Our Trip to Alaska--Kenai Peninsula

I've been waiting all week to be able to journal and post about our recent trip to Alaska! We spent 1 1/2 days in Anchorage and the rest of our week on the Kenai Peninsula, Alaska's Playground. This is my journal entry so beware...it's very long!!

About a year ago we purchased a trip on ebay. It was a super sweet deal for an all-inclusive guided flyfishing trip on the Kenai River and surrounding rivers. The trip had lots of good comments from other people who had purchased it. So we bought the trip, booked the airfare, got work off, etc. and then we anxiously awaited the trip for the following 10 months. The day before we left on our trip we got an email from our guide that stated that he had to cancel due to health problems. At this point I was pretty irritated and upset that he would do something like this, but that changed once Will and I talked.

So then Will and I talked about options. We even thought about canceling our airline tickets and not going. But after talking more and discussing that we already had time off work scheduled and the tickets bought and had been looking forward to going, we decided to still go. Dr. Kelley, my dentist, says that all Alaska trips have something happen that's out of the ordinary and messes the trip up a little, so I guess this is our "something". Will spent the day on the internet and on the phone talking to many people, guides, B&B owners, etc. trying to put together a trip for us. This made it so the trip was all a surprise for me. He always likes to have surprises so it was good for him that way. I guess that way it if things didn't turn out as planned, I wouldn't know the difference. Each night he would tell me what the plans for the following day were. So here is how it ended up.

Friday Sept. 3rd we spent the day in Boise with my parents doing some shopping for last minute things at Sportsman's Warehouse, Cabela's, Winco (for snacks), etc. We got to meet my brother and sister-in-law's baby girl, Marissa for the first time. She is so tiny and cute! She looks like a doll. We went out to eat with them at Mongolian BBQ in Nampa and it was delicious. We didn't get to attend the baby blessing since it was the next day and we already had our trip booked way prior to even knowing they were expecting a baby. So I feel bad that we didn't get to go to that, but I'm glad we got to see them.

Saturday morning Sept. 4th. Apparently my parents house had a power bump and so the alarm clock I had set didn't go off. Usually I use my cell phone for my alarm clock, but for some reason I didn't this night. We got up and quickly ate packed the truck with our luggage and my parents took us to the airport that morning. I am glad that we had the baggage all packed the night before so we didn't have to do that in the morning. On the way to get on the freeway, my dad gets pulled over. Luckily he didn't get a ticket, but it was a little bit stressful thinking that we were already later than we originally planned to get to the airport. We were off and the good news it that we made onto our flight in time, even with time to play the Police Academy shooting game that they have in the Boise airport arcade. Will loves this game. We flew from Boise to Seattle. The flights were fairly uneventful. We flew right over Mount Rainier which was so huge and beautiful with snow all over it. We also saw a huge windmill farm visible from the air. We had a short layover in Seattle and then we flew to Anchorage. On our flight to ANC we sat by a guy who was wearing a visor and had spiky gray hair sticking out. We talked to him throughout the 4 hour flight, and he was a very nice guy. He kept referring to himself as "Uncle Frank". He was from Tuscon and when he mentioned that he was going on this trip for his 80th birthday, we were totally shocked. He did not look like he was 80 years old, he looked a lot younger. He was nice to sit by and visit with.

We arrived in ANC and got our rental car and found our first night's stay, a Bed and Breakfast in Anchorage. Then we went back into town and did some shopping, bought our fishing licenses, and ended up buying some knives after listening to a live info-mercial. Fred Meyer is the main store there and there were several of them in Anchorage that we drove by. We fished for just a little while at Campbell Creek which was a creek that went through town. There were some drunk guys and some other guys that looked like maybe we should get out of there, so we did and we went back to the B&B.

Campbell Creek

Sunday Sept. 5th. We had breakfast there at the B&B, then we went to church at a ward in Eagle River which is just a little bit north of Anchorage. We wanted to see that area, as well as, Will thought that's where some old friends lived that used to live in Preston. We found the church but didn't see the friends. I guess they moved to Palmer. We attended sacrament meeting at the Bear Mountain Ward. The people there were friendly and seemed pretty normal. We then were on our way for more driving down to the Kenai Peninsula, which is where we would be the rest of our trip. We drove around the Turnagain Arm and stopped several times for photos and to check out different streams and creeks. It was a 2-3 hour drive to Soldotna. We stopped at one point called Beluga Point and got to see some beluga whales surfacing in the ocean. That was pretty cool. The weather was kinda stormy/rainy/windy so we didn't stay very long.

At Beluga Point

On our drive Sunday, we had to have a picture by the sign!

We stopped at the fly shop called Troutfitters in Cooper Landing and found out what we needed to do to catch fish. We stayed that night in Soldotna at Fish Alaska Log Cabin Lodge. It was a cute little cabin with several beds, a small bathroom, and small kitchen with fridge, stove, table, etc. The cabin was right on the Kenai River so we walked down to the boardwalk they had right by the river and saw several fish surfacing. It made us that more excited to fish the next day. We decided we wouldn't fish on Sunday, since it was the Sabbath. It was then that Will told me that he had chartered a fishing guide for Monday for some fly fishing on the Kenai River.the Kenai River right by our cabin
6 Sept. Monday morning we met our guide at 7:30 a.m. and we fished the middle Kenai. We put in at DOT's campground and went about 20 river miles to the Soldotna bridge. We were in a drift boat. We used trout bead setups with 10 ft. fly rods. Our guide was excellent! We were very pleased with our experience with him. We caught lots of fish. Big trout, dolly varden, some pink salmon, Will caught a round white fish. Both Will and I caught our biggest ever rainbow trouts. Will's was huge! We had a great day out on the river. The scenery was beautiful. There was only one set of bad rapids on this stretch of river but our guide got us through no problems. I was surprised about how many private cabins and places are along the river. From reading about the river in books magazines it made it sound like it was very remote. Our guide was Captain Mark Ledden. We released all the fish we caught that day. Heidi's biggest Rainbow Trout

Heidi with a Dolly Varden and that's our guide, Mark

Will's fish of a lifetime!

Will's biggest Rainbow Trout! What a lunker!

That evening we fished on our own right by our cabin. Will hooked up with a pink salmon that really gave him a good run. We stayed the night at the same cabin as the night before.

Our cabin is the one on the left with the light on
Will fighting the pink salmon

Tuesday morning Sept. 7th we slept in and ate breakfast at Sal's Klondike Diner in Soldotna. Kim Crockett (friend from Preston) told us we needed to eat there. The food was excellent. I had the French toast and it was delicious. We drove to Ninilchik (further south). This was a day of self-guided fishing. We fished Deep Creek with our fly rods. We didn't hook up with any fish but we saw a few. We were hoping to catch silver salmon, but after talking with some people I guess we weren't fishing at the right time of day and it was a tad bit late in the season and most of the silvers had already moved on. We still had a fun time. At Deep Creek

We ate out a Chinese restaurant there in Ninilchik. It was about 8:15 p.m. when we walked in the restaurant. The lady said she was about the close, but she would serve us first. We were the only ones in the restaurant. That night we stayed in a small cabin at the place where our next day's guide lived. It was a tiny cabin with 6 beds in it. There were 4 bunkbeds on the main level and 2 twin beds in the loft. No plumbing our our cabin but right next door there was the bathhouse with plumbing. Will and I pushed the twin beds together and slept in the loft.Our little cabin

Wednesday morning Sept. 8th we left for Homer with our guide and two other guys (Olin and Bob) that were fishing with us that day. We went out of Homer for some deep sea fishing for Halibut. Overall it was a pretty miserable experience. The fishing was very slow, our guide was rude and had a very foul mouth. Not to mention that he smoked like a chainsmoker! The smoke smell was very annoying and making us a little bit sick. We caught skates (a type of sting ray), dog sharks, and halibut. We didn't get back to shore until about 7 p.m. It was a long day on the ocean. We kept the halibut and each got our limit. Our arms and back and hips were sore from reeling. I had bruises all along my hips and belly.

Here we are with our halibut and Olin

The harbor at Homer, AK

We got back to the guide's place in Ninilchik and he cleaned our fish for us and we vacuum packed and sealed it (he had the machine right there). We had steak and potatoes dinner there with the guide and Olin which was very yummy. Even though it was late, we still had to drive back to Soldotna that night because we had already paid for our cabin there. We stayed in the same cabin as Sunday and Monday night. We had to drive slow because of animals. On all the highways we drove on there were signs like "watch for moose" and "give moose a break" stating that about 300 moose had been killed this summer. So we were totally expecting to see a moose, but we never did. We saw a tiny black bear and porcupine, but that's it. We made it back safely at about 12 midnight. We reeked so bad of fish, smoke, campfire, that we both had to shower before we could go to bed even though were were very tired already.the halibut filets
Will and I got to vacuum pack and seal the filets

Sept. 9, Thursday morning Will told me the next surprise--he had purchased tickets for a 1 day sight-seeing cruise that left out of Seward. So we had to rush in order to pickup and buy the tickets from the lady he had arranged with, eat breakfast, and do one load of laundry (wash only due to time). We ate at Sal's restaurant again because it was so good. I had one of the World Famous cinnamon rolls, and it was definitely the best cinnamon roll I've had. It was good stuff. We made it to Seward in time to board the cruise. The cruise was so cool! At home we have several promotional DVD's of different lodges in Alaska, and ever since I saw on one of them the glaciers and the wildlife that you could see, I've said it would be fun to go on one. Well, Will found on Craigslist a lady that was selling her tickets so we got a good deal on the tickets. I had a blast! We got to see lots of animals and beautiful scenery. We saw orca whales, sea lions, birds, mountain goats, otters, puffins, seals. It was cool because on the cruise they had complimentary binoculars to use. We wished that we had bought a better camera to take with us for this day because there were so many awesome views. We saw lots of glaciers, and saw one of them close up. We saw a few chunks fall off and heard it crack. It was so loud! The wind coming off of it was very cold. this was our ship
I love the panoramic feature on my camera!

orca whales

can you see the seals?

just chillin'

stellar sea lions

I spy...mountain goats!

a cool glacier from afar

crazy hair

The main glacier we went to on the boat

After the cruise we were hungry so we decided to try some seafood at Terry's Fish house and got the combo platter fish and chips. It had cod, halibut, shrimp, etc. So yummy!

On our drive back north we fished No Name Creek. We had purchased a book, "Flyfisherman's Guide to Alaska," that we used to navigate and find good places to fish on our own. It's an excellent resource for self-guiding. We definitely recommend it. The bugs were really bad here so I was glad we had our bug headneats. The sunset was beautiful! looking very attractive in our bug headnets

We stayed Thursday at a B&B in Cooper Landing, "Kenai Lake Escape". The owner, Arden, was super nice and let us do some laundry. Her place was beautiful and very comfortable. It was definitely the best night's sleep and shower we had had all week.This is a picture of Kenai Lake

Sept. 10th, Friday morning Arden made us breakfast that was okay, but not super. She made budweiser pancakes (yucky) and sausage. We tried the milk but it tasted nasty so we had juice instead. The breakfast was the only bad thing about this place.

We drove our car to the Russian River and decided to fish it. We decided to pack our waders and hike up to the falls which was about 2 1/2 miles. There was a lady we met at the trail head that wanted to hike up with us. We saw the falls and then we put the waders on and fished down river to where we had parked. beautiful Russian River Falls

Highlights of this fishing day: Heidi caught several trout, one was good-sized. Will hooked up with a big fish, either a steelhead or a monster rainbow. Not sure because it snapped the leader and he didn't get to land it. He also hooked up with a sockeye salmon and I grabbed it and he took the picture of me with the fish. We fished egg patterns (beads) again and were successful. Everyone we talked to about this area said there were lots of bears around so make sure to take precautions, like making noise and talking to each other while hiking, and carrying bear spray. Both of which we did. While hiking we would talk to each other or just say "hey bear!" to make noise. We didn't see any bears which was a little disappointing on one hand, but on the other hand, I'm glad we didn't have any scary encounters with a bear either. We fished several hours and then were back at our car and we headed back to Anchorage for our final night's stay.

see the bear spray strapped on my backpack?
We had it close on hand because we were expecting to see bear based on what everyone had told us

a good rainbow trout, caught with a bead setup
Will hooked up with a sockeye salmon! They look so sweet and are so big and powerful!

We stayed at Alaska House of Jade B&B. It was a very nice room/suite that Will had booked for us and one of his other surprises is that this room had a jetted tub in it. The unfortunate thing is that since we got there so late (about 10 p.m.) the hostess said we shouldn't use the jets because it would be too loud for other guests already sleeping. We had to bring all our bags in from the car and pack everything up and shower so we didn't get to bed until midnight.

Sept. 11th Saturday morning we finished the last few packing things and had breakfast at the B&B. Then we were off to the airport. They had to search our carry-on because I had put some jam in there (not really thinking that it was not allowed on a carry on) so they security guy took the jam and had to throw it away. This was the only eventful thing that happened on our flight back home. We sat by a lady from ANC to SEA that was very interested in fly fishing and so we talked a lot about fishing with her. Our flight from Seattle to Boise was a little bit delayed, but it wasn't too bad and we weren't worried because it was the last leg of our flights so we weren't worried about missing any connecting flights.

I had a great trip. At first when I found out that our guide cancelled on us, I was pretty frustrated, but now I think the trip Will planned was even better than the one we were originally anticipating. We definitely got to see more of the area having our own car. Alaska is a beautiful state! The mountains are so big! Everywhere we drove the mountains and ocean were so big and pretty. Flying is pretty enjoyable to me for the most part. I enjoy meeting new people and seeing the land from the air. I like eating Seattle Airport food. Some things can be annoying like hot airplanes with hardly any air movement, delays, seats that don't recline. When we travel, it helps to remember the Seinfeld jokes about airplanes and airports. If you haven't seen it, you should.