Homer, Alaska, The Halibut Fishing Capital of the World

We followed the coast of Cook Inlet the 130 km from Stoldotna to Homer. There were lots of trees, campgrounds and RV parks, and lakes. This is a huge recreation area for Alaskans and visitors alike. I enjoyed the wildflowers along the roads, especially the Lupines.

I spotted a home part way along the highway with a complete set of agility equipment in the yard. That was unexpected. They would have to travel quite a long way for competitions.

There are lots of bald eagles, too, but I’m not quick enough with the camera to capture them when we’re driving. For example, as we drove over Anchor River, I looked down at the river and there was a huge eagle just sitting on the bank.

There was a pull-off as we approached Homer with a welcome sign and beautiful views of Kachemak bay, the spit, the mountains, volcanoes and glaciers. Gorgeous.

Once we came down the bluff, we found that Homer is a funky little town with lots of artsy shops and even more fish charter operators.

We settled in at the tiny ‘Castaway’ park that we spotted on the drive down the spit (a very narrow strip of land jutting out from the coast). It is right on the ocean and has electricity and wi fi for $25/night. Most places charge $40/night for electric and the new full service park right across the road is charging $83. So, I’ll put up with the tight spacing for the location and reasonable price. We are able to watch the tide come in and out, the boats heading out fishing, etc. through our front windows! And, I can let the dogs run off-leash on the beach. They love that!

After setting up camp, we rode our bikes further down the spit, into the heart of the action. We checked out the Salty Dawg Saloon. It’s a very old collection of buildings and its ceiling and walls are plastered with dollar bills with people’s names written on them.

Then we went next door to the ‘Happy Face’ restaurant for their halibut fish and chips special. We shared the plate so we could each have a bowl of clam chowder, too. All seafood here is fresh – literally right off the boat.

While we were in this upstairs restaurant, I noticed some serious fish filleting going on across the street which we went to watch as soon as we were done. The charters were coming in and the amount of halibut they caught was jaw-dropping. This picture shows the catch of six guys that were out for about five hours. The biggest halibut on the left weighed over 80 pounds!

And of course the people filleting the fish were pros and whipped through them very quickly.

Anyway, after seeing that, there was no way I’m going to miss out on fishing for halibut, too. We went and talked to some of the charter companies and quite a few are running half-day trips that will fit our time and money budget. We’ll firm up our plans in the morning but are hoping to get out fishing tomorrow afternoon.

This is a picture of some of the boats in the HUGE marina:


We'll spend probably three nights here before going to Seward for a few days.

Portage Glacier Cruise

We got away from Anchorage about noon today, after stopping at both Walmart and Safeway for groceries, etc. and fuel. Our destination is Homer, AK, on the Kenai peninsula, but we didn’t expect to get all the way today.

Not too far down the very scenic Seward Highway, we stopped for lunch at Beluga Point. We didn’t see any Beluga whales, but did see some Dall sheep high on the cliffs above the point. It’s a very pretty spot with cliff, highway, railroad track, then the ocean.

We followed the Turnagain Arm of Cook Inlet for about half the day.


Once we turned toward Whittier and Portage Lake, there were glaciers of various sizes all over the place.

Today’s highlight was our side-trip to Portage Lake where we went on a one hour cruise on the S.S. Ptarmigan which took us around the very chilly, iceberg littered lake and right up to the Portage Glacier.

This is a picture looking back toward the parking lot and a small glacier up behind.

One larger iceberg which had drifted close to the boat launch area had been floating around for over one week already.

Only 10% of an iceberg’s mass shows above water. The captain demonstrated this later in the cruise when he dropped a chuck of glacier ice into an aquarium. See how little appears above the water.

There are a multitude of smaller glaciers around Portage Lake. Many are forming pretty waterfalls as they melt.

The glacier looked quite spectacular as we approached. The closer we got, the more the variations in the ice and the bright blue colours appeared. About half the time the glacier calves (drops chunks of ice) when the tour boat is nearby, but we weren’t lucky enough to see it.

We hung around in front of the glacier for a while, taking pictures.

The captain dropped a bucket and brought up some water for people to put their finger in to feel the temperature. Fran did, and said it was very cold. I took his word for it!

After the cruise we went to the visitor centre to look around. It’s an attractive building, right on the edge of the lake with icebergs floating in front of it. Behind the building you can see a tunnel entrance on the highway to Wittier.

After getting back on the road, we continued on toward Homer. We took a supper break at the Turnagain Pass Recreation Area, which was lovely and green. The scenery was very pretty all day today. Too bad the sky was so overcast as our pictures don’t look as good as they would have on a sunny day.

We had heard the Fred Meyers store in Soldotna allowed RV’s to park there overnight, so that’s where we stopped. Of course, our ‘free night camping’ ended up with an $80 shopping trip to the store! Fred Meyers is a Kroger store (like Fry’s) and is even bigger than our Superstores at home. They even sell guns and ammunition! Kayaks, too.

Anchorage Market

On Saturdays and Sundays throughout the summer over 300 vendors gather in downtown Anchorage for the market. It was only a few blocks from our campground – too bad they were pretty well straight uphill! Oh well, we made it anyway and going home was easy.

The market was great! There was some local produce, home baking and lots of Alaskan handmade items (wind chimes, ornaments, jewelry, etc.). They also had a whole row of food vendors. We had trouble choosing what to sample and went with some tried and true favourites (sticky cinnamon bun, fudge, mini-doughnuts) and some new items (bacon/cheese bun, salmon quesadilla, piroghi).

This is round one:

A little later, we tried Salmon Quesadillas – only in Alaska! It was actually very tasty.

While we ate our quesadilla, we were entertained by ‘Moosejaw’ (a local actor). He recited Robert Service verse with mucho gusto. Fran talked to him after he finished and told him I grew up in Moose Jaw, but he hadn’t realized there is a city named Moose Jaw! So, he was very interested to learn there is. No doubt he’ll be googling it after he gets home.

The piroghy was basically a deep-fried cheeseburger – very tasty!

The market in many ways was like others in other cities. However, you don’t normally see an Iditarod display and author at other city markets!

In case you're wondering, we didn't just eat at the market, we picked up some great souvenirs and gifts, too. We also visited a few more shops uptown before we went back to the RV park.

We didn’t do much the rest of the day – just the way we planned it. It’s nice to have some ‘down time’ once in a while.

Cycling the Tony Knowles Coastal Trail

We biked to Karen’s RV Repair shop (yes, that was the name!) this morning to pick up a part to repair one of the drawers. They had the part and it was a pleasant ride which we made mainly on a bike path. There are 120 miles of bike paths in Anchorage!

We also went to the Ulu factory before coming home for lunch. They had windows to see into the workshops where they make both the blades and handles as well as a nice gift shop.

An ulu is a curved-blade knife used by the Eskimos for thousands of years for just about everything.

After lunch, we rode to the beginning of the Tony Knowles Coastal Trail which runs from downtown and around the coast for 11 miles to Kincaid Park. We went about half way. It was a lovely ride without too many hills. Parts of the trail were exposed to Cook Inlet and parts were through the forest. This is a pretty spot with lots of rose bushes. Roses seem to grow really well here.

There were lots of people biking, running, walking the trail. This picture shows the city of Anchorage across the inlet.

There were some very lovely homes along the way with great views of the inlet. The tide was out so we mostly saw mud flats - and signs every few feet warning people not to go on the mud flats (they are like quicksand).

At Earthquake Park there were a number of signboards regarding the 1964 Earthquake which wiped out an entire neighbourhood and caused a downtown street to drop about 15 feet.

At Point Woronzoff, there was an eagle fishing. He posed for me quite nicely on the top of a pole. He has a tag on his shoulder for some reason.

This old growth grove wasn’t disturbed by the earthquake or development and was very pretty to cycle through. That’s me in the red shirt.

We pedaled back uptown to have supper at a very nice restaurant called “Sacks”. It was “a little spendy” as they say in this part of the world, but worth every penney. Fran had Halibut and I had a Brazlian seafood dish that I can’t remember the name of. They are famous for their bread pudding with hot rum sauce and we couldn’t resist having that as well.

We had thought about leaving tomorrow, but I really want to go to the big outdoor market on Saturday so we decided to stay in Anchorage until Sunday. Fran wasn’t really ready to get back on the road again, either.

Anchorage Touring

We didn’t have too bad a night here at Ship Creek so extended our stay by two nights.

We rode our bikes uptown and got to the log cabin visitor centre just as the hour-long trolley tour was loading. So we jumped on board and got driven all around Anchorage with a running commentary from our driver.

The visitor centre has lots of beautiful flowers around it.

The tide was out when we drove along the harbour. Cook Inlet has the second highest tide in the world – 39 feet! And the mudflats are ‘bottomless’ and very dangerous (like quicksands).

We stopped at Earthquake Park where 150 acres of the city collapsed and a whole subdivision was destroyed. You can see where the earth dropped and the ground below is wavy.

Fran really enjoyed seeing the float planes at Lake Hood where over 1,300 planes make their home. It is said to be the largest float plane base in the world! This picture shows just a small corner of the lake.

We went through some residential neighbourhoods where lovely modern homes are next to modest ones built in the 20’s. There are a few log cabins as well, although not as many as we found in Fairbanks. This house is completely underground. It has a wall of windows on the side away from the street and several skylights. The front door is at the lower level at the front as well and the glass roof covers a stairway down to the front door. There were workmen working in the driveway. Our trolley driver said the house stays at 68 degrees F all year round without any heating or cooling required.

We had a nice lunch at the Downtown Deli then rode a few blocks further to the Anchorage Museum. It is a large and modern facility with really great exhibits. They have lots of native peoples’ artifacts, exhibits on the pipeline, the 1964 earthquake, how Alaskans lived over the decades and so on. We walked until my feet gave out then got back on our bikes to go see the AK Experience ‘Earthquake’ film and exhibits.

That was quite enough sight-seeing for one day!

Supper at home, dog-walking and bike running filled out the evening.