September 11, 2013 Wednesday
Day 67

This morning around 11 we left beautiful Homer and the most wonderful campsite right on the Kachemak Bay. We are on our way to Valdez. We'll drive about half way, 200 miles or so today. Starting out on the Sterling Highway, retracing the drive we took on the way to Homer through Anchor Point, Ninilchik, Clam Gulch, Soldotna, Cooper Landing, to Tern Lake Junction where we'll pick up the Seward Highway for a bit, then The Glenn Highway to just past Sutton.

It was sunny and warm-ish, 54 degrees. A few miles out of Homer, we had spectacular views of Mount Iliamna, 10,016 feet, 52 miles away and Mount Redoubt, 10,197 feet, 54 miles away, both in the "ring of fire".

Passing through Cooper Landing, and driving along the turquoise-aquamarine Kenai River, we were amazed again at its beauty. This river is world renowned for King Salmon fishing. Kenai Lake is equally as stunning as the river.

We took a side road off The Seward Highway to see Portage Glacier and to visit The Begich, Boggs Visitor Center at Portage Lake. Beautiful exhibits, making you feel like you were walking through Portage Valley, Portage Pass, then to Prince William Sound. We saw a good film about the glaciers and surrounding forests, then we headed outside to view and photograph the glaciers, water, and all the beauty around. Nice side trip!

At Anchorage, we got on The Glenn Highway, a gorgeous National Scenic Byway along the Matanuska River. We are seeing lots of yellow colors as the willows and cottonwoods are changing. They look brilliant against the deep forest green spruce trees.
About 10 miles or so past Sutton on the curvy, winding Glenn Highway, and just as we rounded a curve, a moose walked out onto the middle of the road, saw us and went back into the woods. Michael had to apply his brakes pretty hard to miss hitting her. It was a cool sight to see, she was BIG! Good thing Michael is a great driver and is used to these kind of roads. Further along there was a duck waddling in the road that we narrowly missed. Looking back we saw that our passing him blew him off the road, but he was up and tottering dizzily about, so we think he was just stunned!

We are seeing tons of trucks with atv trailers parked in pull-offs along the road. It is moose hunting season September 1-20.

This is one of the most scenic drives on a smooth, well maintained narrow, winding, ascending and descending road. We are surrounded by snow capped mountains, many with glaciers; one of the most spectacular is Matanuska Glacier.
We are losing light as it is getting late and it gets dark around 8-ish now, but we're unable to resist stopping at pull offs to gape at the beauty.
We arrived a little before 8pm at our campground, about 40 miles past Sutton, so we had a little light left to see to hook up.

Our campground is Grandview Cafe and RV Park. When I called them to make a reservation, they said
"we are closed for the winter, but you can stay there and use electric, water, wifi; we haven't shut those off yet. Just put the cash in an envelope and drop it in our mail slot. When you get there, move the sawhorse blocking the driveway, out of your way".

OK . . . we did and this place is beautiful, clean, great mountain views, quiet. We are the only ones here. Good Night, zzzzzzz

Wildlife Sightings
Moose
Duck
Swans