Alaska Review! Day 11--Sutton to Seward

We're really moving through this vacation now.

This was the view we had from our cabin in the morning.

Not bad, eh?

We were on the road by 9.  We had several options of things to do and didn't want to kill too much time getting ready this morning.

We continued along the Glenn Highway.  Not quite as amazing as the Richardson, but still pretty good.  😊

Back on July 3 (our first full day), we had to skip Independence Mine because it was too foggy.  I really wanted to see it, so we stopped in on our way to Seward.   We had already nixed the Reindeer Farm and the Musk Ox Farm because we saw something similar in Fairbanks.  

I think this was $11 for an entrance fee.  We didn't charge it, so I'm going on memory.  I think the boys were free?  Not sure.  

The scenery here was gorgeous and it was interesting to see the buildings of the mine.  This mine was operational in the late 1930s and early 1940s.  What was interesting to me is that some of what we saw was familiar, in that both Chretien and I remember our grandparents having similar appliances, decor in the 1970s as what we saw here.  Not everything was foreign to us, if that makes sense.

Some of the buildings were in better shape than others.

You can just walk around the site.  At 11 AM, the buildings open...we lucked out in that we bumped into a ranger who took us on our own mini tour inside some of the buildings prior to 11 AM.

We first visited the school, which both the kids liked to see.

 

Next stop, the cook house and mess hall.

 I think there were about 200 miners, plus the administrators, plus families.  A lot of people needed to be fed.  The miners were treated quite well by the owner, and the owner made sure that he kept his kitchen modern.

 A lot bigger than my Kitchenaid mixer.

 This reminded me of my college dorm room.

This galley kitchen was part of the residential area (for the cook himself, I think).  I had a similar galley kitchen when I lived in Northern Virginia back in the 1990s.  I think mine was smaller, though.  😑

The lunchbox reminds me of the one my grandfather would take to his job when I was a kid.  

 Bicycle decks of cards.  Another memory trigger from my childhood.

 

After this tour, we lost our ad hoc tour guide.  Another ranger came by and he had to run off somewhere.  That was OK--by then it was 11 and the buildings were all open anyway.  We visited the assay building, where they examined the ore.

Time to climb higher.  You don't have to take the more challenging path that Earnest did.  There are regular, easy paths to walk along.

 This needs some restoring, no?

 This is the mine train.

 

The beginning of an authentic Disney ride?  😉 

Different sort of views than what we saw from the road, but I could look at these for a long time as well.

 And after viewing the mine and train up close, we came back down.  Again, regular paths exist for those of you not wanting to scale small mounds of dirt.

Inside the visitors' center, there were some artifacts to examine as well.

We spent a little more than 2 hours there, and then we were on the road again, eating our sandwiches.

 And stopping for birds crossing.  We thought this was a ptarmigan, another common species that we didn't see (or notice) in Denali.

We passed through Anchorage and spent another $20 on snacks in Fred Meyer...and then kept going to the Seward Highway.

Yes, another gorgeous drive.

 This reminded me a bit of driving along the Pacific Coast Highway.  We don't really have anything quite like this on the East Coast.

 We saw the tide out quite a bit in our few days.

Dirty windshield doesn't obscure the beauty too much.

I drove a good chunk of this drive, so the pictures stop.  We talked about the detour to Russian River Falls to maybe see the bears catching salmon, but didn't think the kids (or maybe us) would be up for the 4-5 mile round trip trek to see them, and it would not have left time for the Sea Life Center.  So, regretfully, we passed on that.

We arrived in Seward around 4:45 or so.   We were staying at Sauerdough Lodging, which is right on Fourth Ave., and within walking distance of the restaurants, shops, Sea Life Center, etc.   We paid $222 for a studio apartment--queen bed, pullout couch for two, and a rollaway.  Full galley kitchen.  Bathroom with clawfoot tub. 

Originally, the plan was to spend two nights in Seward, but when I started booking the lodging (in September), the prices were very high, even by Alaska standards.  I found out that there was a triathlon on Saturday (the lodging was for Thursday and Friday), so I flipped things around and booked our stay for Wednesday, when we could still get a room.  This made things a bit more challenging.  I also wanted to be sure that we were north of any of the activities, which included a bike ride along the Seward Highway, starting in Girdwood.  We did not need to be caught up in the craziness of that on Saturday, when we had to get back to Anchorage for our evening flight.

I will say that the apartment was charming...very bright and sunny.  But, I will also say that it was uncomfortably hot.  We couldn't open the window because there was no screen, and the ceiling fan didn't cool off the sunny room.  I know I'll get flamed for this, but I have also read many times that it does get hot in Alaska in the summer (usually when someone asks if they need a winter coat), and as I mentioned, it was in the 80s while we were in Fairbanks.   Hosts need to have a way for guests to stay cool besides an ineffective ceiling fan...even if it's a portable box fan that you bring in for the few days a year that guests need it and replacing the missing window screen would help, too.  The Keystone Hotel in Valdez was similar with being warm, but since it wasn't sunny when we were there, it was bearable.  (Hearing that there is no a/c because it's Alaska reminds me of when I lived in the Washington DC area 25 years ago and we'd hear that "Oh, we aren't prepared for the snow/ice because it doesn't happen here."  Guess what.  In the six years I lived in DC, it snowed and was icy every year.  People are still staying that, though.) 

We brought our stuff in and headed out for some dinner.

 Another city, another mural.

We poked our heads into several restaurants along Fourth Ave.  Chretien was looking for a regular meal, and some places had more pizza and pub food.  We wound up at Chattermark, which was so-so.  He and I ordered some sort of combo platter for two, which had a salad, salmon, something else (maybe halibut?) and a dessert.   Imp ordered wings and I don't recall what the other two ate.  Bill with tip was $111.  The main thing was we wanted to get in and out, and this place was rather empty when we first showed up, and only had a few other patrons when we left.

We had a mission to go visit the Alaska Sea Life Center today, as we figured we'd be too tired to visit tomorrow after our boat tour.  We had about two hours to visit when we arrived there.  This cost us $68, and we had a free adult entry here due to Tour Saver.

 

The kids found some sort of large video game type thing right away. 

Hello!

The kids really enjoyed the touch tank. 

There were open exhibits outside where you could go, a la zoos.

New walrus at the Center.

 

The calf was quite popular.  At one point, there was an employee who was standing upstairs with us.  She passed around a microphone so we could ask questions about the calf.

Also outside in an enclosure were our favorites...the puffins.  We watched them for quite some time.

You could also sit outside the enclosure and watch them dive.  Now that was interesting.  😎

Some interesting statutes.

There were also films to watch.  And a green screen to add yourself to some scenes.

Sort of amused because Imp had on a yellow and green tie dye shirt, so it looks like the green plants are swallowing him up.

We pretty much stayed up until closing, and then walked back to the hotel.  We did a little bit of souvenir shopping en route.

Another great day was in the books for us!  Only three more days to go.