for the state fair, but when we went to the entrance we learned that the fair didn't actually open until noon! We were glad we hadn't tried to get up early to make it to the fair! :)

We wandered around a bit, just seeing the typical state fair stuff like 4-H exhibits, food stands and rides. Then we noticed a building labeled "King Tut Exhibit." We wandered in and were surprised to see things labeled as artifacts from King Tut's tomb not even behind glass! At the very end of the exhibit was King Tut's mummy itself! At this point I was sure these objects were all replicas, but NOWHERE in the exhibit was anything labeled "Replica of King Tut's tomb," etc. I asked the woman guarding the entrance, "How did you get the real King Tut stuff at the Alaska state fair??" She told me they were actually all cast replicas made from molds of the real stuff, and also said, "They'd have somebody way more imposing than little me guarding it if it was the real stuff!" :)

Hey, look! It's King Tut........ NOT!

There was a lot of fresh produce for sale at the state fair, almost like a farmer's market. They also had a section dedicated to giant vegetables. The livestock section not only included the typical pigs, sheep and goats, but there were also reindeer that little kids had raised as their 4-H project!

Giant veggies!

The local "livestock." Hi Prancer!

After a few hours and lots of unhealthy food later, we decided to leave, having seen everything at the fair, plus it was starting to rain on us yet again... We headed back to Anchorage and did some laundry while relaxing in our room for a bit. Then we headed into downtown to have dinner at the Glacier Brewpub. It was a large restaurant, but the wait was still an hour and a half. Since we wanted to have a really nice last dinner in Anchorage, we decided to wait. About ten minutes later, our buzzer rang that our table was ready! That was a pleasant surprise! We had pretty much the best meal of our trip so far - FABULOUS, tender calimari and I had some more halibut. Gavin is tired of seafood, so he ordered steak. Then we headed back to our hotel for an early night - we have to catch our train to Seward tomorrow at 6:45am!

 

I am about to put some serious hurtin' on that blue raspberry cotton candy. :)

 

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All it takes is ONE question. :)

Sunrise over the dock at Bartlett Cove.

The Baranof Wind: our home for eight hours.

Today we took our eight hour cruise of Glacier Bay. Our boat was the Baranof Wind, which had two levels to enclosed seating plus an open-air upper deck that was CHILLY. We got to see a lot of wildlife today, starting almost immediately after we left the dock. The first creatures we saw were sea otters floating on their backs with their heads and tails in the air to keep them out of the cold water. The water here, too, was almost a Caribbean blue. Our first stop to look at wildlife was Marble Island, where we finally got to see some puffins flitting around the rocks, and there were several sea lions lounging on the rocks. A little farther along where a little stream dumped into the bay, we saw four bears swimming and fishing for salmon. We saw silver salmon leaping out of the water, we saw the spray from humpback whales spouting, and we caught a glimpse of a bald eagle sitting on the shoreline.

Heading up Glacier Bay, luckily toward that patch of sunlight!

Sea lions relaxing on the tip of Marble Island.

Flocks of birds and sea lions on Marble Island.

More sea lions - there had to be hundreds of them!

Bears fishing for salmon in a little stream dumping in to the bay.

Another tour boat dwarfed by the mountains surrounding the bay.

The Baranof Wind was kind enough to provide binoculars for all the passengers. Gavin made me pose for this pic in the freezing cold wind of the top deck. I wasn't actually looking at anything. :)

Two distinct colors of water - the Caribbean blue of the bay water and the muddy brown from the silt of the glacier melt flowing into the bay.

At the end of the bay, we got to see both the Grand Pacific Glacier and the Margerie Glacier. The Grand Pacific Glacier was so dirty that I wouldn't have been able to tell it was a glacier if we hadn't been told. But it was the glacier that originally had carved out the entire 60 mile stretch of Glacier Bay. The Grand Pacific Glacier has been receding for a few hundred years. The Margerie Glacier, on the other hand, is still advancing and was a vibrant blue. We waited around the two glaciers for a while to see if they would calve (drop chunks of ice off into the water), but the biggest calving we saw was about the size of a snowball.

Our first view of the Margerie Glacier (on the left) and the Grand Pacific Glacier (on the right.)

The beautiful Margerie Glacier, an advancing tidal glacier.

The crystal-like ice of the Margerie Glacier.

Gavin and I in front of the Mendenhall Glacier - a bit windy... :)

The Grand Pacific Glacier: the one that originally carved the entire 60 miles of Glacier Bay, but now is receding and is so dirty I wouldn't have known it was ice!

On the way back we saw the Lamplugh and Reid glaciers, and also, my favorite part of the trip, we passed through a pod of killer whales! We got to see them coming up out of the water for air, and one even breached! (launched itself all the way out of the water)

The Lamplugh Glacier.

Wow, we actually managed to get a pic of the orca!

Gorgeous Glacier Bay at the end of our trip, water like glass...

After we got back we had a few hours before our flight, so we sat in the Glacier Bay Lodge lounge and relaxed for a bit. Upstairs from the lodge was the Glacier Bay Visitor's Center, which had several preserved/stuffed native wildlife, as well as the skeleton of a whale, which had vertebrae twice the size of my pelvis!

We loaded the shuttle to the airport, and we shared it with a family of Japanese tourists. The first few minutes of the ride were dead silent, and Gavin leaned over to me and whispered jokingly, "I wish the shuttle driver would shut up!" I made a bet with him that all I had to do was ask him one question and he would talk the whole rest of the way. I asked our driver, "Have you lived here your whole life" and I won the bet... By the time we reached the airport ten minutes later I knew about his ex wife, his new wife, where he was from, that he had a sailboat, that he was building his own house with his wife in Gustavus after living mostly on the boat, and more! I have observed that in general Alaska people are very talkative, but they will not say a word until you ask them ONE question to bring them out. :)

The shuttle dropped us off at the airport, which was barely more than a barn with a desk and a coffee shop inside. :) When our plane arrived, I asked the pilot if I could sit in the copilot seat, and he said yes! The flight back to Juneau was even prettier than the flight to Gustavus! We flew THROUGH the snow-capped mountains, not above or beside them. Also, another interesting fact about flying in Alaska; people can get their pilot's license at the age of FOURTEEN, and that is two years younger than they can get a driver's license! That explains how our pilot on this flight looked like he was about twenty... and it also makes Gavin and I want to get our pilot's licenses; if a fourteen year old can fly a plane, surely we can! :)

Flying through the mountains.

When we got back to Juneau, we headed back into downtown for dinner. We ate at the Twisted Fish, which was right on the cruise ship dock. I was really tired of salmon, so I ordered halibut tacos, which were actually pretty good. Gavin had cedar plank salmon that was definitely served on a cedar plank, but it definitely wasn't COOKED on the cedar plank - the distinct flavor of the plank was conspicuously absent. I guess they figure the tourists won't know the difference... :) After dinner we walked back through the town, which had gotten decidedly seedier in the darker hours after all the tourists were safely tucked back into their ships. We headed back to our hotel and safely tucked ourselves in to prepare for our dog sledding adventure tomorrow!

Flying through the mountains.

 

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Mush, mush!

Our nice, shiny helicopter. :)

Today we headed over to ERA Helicopters for our helicopter flight to the Juneau ice field. Our flight through the mountains was once again really lovely. We also flew over the top of a few glaciers, so we got to see them from above for the first time. The helicopter felt like it was lazily and slowly flying through the mountains, but our pilot told us it was actually going over 100 miles per hour!

Gavin and I are ready to fly... with our life jackets. :)

Gavin is feeling bada$$.

We are ready to fly!

The view from the helicopter.

Our first view of one of the glaciers that make up the Juneau ice field.

The brilliant blue part of it is where it just calved, probably around an hour ago.

The Juneau ice field is still covered with snow. The tiny dots at the bottom are the dog camp!

The dog camp - home to more than 130 dogs and also several humans for three months. Everything, including the dogs, has to be flown to this location and back by helicopter!

Helicopters landed at the dog camp. Each tour usually takes 3-4 helicopters at once.

Gavin and I with a semi-cooperative husky that kept wanting to run back to his caretaker - that's why BOTH of us are holding on to his harness pretty tightly... :)

As we reached the Juneau ice field, we could see the dog camp. The "mushers" (people who train and drive the dogs) live isolated up in the field for three months, taking care of around 130 dogs! The sound when we arrived was a cacophony of yapping - the dogs knew they would get to run when they saw the arrival of the helicopters and were really excited. We got to meet and pet one of the dogs, then the owner gave us a brief demo of how to "drive" the sled. (I say "drive" loosely because we only got to "drive" one being towed behind the "real" sled driver...) As we got on the sled, the dogs got so excited that they were jumping in the air in their harnesses. Gavin got to drive our towed sled first, while the musher drove the sled in front of us. The glacier/ice field in this area was covered with slushy snow, and the dogs pulled us along a track through it. After a bit, we switched and I got to drive the sled, and later we switched again so the people in the front sled could move to our back sled and drive. It was fun to be towed along by the extremely energetic and wiry dogs. :) Whenever we stopped to switch drivers, the dogs threw themselves dramatically in the snow, either on their bellies or on their backs. Our musher told us that is how they cool off; I guess it is hard work towing 600+ pounds of people and sleds... :) (five people, plus two sleds!) Once we were at the end of the ride, we got to pet all the dogs, and our musher told us that all the litters of dogs have names that group them together by litter, i.e. one litter is named for types of mint candy (Junior, Pepper, Spear), one is named for Big Bang Theory characters, one is named by animals that start with the letter "P" (Panther, Puma, Puffin.) etc. (my nerdy self told them their next litter should be named "Kirk," Spock, "McCoy..." :) )

Gavin "drives" the sled. Notice the tow ropes? Those are not connected to dogs. Those are connected to the front sled and the REAL driver...

The lead dog takes a quick dive into the snow - it's hard work carting tourists! :)

Now I get a turn to drive. Mush, mush!! :)

Gavin and I with our team of dogs.

Now we are riding in the front sled with the real driver.

Another little rest for the puppies.

Giving the dogs some well-deserved love after our little trek.

Our helicopter ride on the way back took a slightly different path. This time we flew over a rare glacier that actually floats on a lake! We also got to see a few mountain goats high on the peaks, so another Alaskan animal to check off the list. :) On the ride back Gavin and I got to sit in the front of the helicopter with much better views!

Two glaciers tumble down the mountain, and their melting forms that lake at the bottom.

This glacier is unique in that it floats on a lake underneath it! The hole in the center is a sinkhole into the lake.

Our beautiful flight down to Juneau.

Another lake formed by glacial melting.

After the helicopter ride, we headed back into downtown Juneau to have lunch. We had some delicious pizza at Pizzeria Roma in Merchant's Wharf, then we headed back to the Rookery to have a little dessert and coffee to pass the time before our flight to Anchorage.

Once in Anchorage, we checked in to the Creekwood Motel. Gavin was in the mood to go see a movie since the weather was once again icky and rainy. We found the Bear Tooth Theater where we could both watch a movie and eat our dinner while watching. It was surprisingly good food. Then we headed back to our cozy little motel. We went to bed, the sound of the pouring Anchorage rain lulling us to sleep.

 

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