RVing in Alaska--Day 4 Exit Glacier

The day dawned gray and rainy again....We decided to do the Exit Glacier hike...Milemarker 3 on the Seward Highway. After arriving in the parking lot and checking out the small Exit Glacier Visitor Center, there are two hikes you can take to see the glacier. One is a one mile hike, an easy loop to view the valley glacier, and the other one is a 1.25 moderately strenuous hike to get closer to the glacier. We chose the 1.25 hike, we really didn't realize there was an easier loop. The first 1/4 of the hike is paved and fully accessible. At first, Sparky was just going to do the hike by herself, but Eldy wanted to try and we went together! This is a guy who just had quadruple bypass in February and it's only 4 months later! He was careful to take his time and stop along the way often.


The views were spectacular! But the glacier is a small one, and of course, has shrunk over the years. They keep moving the people barriers further and further back...

 Eldy did a really great job, and finally, we were at the foot of the glacier...

 Sparky was really proud of him for completing this hike! And he felt fine.....

But he was tired on the way back!

Sparky decided she wasn't done hiking yet...She wanted to see snow! The Harding Ice Field hike was a LONG hike and Sparky wanted to do just part of it, hoping to hike 4.1 miles (ONE WAY) to a ridge where another hiker said you could scoop up snow on the trail. Sparky wanted to make a snowball, so off she went, leaving Eldy in the comforts of the motorhome while she went hiking. Lots of people on the trails today and the reports of some baby bear and mama bear sitings only stoked Sparky more. So off she went....she figured an hour up and that would be it...And it was.....a VERY strenuous hike. Now Sparky was in relatively good shape, biking 12-15 miles three times a week back home, but hiking up mountains is totally different!

After an hour of huffing and puffing, and seeing no snow, no baby bears or mama bear, (which is a good thing, says a worried E.) and the ridge was still very far away, Sparky decided to turn around and come back down. Her feet were so swollen, she kicked off her shoes and stuck them in a stream running down the mountainside, forgetting this was GLACIAL water! BRRRRRRRR! But it sure felt good!

The last thing she saw today was this steller jay, hopping around in the parking lot. He was happy! Nice to see some different birds here in Alaska.

After our hikes today, we were tired! Time to head "home"....to a new campground called Stoney Brook RV park. Stoney Brook is on the outskirts of Seward, in a residential section back in the woods, nestled up against the mountains. Head south on Seward Highway, turn left on Stoney Creek Avenue (mile 6.3) over the railroad tracks, right on Bruno, left on Trail Rd., follow Trail around till you reach Leslie Place. They had wifi (very very slow), the bathrooms were really in need of updating, and they had a system of reservations where if you didn't call in ahead and happened to come in when no one was in the office, (office hours seemed to be very irregular and sporadic) you were to come in and look at the chart on the office window to see which spots were taken. The only problem with that was, they didn't update the site reservations. They also didn't seem to care about maintaining the sites and keeping them free of high grasses. Guess things are just a little more casual in Alaska....We found our spot, left our water hoses to claim our spot...took our rig and headed out for supper, and when we came back, somebody was pulling into our spot! We quickly reclaimed it. BUT---the views were AMAZING!!!! We stayed there for two nights....

Next on our Alaskan adventures, we are going on a 7.5 hour cruise in the Kenai Peninsula! See you on the boat!