Kodiak Part 2

Balalaika Players.

Bed Race.

Baskets.
Baskets--plus a porcelain doll with a great Alutiiq cosume on.

1920's parlor and kitch.
Basket.

Rainy, rainy, rainy day today!

Our first stop after breakfast was the Baranov Museum. We saw the Russian Balalaika Players give a performance of authentic Russian folk music

The museum has exhibits from the Russian period, a kitchen filled with early 20th century items and an incredible display of baskets from the Koniag period. It is in the original fur warehouse built by Alexander Baranov.

As we walked out of the museum, we saw the finish of the Crab Fest Bed Race in the rain.

Then we went over to the visitor's center for the Kodiak National Wildlife Refuge. The Kodiak Island Drummers (K.I.D.) a youth percussion group, played. It was fantastic. The director gets a lot out of the kids.

I will try to post pics of K.I.D. tomorrow. They are on the other camera.

Kodiak

Not too many pictures yesterday--it rained all day.

Yesterday at Crab Fest I took pics of a guy mending fishing nets on the dock and the start of the 5 mile kayak race around Near Island.

Friday, when we were at Crab Fest, I went up to the booth for the Kodiak Arts Council to see if they had any ideas about purchasing an Alutiiq doll. I got to talking with the woman there and it turned out that she was a student teacher in 1973 at Denali Elementary School in Fairbanks when Mom was principal. We had a nice chat about mom, then I sent Lynn to the motorhome to get a copy of my book of Mom's stories to loan her---the last third is stories by women who taught with Mom. I picked it up yesterday. She enjoyed the memories.

I talked to a woman at the craft market who noticed my Gonzaga shirt. She is a UW grad and fan, but also follows Gonzaga.

We drove out toward our campground and stopped at Fort Abercrombie Sate Historic Park. The museum wasn't open, but the view is fantastic. We saw a bald eagle preening itself on a rock. Could see it well with the naked eye, and better with the viewers there. Then we drove to the end of the road and walked through the trees to the beach there very nice, but still rainy.

At Crab Fest, I bought some foil packs of stew beef from cattle raised on Sitkatini Island , south of Kodiak. It was fully cooked, so I cooked onions, celery, carrots and potatoes in beef broth until done, added the packet of beef and cooked a little more--beef stew in under half an hour from start to finish---very nice for a rainy day.

It is rainy again today. We have a couple of inside things to do today.

Ferry To Kodiak

The ferry was half an hour late leaving Homer.

Sunset was gorgeous.

Nice stateroom on the ferry--we got the one for four so that we would have full facilities. So there was plenty of room, hot showers in the morning etc.

Our next door neighbor spotted my Gonzaga sweatshirt. He said his wife went to Gonzaga for a special program for a couple of years.

Arrived in Kodiak at 8:00 AM Friday, but it took 2 and a half hours to unload the vehicles. We were the last ones off---even the rig bringing out the dumpster got off before Lynn drove our RV off. I was waiting for him--it was really cold. They load and unload on a turntable which is a little scary to be riding on in an RV.

We went to breakfast at King's Diner. As left, a guy spotted my Zag sweatshirt and started a conversation. Apparently a local young man went there and graduated recently. He is now in Iraq. I did not catch the name. The guys said they had not heard of Gonzaga before this kid went there, but they knew all about it and the basketball team now.

We arrived on the second day of Crabfest. Booths--mostly food--were set up on the dock.

St. Paul Harbor--one of 2 main harbors for fishing vessels.

Russian Orthodox Church of Kodiak.

We went to the Alutiiq Musem. It was really nice.

Then we went out to our RV site and did the laundry--Rusty had jumped on the bed and made it filthy, so we had to do the sheets, blankets, mattress cover--everything.

We missed the Crabfest parade. We thought it was at 9 and we didn't wake up until a quarter of. Then we found out it was at 10--so we heard it on the radio. Not quite the same!!! :-)

We are at a coffee shop that has wireless.

Homer

Sitting at the ferry dock in Homer waiting to load. Thought I'd post today's pictures as I don't know when we will have internet again.

Gorgeous views of the Kenai Mountains across Kachemak Bay.

Harrington House at Pratt Museum in Homer.. Enjoyed the museum--saw three Inupiaq dolls by famous dollmaker Dolly Spencer. What a treat! My Gonzaga sweatshirt caught attention. An employee asked if I lived in Washington, and I said Sandpoint, ID. He used to live in Wallace. Then downstairs a couple asked if we were from Washington, and told me they were from Caldwell, Idaho. They had also lived in Fairbanks, here I grew up. It's a small world.

Cow and calf moose browsing in vacant lot on Main St. in Homer. They usually hang out across the street in a slough behind the Alaska Wildlife Refuse Visitor Center.

Ninilchik to Homer 2:30

We drove into Homer and went to the ferry office which was not open, so we called their reservation number to make sure the schedule had not changed. Then we took a drive out the East End Rd. and got beautiful views of the Kenai Mountains across Kachemak Bay.

We drove to our campground north of Homer and checked in. Then we went to a Russian village nearby--Nikolaevsk. It was settled by Russian Church Old Believers (or Old Rites) in 1947. They had escaped Russia in 1917, and lived in Oregon for a while. We had lunch at the Samovar Cafe. Wonderful food! Piroshkis, borscht, Pel'meni (dumplings), polish sausage with sauerkraut, and cream puffs for dessert. Took pictures of their Orthodox/Old Rites church.

In Homer we visited NOMAR, a locally owned business which manufactures outdoor gear and a special bag used by fisherman in Bristol Bay. Really interesting!

We are now at the campground getting ready to fix dinner. Tomorrow we check out the Pratt Museum, and local historic buildings. We take the ferry to Kodiak at 10:30 PM.

Ninilchik to Homer

We went to see the Russian Orthodox Church in Ninilchik--I had seen it probably 50 years ago, and then again more recently. Took pictures of volcanoes Iliamna and Redoubt across the Cook inlet
Here is Rusty, doing his lap dog imitation again.

The fisher people were happy--they caught their limits--but would have liked to get some bigger fish. Lynn shipped 29 pounds of halibut home and we have a couple of pounds in the freezer in the motor home.

More pics from today in next post.

New Blog!

My password did not work on my original blog, so after a frustrating night trying to change it I created a new blog.

Spent a nice day here in Ninilchik while the others fished. We leave today for Homer.