Soldatna, AK to Homer AK – 75 Miles Today would have been my Dad’s 98th birthday. Happy birthday, Pop. Rest in peace.
It rained most of the night and into the morning. The hasty silicone patch last night didn’t do the job on the leak. Somebody on the Yahoo Tiger Group suggested just putting a strip of duct tape over the suspected area as a temporary fix. I may go by the hardware store tomorrow and see if they have any white duct tape; if they do I my give that a try.
The Seward Highway from Soldatna to Homer is in very good condition. It’s two lanes all the way, mostly with narrow shoulders. The first few miles seems to have been recently re-surfaced, and is very smooth. That same portion of the highway goes through rolling hills, with lush greenery all along both sides. There are signs warning of moose along the road, but we didn’t see any. As the highway nears Clam Gulch, about a third of the way to Homer, it breaks out onto and begins to follow along a high bluff, with glimpses of the Cook Inlet to the west through the trees. Approaching the town of Ninilchik, there is a turn-off onto a short gravel road that leads to the old Russian Orthodox Church of the Transfiguration of the Lord. This rustic wooden church is undated, but it appears to have been built sometime around the turn of the (twentieth) century, or perhaps in the late 1800’s. It sits behind a white picket fence in the midst of wildflower-filled cemetery, on a wind-swept bluff high above the crashing surf on the beach a hundred feet or more below. Adjacent to the church is a small veterans’ memorial with a flagpole and a hand-painted wooden wall containing the names of all the local servicemen who have given their lives in the wars over the past hundred years.
After taking a few photos of the church, we continued southward the last few miles to Homer. By now the rain was finally starting to let up, and we could see the clouds breaking to the east. As we passed through the town of Anchor Point, the land became more agricultural, mainly bright green hayfields. Just before entering Homer there is a scenic viewpoint overlooking the city, the bay on which it sits, and the rugged mountains across the bay.
Homer is an end-of-the-road city of some 5000 people, situated on the north shore of Kachemak Bay, an arm of the Cook Inlet. The Cook inlet is named for Captain James Cook, an English sea captain who explored the northwest coastline all the way up to Alaska in the 1770’s, looking for the fabled Northwest Passage. Unfortunately this was just another dead-end in that search. Across the bay from Homer, the rugged Kenai Mountain Range comes right down to the shoreline. These peaks rise two to three thousand feet in a series of jagged, rocky peaks, still boasting large patches of snow even in August. The interior of the range is totally glaciated, and numerous glaciers can be seen descending in valleys across the bay. The largest is the Grewingk Glacier, a wide river of ice easily visible from most of Homer and the surrounding area.
Perhaps the most distinctive feature of Homer is the Homer Spit, a five mile-long finger of land that juts out into Kachemak Bay at the foot of the low hill upon which most of the city is built. The Seward Highway goes all the way to the end of the spit, ending at the terminal for the Alaska State Ferries to Sedovia and Kodiak Island. Also at the end of the spit are the boat harbor and all the fishing charter boats. The sides of the road at this point are lined with charter booking offices, tourist shops, and restaurants. But most of the spit is a desolate series of wind-blown campgrounds right on the beach. We opted to stay back up in town, at an RV park on a low bluff overlooking the bay and with a terrific view of the Kodiak Range. Oh, did I mention that the sun finally appeared? It’s now 9:00 pm and the sun is bright, although low on the horizon. The clouds behind the Kodiak Mountains make for a dramatic photo op, and I took more than a few in this hour of golden light. I hope this weather holds until tomorrow, for at 6:00 am we try our hand at halibut fishing.
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