SATURDAY, SEPT 14

SATURDAY, SEPT 14:

     Looks like it rained last night – the grass is wet.  But nice and sunny again this morning.  Cool (in mid 40’s), but forecasted to go up to mid 70’s by this afternoon.  J

   After breakfast, we went into the metropolis of Stewart (pop about 450).  A quaint, charming little town if you don’t stray too far off the main street.

                                                              What a surprise!

 

We wanted to see if we could find a little church at which to worship tomorrow.  Went by the Visitors Center, but they were closed.  Drove onto the dock area by the Portland Canal – salt water once again!

 

 

      Went on to Hyder, an even smaller burg (pop about 60).  These two towns (2 miles apart) are at the head of a 90-mile fjord (the Portland Canal) which forms a portion of the border between British Columbia and Alaska.  The towns are surrounded by the beautiful coastal mountains and a massive icefield which feeds the many glaciers in the area, making the area one of exceptional beauty.  (The rest of the border in this region runs up the spine of the Coastal Mountains.)  So we crossed the international border again, back into Alaska!  There is no checkpoint on the Alaska side, as the town of Hyder goes nowhere.  The one main street dead ends.  However, there is a checkpoint coming back into the Canadian side.  Why??  Don’t ask me. 

     On the way to our first stop, we saw a wolf.  Right by the side of the road.  Didn’t even see one that close in Denali! 

 

    Then continued down the road (in Hyder)  to Fish Creek.  This is a U.S. Forest Service managed bear-viewing station.  It’s a lovely area.  A nice long wooden bridge, complete with nice benches, parallels the creek where there’s a big salmon run every year.  And of course the bears come.  This spot is unique in that it hosts both brown and black bears.  At almost all other bear-viewing sites, you see one species or the other; they generally don’t tolerate each other.  But the fish are so plentiful here that the usual territorial animosity doesn’t seem to exist. 
 

 

       All of the literature we read said that the best viewing times are August thru early Sept.  So we figured that we might be too late.  And we didn’t see any for the relatively short time we were there.  But we did see some salmon still fighting their way upstream.  And others dead – apparently after they’d spawned right around here.  Some birds – looked like some type of gull – were playing their role in the ecological cycle by eating them.   So it’s certainly possible that some bears are still visiting the creek.  A few people had told us earlier in our trip that, if you didn’t see bears at Fish Creek, go to the city dump in Hyder – you’ll find them there.  Sure enough, we did.  Two big black bears.  But the place gave me the creeps – garbage strewn everywhere, a smoldering fire in some of it . . . reminded me of Biblical references to Gehenna, outside of Jerusalem, the rubbish heap where fires were kept burning.  I don’t like to remember these stately animals foraging for food there, after I’ve seen so many in their natural world.  I’m kind of sorry we took the side trip there, notwithstanding this good pose. 

      But that was far outweighed by the highlight of our day – the drive to Salmon Glacier. The mountain drive to the glacier was fabulous – even though on a narrow, dusty 23-mile road, there was knockout gorgeous mountain scenery the higher we climbed.  We found places to pull over & stop.

 

 

 

        And then there were two designated viewing places of the glacier – one at the toe of the glacier,

 

 

                                        The last lone Fireweed of the summer:

 

 

                                              Glacier-formed Salmon River near its source at the glacier's toe:

 

and the other at the summit.  The views were just jaw-dropping.  We both felt that, with all the glaciers we’ve seen on this trip, this may well be the most stunning. Partly because of its size – it’s the 5^th largest glacier in all of North America.  And partly because of its location, or at least our perspective of this location . . .  in this deep alpine valley, surrounded by majestic mountains.

 

                                                                                                                   

 

         There were several picnic tables & benches placed at the summit.  We stayed for the better part of an hour and ate our little snack.  Met two German couples up there who were travelling together.  They had their tiny German-made campers shipped over to the east coast, and have been travelling all across the U.S. since March.  Will drive south to Los Angeles, then over to Texas, leave their campers there, and fly home to Germany for Christmas.   Then will fly again to Texas, and resume their adventure – next round down to Mexico and South America.  Makes us look rather tame and sedentary!   

     The road down seemed to be a lot faster & smoother.  Bill scoped out a couple of possible fishing spots for tomorrow.  Tried to buy a fishing license, but was just after 5:00, and places were closed.  Hope they’ll be open tomorrow. 

     Was just a wonderful afternoon.  Warm, sunny, bright blue sky, the light was perfect for pictures.  When we got back to the RV, had cooled off considerably.   So we ate inside.  I did laundry after dinner while Bill went through photos of today.