Glennallen to Valdez, Construction and Fog to Delight Us Today: The Estate Takes on Alaska

Copyright 2019, CABS for Reflections From the Fence

July 25, 2019

Rained all night, off, on, off, on.  Raining this morning too.

We are having trouble getting started, ya know, that rain thing.  In The Estate, as with all other camping units we have had since the army tent, rain makes ya want to go back to bed with lots of warm blankies and sleep away the day.  No can do, we have a reservation in Valdez.

Pulled out at about 10:30. Not bad considering the urge to crawl back into bed.  

Fuel first. 

Much mist and fog and rain, hiding the beauty. Now and then we get a glance of snow/glaciers, waterfalls, blue green or grey fast running rivers and, the pipeline. Sometimes the pipeline is quite close to the road, other times I can barely see it at what seems like a mile or more distant. 

The only good photo I got of the pipeline, going into Valdez or coming out!

Ya, it's raining, again.

Going down hill, interesting formations in the distance and a shelf of cloud, the mountain peaking its head out above the clouds.

I always delight in seeing a river running beside the roadway.  Photos can be difficult to shoot, due to speed and little warning, and poof, we are already past it.

One longish traffic/ construction delay. 20 some minutes. Replacing culverts. A second delay was about another 20 minutes. We have heard of 45 minute delays just waiting for the pilot truck/car, so this was not too bad.

Yep, a flagperson is ahead.

I took a LOT of photos of us passing through the construction zone, cause - - I thought it was interesting.  I know, I am kinda weird that way.

That section is gravel where they have dug up the road and replaced the conduit.  They will come back and lay black top over it.  We tried to stay a bit back from the vehicle in front of us, those stones will make nasty with your windshield.

That extra "bump" sign, it is for sure something to be aware of.  The drop off at the cut of the pavement was about 4 inches, maybe more.  Slow peeps, really slow, and it is still a bit of a "bounce".  Like a speed bump, ya know - - 

Along the way, after the first construction area we spotted a number of bikers (not motorized bike, pedal bikes) riding.  They were on a tour trip, hauled up the mountain and then ride down a part of it, having a catered lunch along the way.  Bikers along the highway like this have always made me a tad nervous, and I sure do not envy them this weather.  Yikes!

Two water falls up there, from this distance they look like frozen snow still laying on the side of the mountain.  They are not, they are running water, running so quickly it looks white.

A glacier is hiding behind the clouds.

Now the mountain is hiding behind a cloud.

Now we are talking, river, clouds and a mountain.

Lots of snow, most likely a glacier, peaking through the clouds.  I liked the artistic feel of this photo.

In the second construction zone, not a bad view while being led through at about 25 MPH.  Time for me to shoot!  YAAAA!

See, when I have a moment, to frame and shoot.  Not too bad.

Down, and back up in this section.  When we were waiting for the pilot truck Man got out and talked to the owners of this rig, as they had a badly bent stabilizer.  They were aware.  Small world, they were parked one site down from us in Valdez.

Pretty shiny new culvert.  A big one at that!

You can actually see some of the removed old damaged culvert laying on the piles of rock on the right side of the photo.  And, the informal caravan continues on - - 

Glacier, big ole glacier.  This is the Worthington Glacier.

Another view - - 

Thompson’s pass. About 3,000 feet and to say it was foggy, well, understatement.  To say I was uncomfortable, is another understatement.

It got worse before it got better.  Man was hanging over the steering wheel. We certainly were glad to get out of this mess in one piece, minus some sweat and nerves.

There is another "bump".  Oh, I so wish this had been a better weather day, this has to be stunning with blue skies and highlights instead of flat lighting. 

WOW!  Look at those walls of stone!

Bridal veil falls - - 

And, literally around the corner, Horsetail falls. 

Sometime after we stopped to take this photo of the Horsetail Falls, we looked up at the GPS and saw - - THIS - - good grief, we are drowning?  LOL

We have arrived in Valdez,  Close gravel lot parking. With a view of the bay, lol, if I peak between rigs.  A RV caravan pulled in about the time we did. A rig near us has a bad exhaust on his furnace or something, we had to close the door or be asphyxiated. 

Walked to town, had a nice burger and beer and cake for desert. The girls room has a merman painted on the wall.  See - -

Everywhere in Valdez are these planters, filled with the same flowers and now and then a cabbage or two, decorative cabbage for the most part.  I saw a planter miles out of Valdez who had picked up the same color scheme.  I thought it was quite nice.

Not in focus, but, someone is having a snack - -

It’s 65 here. A good mellow temp. We can see some of the mountains. And clouds sliding by them.  

We drove 118 miles today.

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Girdwood to Glennallen, Matanuska Glacier Too: The Estate Takes on Alaska

Copyright 2019, CABS for Reflections From the Fence

July 24, 2019

Rained a good portion of the night. 

Up early, forgot to take photo of our sweet campsite.  Rats.  

On the road close to 9:30.  Drove 1 mile or less and there is blue sky.  This would change several times during the day, clouds, clear, but generally speaking decent visibility. 

Here are a few photos that show what was half covered up on our way into Seward, the vis is a bit better.

Headed to Anchorage.  Stopped Costco, few supplies, yes we had pizza and a vanilla frozen yogurt. 

Onward to Glennallen. We note in one section of road so many more deciduous trees.  With hundreds of miles of pine trees, this change is notable and enjoyed by both Man and me.

There are hundreds, probably thousands of these small deep lakes in Canada and Alaska.  I am not a fisher(person), but, every time I see one of these little lakes, deep jewels, I think, I'll bet there are some great fish in there.

This pass was quite dramatic.  This shows what happens when Sony III is not on and poised for snaps!  I barely got it on in time to take this photo.  Note, I did not get to zoom past the wiper blade on the passenger side or the GPS unit.  It is quite a small miracle I ever get any photos, between the camera shutting off, something coming up so fast you barely can see it, 45 to 65 MPH speeds, wiper blades, GPS units, and my nemesis, the radio antenna.  I hate that thing.  I mean, really hate that thing.  It jumps up in front of Sony's lens all the time.  Black, ugly thing.

Then came the glacier and the rivers and the mountains. And we can actually see them, or most of them. 

This is the Matanuska Glacier. When I search it on Google Maps, and go to satellite view, it says, it is a vehicle accessible glacier for hiking.  And, we did not stop.  SIGHHHH  

Sony III zooms in on the glacier proper.

A few miles further down the road we can see a different angle, sure looks like it goes around towards the right and then back again towards the left.  I tried looking at this on Google Maps with satellite and my search/look was inconclusive.  Pretty photo tho - -

And, then, out of nowhere pops up some colorful, unusual mountains.  Two photos follow, same side of the road, different zoom.

Fireweed, pretty lakes - -

A pull off with at least 3 rigs, and in the distance a tall mountain with lots of snow up there.  I have not figured out what it is, yet.

Later we find we are back in pines. And I see a fire/smoke to the south of us. I have looked at the fire maps, and again, cannot determine the name of this fire I know I see.  What with slow internet, I will fess up, sometimes I just abandon the search, after 5 and 10 minutes and no results, maps won't load, etc., I just give up.

The fireweed within 20 to 30 miles of Glennallen, is in full bloom, as in it is fully developed, flowering all the way to the very top of the plant. They say once the top has bloomed winter snows will come in about 6 weeks.   

Stayed at a very nice park in Glennallen, Northern Lights.  We drove 235 miles today. 

Today we heard that Alaska ferries are down, employees on strike.  We had even recently, considered a short ferry ride.  Peeps arriving in Juneau are in a snarky situation. Good luck to all.  

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Byron Glacier Hike and the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center: The Estate Takes on Alaska

Copyright 2019, CABS for Reflections From the Fence

July 23, 2019

We survived! A night sans power. The temps were mild, furnace barely ran, we were comfy. As much as we love The Estate, it has questionable insulation and even tho Man installed a second battery, they are not deep cell batteries and will not give us as much time off the grid as we can get from Tana. 

Generator brewed coffee, however, is quite good. Ok. Coffee is good.  

This is a sweet campsite. Very private. 

Out on the main road, There are peeps parked right on the river, wow!  (We are not!  LOL) Last night when we were checking out a couple of spots we did see signs for no campfires, did not see any signs indicating you could not park. 

Today is partly overcast, low chances of rain. And of course before my breakfast was finished, it started dripping.  I was happy it did not last long.  

We wanted to hike Byron Glacier Trail, which is somewhere between 1.5 and 1.8 miles, give or take a few tenths either way.  Has bout 100 foot gain. I had been told you can “walk” on the glacier. Well, mmm, nope.  Seems that was over 20 years ago. Now you will walk on what was called “avalanche snow” by the ranger. Sigh. We went anyway. My Demon needed the exercise and the walk was nice. 

Here the hiking path and the stream from the melting glacier are close, they actually are for much of the hike, you just cannot see it like you can here.  

What is left of the glacier.  And, fog/low hanging cloud.  I did not attempt to clean up this photo, or any of the others, you are pretty much seeing what we saw, fog/mist/clouds and all.  Water falls from the melting snow to the far right.

Another view of the glacier as we approach, you can see water falls, if you look hard, the water runs so fast they almost look like snow lying in a crevice.

Sony III zoom brings part of that water fall in close for us to see.

Zoom again, teal blue ice pack/glacier and some fog/mist/haze.

I believe this is pretty much the most zoom I can get out of Sony III.  I thought the structure and the deep crevices were fascinating.  Glaciers can be dangerous, rocks and ice fall from the vertical crevices and there are hidden deep crevices a person can fall down into.

This looks like a black and white photo, but, it is not.  It's a lot of zoom.  There is a very long crevice running from left to right, and there are those melted cave like features.  Melting away - -

Another section of the path we hiked.  

Fireweed - -

This was short and different than fireweed, I thought.  It was similar in color tho.  Will work on identifying at some time in the future.

After our exercise we returned to the Visitors Center where we had our lunch. In the very same parking lot we had lunch in during our trip to Seward. 

The rain started, of course. We drove the 5 miles down to the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center, where rescue creatures live and where it was not raining. They have bison, black bears, brown bears, caribou, reindeer, wolves, and more. 

Moose  -- 

This brown bear was quite photogenic, almost as if it were posing.  All the bears are rescues and cannot be returned to the wild.  Some of them were found at such tender ages, that they were bottle fed.  When babies are found, they are observed for several days by officials to determine if the mother will be returning, when it is obvious she will not, they are gathered up, and brought to this facility as well as others. 

Black bear, who was no where near as cooperative for photo ops!!

Caribou, since the likelihood of us spying one in the wild is slim we were happy to see some here, being cared for so well. 

We spent a couple of hours and found this special place to stop and relax, ohhh and the internet connected.  And it started raining again. So we parked, sat and surfed. With a view.

It continued to rain, we eventually drove back to camp and parked, most level site, by the way.  I took a nap. That should be fun later, about 3 am. 

They say the wind and the rain is pretty normal here. It sure is pretty, but all that rain, I think would irritate me, I just need my sun. 

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