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Day Two, Palmer to Valdez

Beautiful day! It was shockingly sunny, barely rained at all. The scenery was gorgeous – snowcapped mountains, sparkling rivers, shimmering waterfalls. We saw various stages of fall color throughout the day, often brilliant yellow, but sometimes all green and sometimes past peak. We stopped for two glaciers. The Matanuska is a relatively stable glacier that…
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Day One, Healy to Palmer

It was snowing in Healy our last morning. The night before we saw the above bull moose in Denali National Park. What an awesome Alaskan summer we have had! Now it is time to meander back to Virginia, by way of Valdez for one last fishing trip. The mountains were beautiful with their fresh snow,…
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Upholstery, Week 27 in Healy
When we visited our relatives on the Kenai back in July, our kind hostess offered a variety of enticing activities. C laughingly told her what he really wanted was to sit in their living room recliner for awhile. Ahhhh, upholstery! Now that we are leaving soon, we have been mentioning some things we have been…
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Packing Begins, Week 26 in Healy
We arrived in Healy on March 17 and plan on leaving September 21, just shy of 27 weeks living in a tiny dry cabin in Alaska. We did bring more than we needed. Both of us have too many clothes and plan to take the surplus back to VA. Some of the gear can go…
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Coho Count III
Total salmon for 3 days: 10 coho and 1 chum. M 2 coho, C 8 coho and one chum. Running total for 5 trips this summer is 2 sockeye, 33 coho, 9 chum and at least 10 pink. We released most of these fish, but enjoyed eating or giving away others. Sept 8 – Sheep…
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Perky Pikas

I worked hard to see my first pika back in July. The two this week were much more cooperative! I was even able to quietly run get C who was looking for sheep, come back, and watch one who was still busily harvesting and eating vegetation. These little rabbit relatives are so cute as they…
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Alaska Sealife Center

While in Seward last week I managed to go to the Sealife Center three times. I especially liked the bird habitat where the birds are used to people and let you get really close. After months of trying to identify unfamiliar birds that won’t sit still, I greatly enjoyed this exhibit. If I lived…
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Termination Dust, Weather, Week 25 in Healy

Yesterday and today we had a dusting of snow at elevation. Summer is over! Low of 39 degrees and high of 58 (we hear Virginia is sweltering at 98). Saturday was a rare sunny day so we went into the park. Hard to believe we only have a few weeks left before we start the…
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Coho Count II

C and I caught 12 coho salmon over a 9 day outing. I caught 2 coho (both on the last day!). C caught 10 coho, releasing 2. It rained 7 of 9 days, sometimes raining very hard. Those 2 days without rain were marvelous! August 22 – half day of fishing at Sheep Creek Slough. …
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Sea Otters in Seward
This evening I watched 2 sea otters for awhile. C pointed out the first one while we were walking. Then he headed further down the beach to fish for salmon. It is drizzling, a great improvement on the driving rain we have been getting off and on the past 3 days. If it had rained…
