We spent two full days in Homer, Alaska (July 27 and 28). We stayed on Homer Spit right on the beach. When we arrived, the wind was blowing so hard, we one of us had to hold the door in the trailer so the other could get in! By the next morning the wind had subsided, it rained for a while then cleared before we left for whale-watching we could go whale watching! The boat took us to several of the small islands around Kachemak Bay and then headed over to a small town named Seldovia. Although it is on the Kenai Peninsula, there are no roads connecting it to other communities, so all travel to Seldovia is by airplane or boat. On the way we saw otters and a few bald eagles. The best viewing of bald eagles was a lunch. They swooped around us and two ended up landing on a post right across from where we were eating.
On he way back to Homer, we spotted three Orcas, it looked like a male, a female, and a baby. Viewing rules say you can stay and watch for 30 minutes, and we did just that. They eventually came pretty close to the boat, and they were majestic!
Friday Tom went deep sea fishing for halibut. He successfully caught two and had them cleaned and vacuum sealed. They were not huge, so I got all the meat in our trailer freezer. We’ll bring some of it home to share. Danny and Rick Martinez also caught fish, so we all worked together and cooked up all of it and fed the entire caravan! Yolanda made fish tacos, they grilled a lot of it, some of it we put into foil packs with onion, cilantro, and jalapeno which were then grilled. Yolanda also bacon-wrapped some of the chunks and baked them in the oven – delicious!
What’s a trip to Homer, Alaska without stopping at the Salty Dawg Saloon? Apparently, it is the place to go, so we stopped in, had a beer, tacked a dollar bill to the wall and enjoyed the quirky atmosphere. Why tack a dollar on the wall? Well, the story goes that years ago a person tacked a dollar bill to the wall stating that his friend would be in later and this was to buy him a drink. The entire place is covered with dollar bills, personally I think the owners collect them yearly as a part of their revenue. So, did we tack a dollar to the wall? Absolutely!
On Saturday we drove to Seward with both Tom and I being sick. Tom caught a cold along with fish and apparently shared that with me as well! But this trip is jam-packed with adventures, so we took some Dayquil and kept on going.
We took another boat ride to Fox Island and in the process saw sea lions, more otters, puffins, and other birds. We stopped on Fox Island for lunch and on the way back I asked, “We saw where they keep the sea lions, otters, and birds, where do you think they keep the whales?”
Within a few minutes we saw the blow of about 7 humpback whales who were feeding using a process called bubble net fishing. They would dive deep then while returning to the surface produce a bunch of bubbles, essentially confusing and surrounding the small fish they were going to eat and forcing them to the surface. Then they would all shoot to the surface with mouths open, capturing as many small fish as possible. Although a humpback whale has an enormous mouth its throat is quite small, they eat vast amounts of krill or other small fish but not large ones. Also, since they don’t have teeth, just baleen they can filter out the sea items they are not eating. They are fascinating animals and HUGE! As most of you know I’m not a fan of large things, especially whales. I was OK watching them from a distance, but when they came very close to the boat, my anxiety level rose dramatically! I still was able to get some good photos.
Monday July 31 was our last day in Seward. Although Tom and I were not feeling the best, we both came down with a cold, we had scheduled a dog sled ride at a local dog kennel. The owner of the kennel was Mitch Seavey who is a 5-time Iditarod champion. Apparently retired Iditarod champions, open kennels, train dogs and capitalize on their wins! Unlike Jeff King, Mitch Seavey stays out of the limelight. The young woman who gave the tour, Lara, is an up-and-coming Iditarod musher and is training and learning all she can. The young man who took us on the ride has no interest in running the Iditarod, in his words, “I’m up for a 100-mile race, one you can do in a day, but 8 days in the Alaska wilderness all alone? No thanks!”
Of course, there were puppies as well! We went into the enclosure with them and apparently, they thought my shoelaces were the best! When I bent down to get them to stop, they chomped onto my hair and started pulling! They were adorable and SO MUCH energy! Lara told us that when they take them for a run, they just let them run in the forest, they always come back.
Our plans were to travel one day back to Anchorage and stay the night, then on to Glacier View for one night before going to Valdez. On the way to Anchorage our truck kept giving us a warning to check trailer wiring and then would give us a message that everything was connected. When we arrived in Anchorage we checked, and the trailer break-away switch appeared to have shorted out. Our friend Rick Martinez had a spare one on hand and with some help from another couple of caravan members we got it replaced. The next morning, we were hooked up and ready to leave for Glacier Bay but when Tom plugged the power in smoke billowed out from somewhere around the rear tires. There was no fire, but someone in the park called 911 and the fire department showed up! They asked where the fire was, Tom told them there was no fire, It appears there is a short in the electrical wiring.
Before we started our trip to the Midwest last year, we bought roadside assistance for RVs from Coach Net, so I called them, and they were able to find a mobile repair company to come out. But wait it gets better (or worse depending on your viewpoint), he was unable to fix the issue because the short seems to be at a point where the wiring goes inside the enclosed underbelly and told us we would have to bring it to the shop, luckily, we were in Anchorage where there are large repair facilities, so he disengaged the brakes to the trailer and we towed it in. Before you get too excited, when the brakes are disengaged the trailer will still stop, but if it happens to break away from the truck it would just keep on rolling.
Anyway, we get to the shop and the service guy tells us they can’t work on it until tomorrow morning! We reminded him that we were told the night crew could work on it this evening and he agreed but cautioned us it may not be done tonight. We grabbed some clothes and made a hotel reservation. By this time, it was 3:00, we were hungry, so we grabbed some food then headed to the hotel. Our hotel is on Ship Creek Road, Tom has decided we are up Ship Creek without a paddle!
Oh! But the fun news? We saw a moose; he crossed the road right in front of us on our way to drop off the trailer! Anyway, I’ll update the rest of the story when we get to Valdez.
Tom and Patti's RV Adventure 