June 27-28 Palmer, Eklutna, Anchorage

Thursday, June 27

Began today at 57 degrees, mostly sunny.  Our first stop was the Iditarod Headquarters near Palmer.  They had a good film about sled dogs, some dogs, history of the race, etc. 

Doggie booties, many dogs wear these for all or part of race

 Stopped next at Palmer Hays Flats, which is a game refuge mostly for migrating birds.  Only a few ducks, but beautiful field of Alaska Iris.

Note garden on roof

Next we headed northeast on the Glenn Highway to Matanuska Glacier.  Someone we had run into back in Talkeetna recommended it, and it was pretty awesome. We drove down a steep and gravel road to an access point and then hiked to the glacier and clambered around on it a bit. The landscape of the glacier was amazing. It was  carrying a lot of rocks and debris, so as the top layer thawed you could sometimes walk on gravel, rocks, boulders, and dirt, with  more of the same trapped in ice beneath your feet. Some places were pure ice, a beautiful bluish tint or white.  

Drips formed rivulets which formed small streams which carved their way to  a few bigger streams , eventually leaving the glacier and forming the Matanuska River.

 Greg retrieved a few rocks for our collection.

Late afternoon, we headed back to Palmer.  Did some grociery shopping at Fred Myers  and stayed in their parking lot overnight.  We bought a pre-cooked roasted chicken and made a salad, topped with an ice cream sandwich.  Ahhhh.  Great night except for the street cleaning machine which cleaned the parking lot between 1:00 and 2:00!  Oh well….

Friday, June  28

Today began as very cloudy and 61 degrees but the temperature actually dropped.  We stopped at the Palmer Police station and got directions to a service station which sells propane and filled our tank.  Nice, friendly people.

We drove south and stopped at the tiny town of Eklutna, which is mostly Athabascan.  Visited St. Nicholas Russian Orthodox church – the original log one built in 1870 and the newer one built in the 1960s.

The feel is definitely Russian, with many icons, some which came from Russia. Though originally mostly a Russian parish , the congregation eventually became mainly Athabascan converts.  The cemetery shows the mixing of the two cultures, as Athabascan “spirit houses” mark many of the graves.  Some simple, some quite elaborate.   Both the cemetery and the newer church are still active.

From here we headed into Anchorage and its visitor’s centers. One of Anchorage’s titles is City of Flowers, and it had a wonderful assortment of bright and cheerful flowers everywhere!

We watched a couple of well-done films on Alaska at the Federal Building, where we had to present ID and go through a metal detector (back to civilization!)  Talked about the area and got some more maps and literature on upcoming destinations.

We went a few blocks away and visited the Ulu factory where some of the Ulu’s are made.  They showed a film on manufacturing and had a demonstration on how to use these clever knives.  Just a few blocks away is Ship Creek, and since the salmon were supposed to be running, we walked over to have a look.  We were disappointed not to see any salmon struggling upstream, but probably not as disappointed as the many fishermen – we didn’t see any salmon caught but lots of trying….

Left downtown and found a campsite at The Golden Nugget RV Park.  Not too much more than a large parking lot with a little grass and few trees, it DID have wonderful hot showers and (very slow) wi-fi.