Boarding the bus at the Captain Cook hotel in the early morning, was refreshing in the cool morning air. After a short wait it was all aboard’and a short drive to the Alaska Railway Station. Alaska is the only state to own it’s own railroad. Aboard the coach we sat in the viewing car with glass all around for a terrific view. Our tour guide was taking his last ride as a guide with Princess Cruise Line. He on to a new job in Seattle after spending 16 years as a guide.

We arrived.

All lined up and ready for breakfast guests.

Our dining room at the Captain Cook for breakfast.

Logo

A reflection of the Captain Cook.

The front door.

Our tower.

Waiting on the bus.

All aboard.

Boarding the train.

This is Joe our tour guide…this is his last trip and on to a new job.

There are so many mountains in Alaska I can’t remember the name of this one.

Wasilla, AK I didn’t see Sarah.

Our train car.

A friend said did they know this sign has a hot dog on the sign instead of a burger.

Stacked 3 high

Rubber boots and raincoats.

Joe said at one point this was the roughest bar in Alaska…if you went in and were not armed they would arm you.

Talkeetna

Talkeetna

A group returning from a jet boat tour.

We arrived.

From Seward to Kenai.

Alaska SeaLife Center

Valerie watching the Seals swimming.

Puffin

Ready for takeoff

Fur Seals

Motorhome on steroids. These guys shipped their motorhome to Alaska from Germany.

The back end

Holy Assumption of the Virgin Mary Russian Orthodox Church

A large chandelier for such a small church.

Russian Orthodox Church built in 1840

Val interrogating the priest.

An old barn across the street.

Exit Glacier is a glacier derived from the Harding Icefield in the Kenai Mountains of Alaska.

It received its name because it served as the exit for the first recorded crossing of the Harding Icefield in 1968. In the spring of 1968, the first documented mountaineering party succeeded in crossing the Harding Icefield. Ten people were involved in the crossing, which went from Chernof Glacier east to Resurrection Glacier (Later renamed Exit as the newspaper reported that the group would be descending the “Exit Glacier”)

Entering the Kenai Fjords National Park

Valerie holding a piece of a glacier

Up close and personal.

Infrared of the Glacial River

Exit Glacier

Boondocking at Gene after the Exit Glacier.

Anchorage is such a beautiful city with hanging baskets everywhere. Val was trying to figure out how to get one in our suitcase. We walked down some of the streets surrounding the hotel. There are also some photos from when we checked in the motor-home.

Waiting for our ride to the hotel.

Our hotel

This guy was at the Visitors center, he was form Melbourne Australia.

The one that is lnot in the photo is in Val’s purse.

Cute

Beautiful hanging baskets.

This is Mount Redoubt, we took this photo on our flight from Brooks Lodge to Anchorage after photographing the Bear. Mount Redoubt, is an active stratovolcano in the largely volcanic Aleutian Range of the U.S. state of Alaska. Mount Redoubt has erupted five times since 1900: in 1902, 1922, 1966, 1989 and 2009. The eruption in 1989 spewedvolcanic ash to a height of 45,000 ft (14,000 m) and caught KLM Flight 867, a Boeing 747 aircraft, in its plume; the flight landed safely atAnchorage.

Mt Redoubt

A little closer.

I know I am still behind in the blog but I did a panorama from our window on the 18th floor of the Captain Cook Hotel. It was early morning about 4:30am (I know some of you don’t even believe I can get up that early but I did to take this photo) I saw some light coming through the blackout curtains so I got up to investigate and this is what I saw. I hope you like it too.

This is actually three images joined together in Photoshop to make this Panorama.

After boondocking in the Sam’s Club parking lot we were up at 4AM to arrive at the PenAir terminal for our flight to Brooks Falls. It was wonderful, no security, no baggage check, just a plane ride to King Salmon AK. After arriving at King Salmon we took a bus to the float plane dock. While waiting for the plane to get ready we spent some quality time swatting mosquitoes and flies…monsters. Before they would let us board each one of us had to step on the scales for a weight check…some of the ladies didn’t want to get on the scales…imagine that! So, after weighing in, it was time to board, each person was placed on the plane according to weight, and away we went. Val’s cousin had offered to ship a box of Depends for Val and I, but it was totally unnecessary, it was a great flight. After arriving at Brooks Lodge and taking a Bear Awareness Class and receiving our certification pin, it was off to view the bears. After a one mile walk from the lodge and going through some security gates and a floating bridge we arrived at the elevated viewing platform. After waiting for 4 hours for a bear to make an appearance we were really getting disappointed. We had expected to see many bears because it is one of the best bear viewing areas in Alaska, but the Salmon run was early this year. Finally someone on the platform shouted “I see something” and sure enough a large brown bear descending to the river to fish. It was the only one to appear but it made it worthwhile to get a few pictures of this bear.

PenAir at Anchorage Airport

Our flight to King Salmon

Our stewardess

King Salmon Airport…A real treat

Our ride to Brooks Falls

Getting ready for the baggage.

Katmai Air…Mosquito Capitol of the Katmai peninsula.

I dare you to take his stick.

On the way!

Finally we made it.

Security gate, they told us the bears couldn’t open the gate.

How about a 4X4 school bus.

Lined up and waiting.

The Salmon were there…where are the bears.

More Salmon.

A nice one.

Finally he arrived.

Majestic!

Searching for fish.

I see you too.

All the big dogs lined up. I am not on this level.

I know he’s down there somewhere!

Our pilot.

Driving from Alesyka to our first boondock camping night. What is Boondocking?  Boondocking is free camping, generally out in the boondocks.

Log World…just before Bird Creek

This Octopus marked the driveway to Log World…Beautiful!

Bird Creek…Fishing for Salmon.

A good catch…but he wouldn’t share.

One man raft.

Fishing

Fire Weed

Fishing

A resort worth remembering…set in the beautiful mountains of Alaska. It is situated off  the Old Seward Highway just a few miles from Anchorage. The Alyeska Aerial Tram is a three-to-seven minute scenic ride from The Hotel Alyeska to 2,300 ft in elevation and the top of Mt. Alyeska.

This is the resort hotel.

On the way to the tram.

Our car arriving.

A view from the top.

Watching a car arrive at the top.

Looking down on the hotel and some hikers that were brave enough to hike up the mountain.

I know some of you are probably wondering what has happened to us, but for the last three days we have been south of Anchorage touring the Kenai Peninsula and in these areas cell phone and internet coverage are hard to come by. We have seen some beautiful country but now we are in Anchorage now and it’s like any other large city, good connections. But before we started our exploration we picked up our motor-home. We thought it was really nice what do you think. Which one do you think we rented?

This is your first choice…is this our Motor-home?

This is your second choice…yea or nay.

If you really stretch your imagination you could consider this a motor-home if you carry a tent in the side car…so is this the one.

OK, do you think I paid someone to use the motor-home for this picture or is this the one.

We will be posting photos from the Kenai trip in the next few days, so keep watching.