The Kenai Peninsula

Monday the 19th was a long day - up early to catch a 0440 shuttle from the hotel to the airport and a 0600 flight back up to Anchorage. Picked up the car and drove south to the Kenai Peninsula where we'll be for the next few weeks. Our first stop was the little village of Hope (population 100). Founded in the 1880's after the discovery of gold in the area, it actually boomed to around 5,000 resident miners by 1896 when it was formally established as a town. The boys were casting around for a name and finally agreed to name their town after the first person who walked off the next ship. Turned out that person was Percy Hope, lately arrived from the lower 48 to try his luck in the gold fields. Never found any gold, and the rest of his career has faded from history, but he does still have a town named for him in Alaska.



The Russian Orthodox church in Ninilchik - an especially pretty place on the drive from Hope to Homer.

There were several nice hikes around Hope, including the Resurrection Pass trail that once connected Hope to the gold fields of the interior, but the weather didn't cooperate well enough to really tackle any of them. We wandered in to the local museum which was a treasure trove of information about the town and its history. It was also a veritable junk box of old artifacts from Hope's gold rush glory days, presided over by an ancient, cranky old sourdough who must have been about 90 and looked like he might have walked off the boat with Percy. It was vastly entertaining to have him walk us around the little place, explaining the arcane history of every (and I do mean every) small artifact, while his false teeth kept clacking as he fought to keep them from falling out of his mouth. It was like having an irascible old great uncle show you around his dusty attic.

Our host was an interesting guy too. He mines the same claim he's been working for over 30 years and apparently still makes a decent living at it. Showed me an extensive collection of old arrowheads that he's collected over the course of his lifetime both in Oregon and in Alaska. He had some amazing pieces too, including the only Clovis Points I've ever seen outside of a museum.





Kenai must be the land of the Fireweed...there were fields upon fields of it as we drove towards Homer. This one was just across the road from the Orthodox church in Ninilchik.

This area was originally settled from the sea by Russian explorers in the 1850's...still looking for sea otters. They also recorded the first gold discovery here in 1852, not far from Resurrection Creek where the big local strike occurred in 1889.

Our hosts recommended a local Wildlife Conservation park not far from Hope, so one sunny day we opted to drive up and spend the day there. It's one of those places where they collect and care for orphaned animals, usually releasing them back into the wild once they're grown but sometimes not if they were brought in too young to have learned survival skills from their parents. Took a few photos as we walked around for Grand Daughter Makenna. here they are:




Musk Ox from the Russian Steppes, brought here years ago and now virtually native to some parts of northern Alaska and the Yukon.




One of two orphaned Grizzly cubs that have been here for a couple of years. Not sure if they can be released, having by this time become pretty acclimatized to humans.




These are Rock Bison, slightly smaller than their cousins from the Plains.



These Moose calves were orphaned when their mother was killed in a collision with a car on the Seward highway earlier this Spring. The big bull isn't related but seemed to hover around them protectively.




He was a big boy...but we've seen one even closer than this!




A Sitka Deer fawn. Never saw any of the resident herd while we were on Baranov Island...had to come here to see one.

After a few days in Hope we motored on towards Homer - another candidate for the title of "Prettiest Town in Alaska".