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Published: August 15th 2021
20210814_114015
Tordrillo Mountain Range Day 5
166 miles
The day started with breakfast delivered to our room, but we didn’t realize we would have to cook it ourselves! Heading out in the chilly, raining morning (AGAIN), we followed the scenic route down Alaska Hwy 1 to go on our glacier cruise. Alaska Hwy 1 South runs by Turnagain Arm (named when Captain James Cook was forced to turn again in 1778 when he realized it was not the NW Passage like it was believed to be – that must have been a major disappointment). Beluga Point, one of the many pullouts where we stopped to make pictures, gave us a great surprise. There, we turned around and saw gorgeous, snow-covered Mt Spur and other mountains in the Tordrillo Mountain Range off in the distance. What a beautiful, majestic sight! The farther we drove, the worst the weather got, but we stopped many times anyway to make pictures and saw numerous glaciers on distant mountains.
Knowing it would be cold on the Portage Glacier Cruise, we dressed appropriately or so we thought (but we ARE from NC). The glacier was strikingly beautiful with its light, blue tint and it even had an ice
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mountains along the drive cave in it. Unfortunately, while we were there, it didn’t calve like we had wanted it to. We also got up close and personal with several icebergs floating right next to the boat. At the beginning of the cruise, the crew showed us how to use the life jackets in case of an emergency. We all laughed … we all knew that we’d all freeze to death before we’d have time to drown … so, why bother with life jackets and prolong our agony. We were told that at times the winds in that area get up to over 200 mph and it snows more than 100 FEET per year. Can you say cold??
On the trip back into Anchorage, the weather got sunny and warmed up to the 60s. Dorothy had another seizure today while we searched and searched for the Anchorage Weekend Outdoor Market. We found it but it wasn’t there anymore even though the spots were still labeled. However, we were persistent … after several more searches, we found the market in a mall parking lot about 15 mins away. It ended up looking nothing like the pictures and no one bought anything. So, we drove
back to Earthquake Point to get another view of Denali in the afternoon – Nope. As we were driving through a residential area on our way back, we had a moose sighting! Claire said, “TURN the car around; I just saw a Moose back there!” Yeah, right (we thought she was nuts), but as we turned back around, the moose walked into the middle of the road and was blocking traffic!!! ??? It was a BIG moose and it just took its time and sauntered down the street finally heading off down a side street and then disappeared. Only in Alaska.
After dinner, we headed back down the Turnagain Arm to see the famous bore tide. And what’s a bore tide, you might ask? Maybe you should look it up, because it’s really interesting. The evening forecast was for a surfable bore tide and we were excited to see it. The long wait with plenty of others was a bit boring and it was definitely not surfable like they said, but we were like little kids waiting for it to start. We also saw some whirlpools form in the water that looked as if they had plenty of fish
in them and hoped that we’d see some whales come out to eat, but no luck. All-in-all we had a real good day.
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