Bezaire's Ramblings

All the main roads in Alaska have names as well as numbers but the names are what everyone uses when referring to a route – we have traveled the Alaskan, the Top of the World, the Parks, the Edgerton and the Nabestha in Wrangell-St. Elias NP, the Haines, the Klondike Loop, the Richardson, the Seward, the Sterling, the Glenn and are now on the Tok Cutoff. Continue reading ‘The Glenn Highway’…

Well – we didn’t – but practically everyone else we’ve met these past 3 weeks is. The salmon are running, and the Kenai peninsula is frequently referred to as “South Anchorage” during the salmon runs. Never seen a salmon run??? Just check out Susi’s video at the end of this story. Continue reading ‘Gone Fishin’’…

Homer, population 4,000,  is the most Western stop, via freeways, on the Kenai Peninsula – it’s as far as we can go without hopping on another ferry. It is a primary spot for sport fishing, both on the shore and by boat. It’s obviously a very tourist-oriented place, but we were surprised to find that most of the other campers we met were also from Alaska! Maybe Homer is actually a suburb of Anchorage??? Continue reading ‘Homer – The Spot on the Spit’…

There are some new words that we’ve added to our vocabulary on our journey this summer – most of which define specific land masses that are not found in the flat corn fields of Ohio. Continue reading ‘Alaskan Vocabulary’…

Each time Susi suggests another tour, she silently accepts my quiet grumbles. “What? Another boat ride?” I’m just glad she’s gracious enough to never say, “I told you so,” because our Kenai Fjords Tour was such a magnificent day that we had to upload two albums of pix and videos titled 07-14 Kenai Fjords Wildlife and 07-14 Seward & Kenai Fjords at right. Continue reading ‘Whale of a Tour’…

Thank goodness we finally left Seward – now we can finally catch up on our bloging! We managed to get a front row camping spot on the Seward beach so we’ve been continually entertained by sea otters floating by, fishing boats madly dashing out to sea at 7:00 am, gulls circling the returning boats for fish scraps in the afternoon and eagles soaring overhead all day long. Continue reading ‘Too Busy to Blog in Seward’…

Homer claims to be the fishing capital of Alaska, and I promise you that the Sourdough Express Bakery & Cafe cooks it to perfection! Furthermore, as we write blog entries using their speedy WiFi, our dessert just arrived to underscore the “Bakery” part of their name. My Obscene Brownie smothered in ice cream and chocolate is a work of art and tastes even better. Susi’s raspberry/apple/rhubarb cobbler has her gushing about good eats she enjoyed as a kid. Make Sourdough Express Bakery & Cafe a “must visit” when you come to Homer!

We embarked from Whittier on a lovely boat tour (see the album titled 07-11 Whittier & Portage at right). Although we enjoyed the trip very much, we were rather surprised by the city from which it left. Continue reading ‘Why Is Whittier So Different???’…

When I was planning this journey, I didn’t spend a lot of time learning about Anchorage – I figured a big city is the same pretty much where ever one goes, right? NOT! Of course “big” is all relative – Anchorage is the largest city in Alaska and only has a population of 283,000. Continue reading ‘Anchorage – Not Your Usual City’…

Most people we’ve met in Alaska are from somewhere else, so we’ve heard many stories of people coming to Alaska for a vacation and never leaving. A very unique synergy develops with so many people living in communities because of their intentional commitment to be there – everyone becomes a tour guide. Continue reading ‘Amazing Alaska Ambassadors’…

We were very excited to use our Alaskan Tour Saver coupon to fly in a 1968 Beaver to the base of Mt. McKinley and land at 5500 feet on the Ruth Glacier. What a thrill! Check out more pics on the album titled 07-05 Flightseeing and this video:

Talkeetna is the staging ground for all climbers headed to Mt. McKinley – this year a little over 1000 will attempt the climb – at a personal expense of around $7,000 each and 3 weeks to do it. Only half will succeed and a few will die.  We celebrated the 4th in this 870 person village watching a parade which lasted about 7 minutes. Continue reading ‘Talkeetna – a Climber’s Paradise’…

Throughout our journey we have heard repeatedly about last summer’s weather – only 6 days of sunshine. We’ve been thrilled with the abundance of sunny days. It’s made it easy to get some great photos and pics like this one and more in the album titled 07-03 Mt McKinley at right.

What fun – a great tourist event and warm dry weather! Dave was mumbling about being “lemming tourists” as we followed the line of tour buses  to hop on a 3 1/2 hour cruise. Fortunately, we found that this particular tour was so well done that we didn’t mind being packaged as part of a crowd. The cruise had a fantastic speaker – a radio DJ that had many amusing stories about the people who lived along the river. We stopped at Susan Butcher’s Dog Sled property and saw a demonstration of a racing team as well as visited a First Nation summer camp village. Thanks for all of you who recommended that we do this! Check out the photos in the album titled 07-02 Fairbanks at the right.

Many people in Alaska and the Yukon use sled dogs for transportation during the 7 long months of winter. Although I had heard of the Itiderod race, I wasn’t aware of the number of other races held in Alaska and the Yukon. Anchorage even has a storage shed to keep snow available for 2 of the major races that run through the town! We were able to see demonstrations of the teams used in Denali Park, for hauling supplies for researchers and breaking trail, and Susan Butcher’s 4 time Itiderod champion racing teams.

I was amazed to how much the dogs love to run and work! Here’s a fun video of Denali’s working dogs: