Monday, June 27, 2016

Anchorage, AK - Counting Sheep

Today we began with the Wells Fargo Alaska Heritage Museum, the largest collection of Alaska Native artifacts in the state. It belonged to the owner of an Anchorage bank which was bought by Wells. The contract stipulated that Wells would never part with nor break up the collection and would provide a permanent home for it in one of their banks. This Wells was pleased to do and what a fine museum it is. (Wells actually has museums in many of their main city banks - the curator of this museum told us that the Des Moines branks is getting a museum soon.)
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There was clothing and artifacts including tools from all 4 distinct Alaskan climate regions. Here’s a parka made out of bird feathers.
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There were carvings from all 4 groups too.
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There is even an authentic Bering Sea kayak
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And, there is a 46 ounce gold nugget found in Alaska in the 1960’s. Hmmm. Am I to believe that this is not just a copy?
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Beautiful carvings.
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And this chess set.
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Here are some ‘ice creepers.’
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But, if you want to do any kind of research, there is also an extensive library. Many of these books are one of a kind and priceless. But I was told that I could handle any of them.
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We then left the museum and for some reason, I wanted to travel down the Turnagain Arm, just to see it. There are lots of stops along it and, even though we’re going to travel down it tomorrow, I don’t think that the RV will fit in these. Let’s do it in the Jeep.
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Beautiful drive and we enjoyed swirling around all the curves as it wound down to the end of the Arm. How ever did they build both a 4-lane road with turn-offs and a railroad track down this narrow arm, between the towering cliffs and the water? Oh, yeah, they chiseled out, blasted out and bore out the cliff to make it all fit.

There’s a spigot in the cliff too. Someone was holding up a jug next to it. We saw it too late to take a picture on the way down but got one on the way up. Why in the world is this here? Dangerous situation with traffic driving by at 50+ mph and people running across the road to get water.
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And a roadside waterfall.
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When we turned around to head back, we saw a ‘jam.’ People had cameras and binoculars looking up and pointing up the cliff. We stopped and got this view. A Dall sheep family. Terribly rare to see. Dall sheep usually are tiny white dots on high cliffs.
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That’s a close-up of them. Here is the whole cliff. They are the tiny white dots in the middle.
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Looks like the lambs are as curious about us as we are about them.
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When we got back to Anchorage, we headed over to Kincaid park, on the tip of the Anchorage peninsula. Big park with all kinds of lighted ski trails, soccer fields, event centers, dirt bike trails and hiking trails and probably lots more that we didn’t see. We took the nearest trail and, when we rounded the first corner, I saw - a moose derrier in the foliage off the trail. I grabbed Gary’s arm to hold him back and we waited. Sure enough the moose saw us as no threat (probably used to people), wandered across the trail and into the foliage on the other side.

We then drove back to town for our daily hike in Kincaid Park.

Now about the moose. We saw this clever sign along a trail warning everyone that moose often come into this area and what to watch for.
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Shortly after we had seen this sign we saw our own moose along the trail. I saw the moose’s brown rear end behind a tree and grabbed Gary’s arm to hold him back. Then the moose peeked out to see if the way was clear.
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When he noticed that we didn’t seen to pose any danger, he ambled across the road and into the brush on the other side.
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We looked and looked but never saw him again.

Kincaid also has free lighted ski trails during the winter. Almost makes you want to stay in Anchorage.
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WOW. Dall sheep and moose all in the same day. We must be living right.

But, here’s the biggest chocolate waterfall in the world - or so the owner says. Right here in the Alaska Wild Berry Products store.
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