Day 40 -- Exploring Seward, AK, and surroundings

Sunday 7/30/2006

We had heard about the glacier outside of Seward that is part of Kenai Fjords National Park. We decided we wanted to go up and visit it. The weather was not as good as the past two days, but since we had already assumed the whole visit here in Seward was going to be a wash-out, we had already exceeded our expectations the last two days. So the shabby weather did not matter too much. The glacier we are referring to is sometimes referred to as "Exit Glacier" and you get on that road just outside of Seward. The book told us that there would be a fee for entering, but that appears to have gone away since the booth was closed. We followed a hiking trail up to the glacier to get a better view of it.

Karl is viewing the glacier at "Exit Glacier" from the walkway

Karl throwing rocks in front of the glacier. You can see all the moraine it pushes forward around it.

Magellan II is parked in the lot. We're pretty sure we spotted them in Wiseman (by the river) when we went through there.

Somehow our vacation seems a bit lame by comparison. Hey, something to aspire to for the future! Wally, we'll put you to shame some day!!!

Erik talked about taking a hike up the trail to the ice field above the glacier. It was a 9 mile hike. It seemed a bit high risk to undertake on such a short notice. The weather did not look that great either. While the sun peeked out for a while, we could see that rain showers came and went at altitude. We decided not to do it and, instead, headed back into Seward the town. When we got back into town we were all hungry and we thought we should eat out for a change. We found a great and modern restaurant along the main road in town. The food was very good.

Downtown Seward, AK

Isabella at the lunch table

Karl at the lunch table

Lilli at the lunch table

After we had eaten a good lunch, we strolled along the street and looked into stores. It was raining and the weather had definitely turned for the worse. We wanted to top this visit off by going to the Alaska Sea Life Center in Seward. This is a museum and aquarium of local fish, seals, etc, in Alaska. We learned that it was initially setup to study the effects of the enormous oil catastrophe caused by Exxon Valdez in the late 80s. That ship ran ashore not far from here, in Prince Williams Sound.

Underwater creatures of Alaska

A colorful rockfish

Most of this activity center is too dark for any pictures. In one aquarium they had Puffins (a bird). You could enter a room and see them from above the surface. You could also go downstairs and see them dive into the water. Their swimming abilities under water are quite amazing. They sort of flap their wings as they move quickly through the water. We went back and ate a simple dinner at the trailer. It was too wet to have an evening fire. We did not stay up that late since we wanted to leave early:ish tomorrow morning.

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All Pictures (c) 2006 Hamnqvist, Background features a very colorful wolf eel in a dimly lit aquarium.