Back to Anchorage

Today I went up the coast to Kenai and back to Anchorage. I hoped to get a better view of the active volcano, but even though the road hugs the coast, the trees are dense and there is a lot of development. 

I ended up going to Captain Cook State recreation area (one place he landed) which was the end of the road, and there was a family with boogie boards on what passes for a beach around here.

Kenai was well worth seeing. It had a Russian Orthodox Church and chapel, and a number of historic buildings dating from Russian times and from early American settlement. The local visitors centre had a museum attached. Although the museum was very small - basically one room - it had an amazing collection including explanations of the three different groups of indigenous peoples, many well selected artifacts, including an incredibly intricate sea grass basket and model seal skin kayaks and dolls from each of the groups in their traditional costume, a model oil rig, and a first edition print of Cook's voyage.

The road back to Anchorage was still full of roadworks, so I didn't stop much. The shot of the bay was taken while I was waiting for 20 minutes at one set of roadworks.