Morning on Whiskey Gulch Beach provided good cloud free views of Iliamna and Redoubt Volcanoes. Not bad for a free camp spot. These are all active volcanoes and have erupted as recently as 2009.
That speck in the lower right corner is a sea otter floating by on its back.
I waved at "Bluie" as he pulled out. I think it's time for a VAN upgrade...
Not sure where to go, we ended up at the Islands and Oceans Visitor Center. We waddled around the exhibits and listened to a presentation about the bears of Katmai and Lake Clark National Parks. These are the huge, well fed brown bears you see on all the Alaska tourist info.
After the visitor's center, we made a quick stop for sandwich building materials at the grocery store. Orangie was in the parking lot. I think they are following us.
We drove to Homer Spit. A delicately thin, 4.5 mile long peninsula extending into Kachemak Bay. We made and ate lunch at Mariner Park and chuckled as Orangie pulled in behind us to find a camping spot.
Homer Spit is home to a mix between a thriving fishing industry and rows of tiny shacks selling mediocre marine mammal based art. It's hard to imagine how those places make any money. However, I did find one interesting thing in the back of a gift shop. A window. I noticed something and quickly shuttled Rachel out the door as unenthusiastically as I could.
We/I stared in awe at a pair of custom campers.
These campers belonged to John. He noticed us staring and asked where we were from. It turns out he is from Duluth Minnesota.
We talked to him...well, he talked to us, for over an hour. He had been everywhere by just about every mode of transportation. Sailing from Duluth to Florida and back. Then to San Diego and it sounded like the boat stayed in Seattle for a while before eventually making it to Homer Alaska. He originally planned to sail to New Zealand but never quite made it by boat. He's been there by plane twice and just about everywhere else. China, Baja, most of South America, all over Asia, western Europe and even to various camps on Mt. Everest just to name a few.
He has lived in Homer for 34 years but only one winter. His kids went to school for half of the year then they headed somewhere and "homeschooled" the kids during the winter. Very interesting guy with a couple of cool rigs. The samller one is a custom built cab on a 4X4 Fuso chassis. John is a pretty creative guy.
We eventually left John and walked around Homer Spit for a while. Looks like fishing was good for someone.
Those are all halibut except for the big Ling Cod on the end.
This is the famous Salty Dawg Saloon. Everything seems to be self declared famous or world famous in Alaska.
We left to find a camping spot out of town. We drove down East End Road toward what we heard was a traditional Russian village. The road turned to dirt and quickly degraded in quality.
Then The Hill began.
There are conflicting memories of The Hill. Rachel would use words such as, but not limited to terrifying, vertical, death defying, slippery, cliffs, and a "death ride that felt like being in a casket shot down a tube."
It was extremely steep with loose gravel and sheer cliffs, but not quite a "death casket ride" or whatever. This is the only picture of the road that we have. This is before it got steep.
No pictures were taken during the descent or ascent because my photographer was busy making permanent grip depressions on the VAN's arm rests.
We eventually made it to the beach and what turned out to be the private property of a Russian village.
There were remnants of a recent party scattered about the beach where we planned to camp. Based on the loud music in the distance, it sounded like another one was about to start around the point from us. We reluctantly drove up The Hill safely and back to Homer to camp.
We worked up an appetite from all that death we just defied so we decided to eat before camping. Rachel wanted to eat Surf and Turf somewhere which seemed like an easy thing to find on a peninsula with a fishing harbor. By the time we realized nowhere in town had it on the menu, the only restaurant open was "Happy Face Restaurant". They falsely advertised a nonexistent happy hour.
We camped on Homer Spit with plans to leave Homer in the morning.