On the road & arriving in Valdez, July 24th and 25th.

We depart from Anchorage on the Glenn Highway heading towards Richardson Highway Junction, where we head south.  Valdez is a little over 300 miles away, so taking our time--as we do--we will be boondocking along the way tonight.  A short way out of Anchorage we come to the Mat-Su Valley.  More information on this valley is here  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matanuska-Susitna_Valley
Next we come to the foothills of the Chugach Mountains and the Matanuska River.  We will be with both for a while.  Passing right through Palmer we were so sorry to miss the Alaskan State Fair held here the first part of September.  We would so love to drive in traffic and crowds, see giant veggies, etc.  O-o-oh yes, so sad! 

The start of the view of the Matanuska River and Chugach Range:

 Few more pictures of the river.

It is a braided river--which means??  You are correct.  It is coming off a glacier, in fact several of them.

Another clue!!

Look at the gray silt-laden water.  And it is moving rapidly, swirling its way right along.

The photo opportunities along the way were continuous!

We took these pictures at several pull-offs, and also got a few of our favorite subjects.






In addition to distant views, the native vegetation is always of interest.

What was she taking a picture of?  This.  What ever it is.

(Remember the pink roses of earlier photos?  Now, as the season is progressing, Rosehips are maturing!  Rosehips can be used to make a tea which is very high in Vitamin C.  If only the early sailors had known it, they could have saved much illness and deaths due to scurvy.) 

In the distance we saw Mt. Marcus Baker with Harvard Glacier weaving it's way around it.  At 13,176 feet, Mt. Marcus Baker is the highest mountain in the Chugach Range.

This is the way they do graffiti up here:  rocks laid on a smooth soil.  Sometimes they go to extremes and paint the rocks, but most of the time they just carry rocks a short distance and stack away.   We saw this a few times in Canada, as well as in Alaska.

Blue skies, green hills and graffiti beside the road (on the right)--much nicer than spray painting.

This was the first peek of Matanuska Glacier, but there was more to come.

 The Matanuska Glacier is without a doubt the largest and most spectacular sight between the cities of Palmer and Glennallen. It was chosen by Alaska Magazine as #2 of “49 PLACES TO GO IN THE 49th STATE”.  It originates from within the Chugach Mountains of South Central Alaska and is visible from the Glenn Highway.   It is approximately 26 miles long and 4 miles wide at its terminus. It is classified as a valley glacier; a body of solid ice that flows like a river under its own weight through an existing valley. About 10,000 years ago it began its retreat to its present day location, and it has not seen any significant change in mass for almost two decades. Because the Matanuska Glacier is a weather hole, cold air from the glacier forces warm air upward towards the mountain peaks. This results in sunny skies and more favorable weather than its surrounding areas.  (I'm so impressed with all of Chuck's research!)

Here is where it is coming out of the Chugach Mountains.

Even as great as they were, there was more to see than the Matanuska Glacier and River and the Chugach Mountains.  A good example is these hills.

This is not gold, copper, or iron in these hills but Toasted Gypsum.  Toasted by Volcanoes, and one of the very few places in the world where you will see this.

No big deal, I just know the name of this one:  King Mountain.

The Chugach Mountains will be  with us all the way around Valdez and the Prince William Sound.  As you might notice, the clouds are coming in.









We found a nice wide pull-off away from traffic, and stopped for a nice quiet dinner and a very light evening of reading and relaxation.  

The Trans-Alaskan Pipeline was visible in the distance. 

The pipeline was a tremendous help to the economy in the 70's while it was being built.  It traverses over 800 miles of the roughest terrain imaginable.  It was finished in 1977 and built to last for 30 years at a cost of $8 billion.  More info 
http://akpipelinesafety.org/pipeline-facts




There are over 700 moose alone killed annually on the highways of Alaska.  Many other bears, caribou, and sheep also are destroyed.  The Fish and Game Department is trying to alleviate this problem.  Want to see what the trucking companies are doing?

They do want to protect their trucks, and with these very beefy bumpers the drivers don't slow down at all when there is a possibility of game on the road.  This bumper was far from the only one like it.  All the big trucks have these, as well as a lot of the pick-ups.  So that's why the animals are called "Alaskan Speed Bumps"!

OK, lets get back to the views.

It was a wet, foggy morning when we took off the next day.  Saw a couple of nice waterfalls.

Mostly coming from melting icefields on top of the hills.

We crossed over the Tsaina River, a small  river that grows before it joins the Lowe River.  

We could not figure out what these guys were doing way down in the raging river gorge, breaking apart fissured rocks with a shovel, looking for something.  It was quite a climb down there, (my camera was zoomed in for this one) so I hope they found whatever they were looking for.  I didn't see them getting anything.

Maybe gold?  Any ideas?

A hanging glacier just before we got to Worthington Glacier

  This is the trail to Worthington Glacier, visible above our heads.

 It was quite a sight, but the fog and/or clouds were moving in fast, so that limited just how much we could see.   This is the view of Worthington Glacier as we left, showing the clouds descending.

As we drove down the highway to Valdez, we had problem seeing the road due to the fog--never mind the vistas. I even pulled over for a little bit to try to wait it out, but not too much traffic, so we continued slowly on down to lower altitude.

When we finally got below the clouds, we found we were just 22 miles from Valdez.  We had completely missed Thompson Pass scenery, so we were going to have to go back later to see it.
   

I had read of Keystone Canyon (named after the state of Pennsylvania) and fog notwithstanding,  we were not disappointed.  

 As we entered the Canyon next to the Tsaina River you can see it was a bit of a wet, rainy, foggy day.

One of the attractions of the Canyon is the Bridal Veil Falls.  (I wonder how many Bridal Veil Falls there are in the world)                                                                                                      

Here I am admiring the falls and get ready to take a picture of the Bride.

Can you see the Bride?

There was also more Fireweed, and Goats Beard. 

Further down the road was another falls.  This water is coming down off either snow or icefield melt.                                          

    

This is Horsetail Falls. and no, I don't see any horse.

 In Valdez we stayed at the Eagle Rest RV Park.  Here are a couple of very dirty vehicles.

 I was being very careful not to rub against them as I was hooking up the utilities.

 

They were so dirty we decided to wash them right there in the RV Park.  As you can see we were on gravel so the wash water would soak in real quick, and we were told it would be OK.  We are getting pretty good at this by now.

We drove the Honda downtown to the dock area and saw something colorful enough to brighten the grey afternoon:  this group of Kayaks for hire. 

There was a fishing derby going on so they were pushing that.  Street signs along the main street by the harbor were lovely.

When the charter boats return someone weighs and cleans the fish.  The expert crew very efficiently empties wheelbarrows of fish & quickly fillets them.

                                                                                           




 There was a special prize for the largest Halibut, so they were kept separately.  

All I wanted was one.  

They didn't have to yell like that.

                                                                                

 





After the filleting, fish 'leftovers' are thrown down into the trough, where greedy,  happy, and very noisy gulls have their feast.











It is about time to call it a day.  Tomorrow we explore more in Valdez.  See you later.