September 2, 2013 Monday
Day 58
Another on and off rainy morning, luckily there was a break in the rain during the time Michael was outside hooking up the camper. Today we leave Palmer and drive 166 miles to Seward. Michael lived in Seward from 1984-1988 when he was the Assistant District Ranger in charge of recreation, lands, minerals, and special uses for the Chugach National Forest.
Drove along Turnagain Arm, an eastern extension of Cook Inlet.
Turnagain Arm has one of the highest tides in the world. With a range of more than 33 feet, it has what is called a bore tide, "an abrupt rise of tidal water, just after low tide". It moves swiftly towards land, and Turnagain Arm narrows considerably towards land. This wall of water, can get as high as 6 feet and is supposed to be spectacular to watch. When we got to a viewpoint for Turnagain Arm, the tide was still rapidly going out. The bore tide was predicted to come through at 2:45pm, a few hours later than when we were passing by, so we'll try to see it another day. We passed Turnagain Arm Pit Bar-BQ, haha!
Mountains were all around, rising up from sea level, so beautiful.
Most all of our drives in Alaska are scenic with breathtaking views and there are pull offs with interpretive signs. We stop a lot at these scenic points, making our trips so enjoyable.
There were so many campers heading the opposite direction, they were probably coming from a long weekend on the Kenai Peninsula, (Anchorage's playground), and where we are headed.
Hooked up our camper at Bear Creek RV Park, about 3 miles outside of Palmer. The sites are grassy, sort of, and there are trees, so that is nice, the owner is a friendly guy, but it isn't the nicest place we've been. The office and other outbuildings look a bit run down and trashy. We'll be here a week, and as I said, the campsites are clean, so we'll make do. Not too many full hook-up campgrounds in the area and we do like electric, water, sewer, cable and wifi because we ARE roughing it you know.
Michael and the campground owner had to go through several machinations to get the cable tv up and running. Usually Michael just plugs in some cord and it works, but this guy had to give us a cable box and yada, yada, yada, geez.
Then we headed off to downtown Seward to explore the sights and for Michael to show me where he lived, worked, etc.
Drove down Lowell road, along Resurrection Bay, saw a sea lion swimming along in the bay.
Wildlife Sightings
Sea Lion