A Very Scenic Drive (Wednesday, August 19, 2009) Up early, for us, we departed the RV park at 8 AM, driving east towards Glennallen on Alaska Highway 1, then south to Valdez on Alaska Highway 4. We had been looking forward to the Valdez leg of the trip because of the fondness with which Gerald, my brother-in-law, talked about the town; he was one of the workers responsible for constructing the Pipeline which has its terminus at Valdez. We digress. As we drove through Palmer, then continuing east, we began to see snow covered mountains on all sides. Mountains in front appeared to have a fresh covering of terminus snow. Terminus snow is the first dusting on the mountain tops, and continues getting lower and lower until everything is covered with snow. Typically, terminus snow is the sign for travelers to head south. Despite the terminus snow, we had a beautiful driving day with partly cloudy skies, and temps in the 60s. We saw many glaciers among the mountains along the mostly unsettled areas served by the highway.

Sheep Mountain, just north of the highway, was colorful, with various earth tones interspersed with green, reminding us of Polychrome Basin in Denali National Park. We glassed the area for mountain goats, and finally spotted a small group on one of the distant green patches. Along the way, we encountered a couple of construction stops, up to 20 minutes. This is a way of life driving Alaska roads, and we’ve become accustomed to it; however, we enjoyed the vistas so much along this route, we would like to spend a few days hiking and fishing the area between Palmer and Glennallen on our next visit. At Glennallen, we turned south on Alaska Highway 4, stopping at the Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve Visitor Center. We expected a lot of activity but were surprised to find only a couple of RVs and automobiles in the parking lot. The Visitor Center complex is new, and very accommodating. However, the only workers present were two high school students serving as National Park Service summer employees. They were eager to help, but were not up to providing good interpretive information. We did note a large administrative building with several cars! We had intended to hike the short trail at the Visitor Center, but a black bear had just been sited along the trail, and we chickened out. We did see the park film, Crown of the Continent, and it was the best we’ve seen thus far. In any future visits, we’d like to spend several days in this area, and with a 4-wheel drive vehicle, drive the two interior roads. Our friends and fellow RVers, Jerry and Ann, did a flight-seeing tour of the Kennicott Copper Mine, the largest in the world when it was active, a couple of years ago, and we would like to spend a day there, as well.

Continuing our drive south, the paved road became quite rough, better only than the Top of the World Highway. Frost heaves were everywhere, though manageable, but expansion joints every 100 feet or so jarred us, the motorhome, and everything in it. Despite the terrible highway, this travel day provided scenery that was among the best experienced in Alaska thus far outside of Denali National Park. We began to see the Pipeline about half way between Glennallen and Valdez, west of the highway.

Worthington Glacier was a necessary stop, and the State of Alaska provided a 0.4 mile road to a parking lot and small visitor center. Though we couldn’t walk to the actual toe of the glacier, we were able to get quite close. It’s much bigger than it looks!

After Worthington Glacier, we continued our southbound route, descending a very long grade after Johnson Pass into a canyon leading to Valdez. Waterfalls were at every turn, and we took photos of each one.

We arrived in Valdez to one of the nicest RV parks yet, Eagle’s Rest, set up and had dinner at Ernesto’s in Valdez. What a surprise! Ernesto’s is a Mexican food restaurant, and one of the best at which we’ve eaten. I had the shrimp and crab enchiladas dinner which was superb. We may have to eat there again before leaving Valdez.

Day 2 in Valdez (Thursday, August 20, 2009) The Lord has blessed us with another beautiful day when we wanted it—for our afternoon wildlife and glacier cruise in Prince William Sound. After making a great omelet, Kay cleaned the motorhome from top to bottom. I tried finding an inexpensive car wash, but with no luck, hand washed the Saturn at the RV site. Most RV parks do not allow washing vehicles at one’s site, but this one does. While washing the car, a black bear wondered into the campground, about 30 yards from our RV. With all the onlookers and noise, it got alarmed and ran off. It crossed the road, and several police and locals chased it into the brush. After they went into the brush, the bear came back out to the road and watched! This was a comedy reminiscent of the Keystone Cops!

As we waited to board the Lu-Lu Belle, our afternoon entertainment, Kay took several photos of Oscar the sea otter. He hangs around the boat slips and poses for pictures. We finally boarded the Lu-Lu Belle. She is a 75-foot yacht built in the late 1970s, and the guy who built her is still her captain. We boarded at 1 PM for the wildlife and glacier cruise. This is one of the most highly recommended activities in all of Alaska. Heading out of the harbor area, the captain steered us by a raft of sea otters which inhabit the area. Fishing boats surrounded the west side of the bay leading to Prince William Sound, trolling for salmon.

Next, we cruised by an awesome waterfall. It must have been several hundred feet tall, and had to be larger than many of the famous waterfalls in the lower 48. (Note: there seem to be two standards for the U.S., the lower 48 and Alaska; it would be unfair to compare things in the lower 48 with those in Alaska!) Bald eagles were in trees along the shoreline, waiting for salmon.

We cruised by a buoy marking the location of where the Exxon Valdez ran aground on Good Friday, 1989. Interestingly enough, the buoy locates Bligh reef, named after the one and only Captain Bligh, first mate on the Bounty who orchestrated the mutiny on the Bounty). Captain Cook, and Bligh, traveled these seas in their early days, thus Cook Inlet and Bligh Reef. After motoring a short distance, one of the crew climbed into the crow’s nest atop the yacht, and began looking for whales. She spotted a humpback some 8 miles in the distance; wow! After a lengthy ride, the whale was again spotted, sounded for 11 minutes and resurfaced. It was like a food fight to get in position to take photos, and because of his politeness, I lost, only able to take photos by holding the camera behind and above everyone. Our next stop was to view puffins and Stellar sea lions. In his attempt to find puffins, and/or show off his piloting skills, the captain pulled the Lu-Lu Belle into areas of jagged rock with only a foot of clearance. As we were backing out of one of the small coves, we did witness a puffin coming out of a crack in the cliff face. As the yacht quieted, we heard this loud rumbling sound, and discovered it was hundreds of sea lions, sunning themselves in the rocks. The noise was so loud it could be heard above the two 600 horsepower diesel engines.

Finally, we headed to Columbia Glacier. We had noted ice bergs floating in Prince William Sound all afternoon, and soon discovered the source. Columbia Glacier unfolded before us, extending as far as we could see. It is so massive, and regrettably, photos do not do it justice. The captain maneuvered Lu-Lu Belle to the wall formed by icebergs being calved by the glacier. Very impressive!

Captain Fred talked non-stop for 7 hours, some good, most BS. He has a very conservative, right-wing view of the world, and it is clear in his talking. I took particular offense to his subtle slamming of government laws, policies, and regulations, and especially government employees. He was also pretty loose with the facts. Unfortunately, a lot of unknowing people who listen to him take his message as truth. After dinner again at Ernesto’s, we returned to the motorhome, calling it a night.

Day 3 in Valdez (Tuesday, August 18, 2009) Our third day in Valdez was somewhat anticlimactic, having been on an outstanding wildlife and glacier cruise noting where the Exxon Valdez ran aground, spotting whales, seeing sea lions and puffins, and standing toe-to-toe with Columbia Glacier. Our morning began in great fashion as our new friend, Julie Hard, brought us fresh pastry. We took advantage of the free day today to download photos, catch the journal up-to-date, and do laundry. Kay decided to air freight her catch of halibut, plus some sockeye salmon filets she bought, back home for the freezer. We spent a lazy afternoon in the motorhome, visited the local library for reading email, ate at a great Chinese restaurant, Fung Ku (yeah, sounds like Kung Fu, and we have enough left over for two more meals), and watched salmon swim upstream in a nearby stream. Tomorrow, we head to Tok for an overnight stay on our way to Destruction Bay and Skagway; this will be our last travel day completely in the U.S. until we complete our trip in a couple of weeks (Skagway is in the U.S. and we’ll spend 3 nights there, but travel to and from will be partially through Canada).

Kay’s Take Many think Valdez is the ‘little Switzerland’ of Alaska. It is a very clean and neat city, even the small harbor & docks. One really cool sighting on the cruise boat was seeing porpoises. They jumped out of the water,& ran very fast right in front of our boat for several minutes. It was like they were ‘playing’ with us. They were incredibly fast, crisscrossing in front of our boat and each other. It was a ‘WOW’ moment for sure.

I visited with some of the ‘meat’ fisherman at this RV park. The silvers (salmon) have started coming in the bay and up the creeks/rivers. They want to catch them in the bay because they taste better just coming in from salt water, so most of the fishing is done from boats. They can catch and keep 6 silvers a day and the cleaning station is busy from early morning to late afternoon. I went to Peter Pan seafood company to have them ship my halibut, and I also bought several sockeye filets to ship. Our little RV freezer can now breathe again – it was way overpacked! We’ve had light rain and mist most of today but that’s okay because our other days here were sunny and beautiful.

Our Recommendations for Valdez, AK Valdez was one of our favorite towns. It is clean with modern structures, brought about by total eradication of “Old Valdez” by the 1964 Good Friday earthquake which registered 9.2 on the Richter Scale for about 5 minutes. A tsunami hit the town, killing some 30 people and destroying most of the structures. The remainder was determined to have been built on unstable ground, and the town was moved 4 miles to its present location. There are many things to do in and around Valdez, and we did not take advantage of them—several good hiking trails are nearby, “Old Valdez” is close, there are a couple of good salmon viewing areas, and the downtown area is definitely worth exploring. We definitely recommend a wildlife and glacier cruise in Prince William Sound. The Lu-Lu Belle is a very clean vessel and many photo opportunities will present themselves. If we do it again, we’ll know to wear ear plugs! Valdez also had the best dining of anywhere we’ve visited thus far, with Ernesto’s and Fung Ku being especially good; we did not try any seafood restaurants. Fishing for silver salmon is especially good here this time of year, trolling along the bluff lines in Prince William Sound. Halibut fishing is also very popular, and there are fly fishing opportunities for salmon, trout, grayling, and dolly varden nearby. We will definitely include a few days in Valdez on our next trip.

Campground Eagle’s Rest RV Park was one of the best in which we’ve stayed. The park was clean, laundry was reasonable and clean, restrooms spotless, sites were large enough to accommodate RVs and toads, and the 30-amp electricity was better than average. Cable was outstanding. Wi-fi did not work the first couple of days, and when it did work, there was so much traffic that we could not get on, having to use the library hot spot instead; this was a definite negative for us. Valdez is a small town, and downtown activities are within walking distance. We would stay here again, but would probably opt for a $10 site downtown along the waterfront.

Driving Statistics
Beginning Mileage: 14,561.9
Beginning Time: 8:00 AM Alaska DST
Ending Mileage: 14,824.7
Ending Time: 2:30 PM Alaska DST

TOTAL MILEAGE FOR THE DAY: 262.8
CUMULATIVE MILEAGE: 5,433.2