Our neighbours in the Homer site had a number plate on
their car “130 Iditarod Finisher”. On
asking them about it, it turned out that Richard was the 130th
finisher of the famous Alaskan sled dog race to Nome back in the 1970’s, and he
is now on the organising committee, while his son has competed about 15 times,
and is still competing. Janet was
chatting to them last night while I was catching up on the blog, and this
morning we persuaded them to join us at La Baleine for breakfast before they
returned to their home at Eagle River, just north of Anchorage, where we had camped
just 4 nights ago. Over breakfast, Richard and his wife Janet, (!) had told us
about the Iditarod, and he suggested that if I really want to come back to see
it one year, to contact him and he can not only tell me where the best places
to go would be, but might also be able to get me a bit more “involved” which
would be fantastic ! I really would like
to come up for it one year, so now I have some real incentive to do so ! Just after Richard and Janet had left, Chuck
and Jeff and their wives rolled up for breakfast too, and I told them I might
have to come back for the Iditarod, so Jeff offered me the loan of his real fur
hat to keep me warm ! I might need more
than just a fur hat though !!
We then set off north heading towards Whittier, stopping
to take a few photos of some amazing boats on dry land where people do actually
live ! The big one in the photo has a
kiwi and a welsh flag in the window !
With increasing low cloud and rain, it was a bit miserable, but a little
way north it just cleared as we arrived at a little village called Ninilchik
that we had been told was worth getting off the road and visiting, and where
there was also an old Russian Orthodox church that was worth seeing. We took a wrong turning to start with, but
found a campsite down by a river with lots of eagles all sitting around –
Waiting for salmon to start swimming in from the sea ? Whatever, it was quite a sight. The next turning we took was a road up to the
church, so we went in there and it was delightful. There was a lovely lady in
there called May and we started talking to her – She had grown up in the
village, lived there all her life, and she was married to a fisherman.
Incredible lady. After visiting the
church, we finally found the right road down to the village, but first found a
whole lot more eagles – Both bald and golden ones – this time on the beach
itself ! One was even in a stream having
a bath – fluttering his wings, ducking his head under water, and fluffing out his
feathers ! He was too far away for my
camera to get good photos, but I include them anyway because it was just such
an amazing sight to watch him, especially through the binoculars. And
the village of Ninilchik itself is amazing – All these old houses, many
obviously original, and the church we had just visited perched up on top of the
hill overlooking the village. Once again
the local Russian influence was very evident.
After that, it was on again and off again rain as we
headed north. Through the fishing area
of Russian River it is starting to get busy as the salmon start their run up
the rivers, and from one bridge we passed over we could lots of fishermen
almost shoulder to shoulder on the banks, all casting their lines out hopefully
! It looked like chaos to us – And a non
fisherman like me could probably tangle 50 peoples lines up in 30 seconds if I
was out there !!
It dried up a little as we came near the Whittier turn
off, at the end of Turnagain Arm, and the Portage Valley campsite that we had
decided to stay in for the night was just a couple of miles down the road. We managed to get set up in the dry, but it
has now been raining most of the evening since, and worse still, although they
have wifi, I am unable to connect for long enough to get my blog posted ! So as usual, I am writing this in Word so
that if any when I do ever get connected, I can quickly copy and paste it in. At least I am almost up to date now !!!
I think it is going to be a wet night – I am now hoping
that all my waterproofing on the tent and van work, and we do not get woken up
by drips or leaks during the night !
Will report tomorrow !!
Hi, we briefly crossed paths in Whittier, I'm sure we'll cross paths again, but we'll keep an eye on your blog as we travel as well.
ReplyDeleteEmma and Ben :)