Alaska Day #2

Day #2 in Alaska!  We awoke to frost on the ground outside.  Yes, it was quite cold!

Daddy wrote our town in the frost...

As we were driving along, a cow moose ran across the road in front of us! 

The first moose spotting of the day!

 We visited Trail Lake Fish Hatchery and got to see where they raise the salmon.

The man that showed us the facility told us about a wier (a place where they count the salmon as they come up the stream) down the road. He gave us directions to a place called Bear Creek.

So....we went and visited that too!

 We were able to "pet" the salmon in the weir.

 Then we each got to net a fish and identify if it was a female or male.

The females have a flatter nose and the male's nose is very hooked.  Also the females

stomachs are very large, because of the large amounts of eggs inside.  (up to 2500)

 Then we got to send the salmon down the chute and it continued it's journey upriver

to the creek that it was born in, where they spawn, lay their eggs, and die.

 Can you tell what this one is?

(female)

Here Kathy was showing us how full the salmon was of eggs

  Kathy held one of the female salmon upside down and a bunch of eggs fell out onto the floor.

Elainah and Joy were picking them up and we all got to examine them.  Pretty neat Science class!

 After going to the Fish Hatchery, we headed to Exit Glacier.

 Heading up the path...

 The glacier was huge!

On the glacier...you really aren't supposed to do this.  :)

Everyone except Mommy and Elainah decided to hike down to the glacier and then out over a rocky outwash plain.  As Mommy and Elainah are walking out together, Mommy says to Elainah "Can you hold my hand so if I fall you can hold me up, and if you fall I can hold you up?" then Elainah says "And if we both fall, God can catch us!"

We went to Seward where Mommy went shopping and we went down to a nice park along Ressurection Bay. Lillia saw a Killer Whale.  The Bay is over 1,000 ft. deep in the middle so
 killer, belugas, and humback whales are spotted here.

 Skipping rocks...

 Up on the mountains behind Seward were some mountain goats.
I tried to get a picture of them, this one was the clearest.

 Cutie!

 Motorhome Monkeys!
Do you think they could actually see with all the blood in their heads? ;)

Hope hangin' upside down off the top bunk.
As we were driving along after leaving Seward, a black bear ran across the road in front of us!  We were all so excited!  Our first bear spotting!  However, no picture, when we saw it Daddy slammed on the brakes and everyone was thrown to the front.  Amidst the flurry of arms and legs, the camera was unattainable at the moment... :'(

 I am going to share some more scenery pictures from Day #2...Enjoy!

 See the rainbow?

Alaska Day #1

   Day #1 in Alaska! 

 Monday morning we went to McDonalds for breakfast and free wifi.

While we were there we saw this truck with the "moose/bear" guard! 

Home Sweet Home (in Alaska!)

The girls and Daddy in the motorhome!

After we picked up some lunch at Subway we went to the Lake Hood Seaport, where seaplanes land

 and take off.  We had quite the show while we ate!  Lake Hood is the world's largest seaplane base!

There was at least a hundred planes parked along the shore!

While we were watching, a plane pulled up to the shore and two men got out.  
They unloaded their catch, the fish they had were huge!
They said they saw three grizzlies, one bear they didn't even see until it was five feet away! 

 You can imagine how big these fish were!

 We began our trek along the Seaward Highway.  The scenary was beautiful! 
Alaska's autumn is right now, so we enjoyed the fall colors. 

Joy

We had been playing around the tracks when Daddy and Mommy called us and said it was time to go.
As we were climbing up the hill, a train whistle blew!  We got off the tracks just in time!

At Beluga Point, Beluga Whales are often spotted. 
We didn't get to see any, but it was fun looking for them!

On the other side of the road was a mountain. We saw some white dots waaay up on the top.
When we used the spotting scope we could tell that the dots were Dall Sheep!

 David, "I wanna see too, Joy!"

Daddy, Joshua, Lillia, Hope, & Joy climbed out onto a rock overlooking the bay.

They wanted to see if they could spot any Belugas.

Everyone else took the easy path, but Hope decided to scale the steep side!

 "See any Belugas?"

 Coming back across the tracks

We journeyed on to Bird Point Scenic Overlook where we watched the Bore Tide come in.
Created by the high tidal range in Turnagain Arm, a bore tide is a wall of churning water which steadily moves up the bay.


These men were riding the tide in.
Really neat to watch!

Hopie

Peeking out of the motorhome!

Watching the tide come in


~Your Blogger~

There were still a few flowers left!

When the 1964 earthquake hit, tsnami waves swept the coast.
The saltwater from those waves killed the trees roots and caused forests of trees to die.

 We pulled over at one turnoff to see if we could spot some wildlife.
There was a path down through a wooded area, so everyone else stayed in the motorhome
while not-afraid-of-bears-Daddy went down the path. :)  When he got down to the lake at the end of the path he motioned for us to come. When we got down there, a huge eagle flew off into the trees leaving behind his meal.  I didn't get any pictures of the eagle, because (1) he was too far away and (2) the camera batteries went dead so I had to borrow Hope's camera to get a picture of the fish.

The spot where the eagle was

 The highlight of our day was to see 4 moose!  A cow, her two calves, and a young bull who was following them.  Daddy slammed on the brakes and jumped out to get some pictures.

 a calf, the cow, and (can you see it in the brush?) the other calf.

the bull

How Big is Alaska?

I got this off the internet.  Kinda gives you an idea of how big Alaska actually is!

Here are a bunch of pictures of the beautiful scenary!  It was so hard to choose the "best" ones to post!

Well, there you have it folks!  Our first day in Alaska.  Keep checking back for Day #2's post! God bless you!

Rare Sighting

Post by Philip

   While Joshua was outside feeding the animals this morning our Amish neighbor, Levi Michael, drove by in his buggy with some of his buddies. Levi had his head leaning out of the buggy door looking up at the sky.  He yells to Joshua, "Hey, there's a bald eagle in your tree!"  Joshua came running into the house shouting,  "There's a bald eagle outside in our tree!"   Lillia and Hope were fortunate enough to get a view of it just as it flapped its wings two or three times and sailed away.    This is the first time we have ever seen a bald eagle around our house. We appriciate when God blesses us with things like this, He sure is good to us. Hopefully tomorrow Kaitlyn will be posting about our recent trip to Alaska. God Bless