The Silver Salmon haven't quite arrived yet, we hear they ARE coming. There are a couple of areas in Alaska where there are so few fish they have closed the fishing for now. The fishermen fishing from boats have caught some further out in the 'narrows'. Gene goes over and watches what the fishermen that are catching from the bank, ARE catching. He goes almost everyday when I'm working, but they are snagging pink salmon, not catching them. He is waiting for the Silvers, as are a lot of people hanging around town. Saturday was the Womens Silver Salmon Derby, we don't think by the amount of people we seen around the dock, that it was much of a competition. We did hear that only 2 of the boats that went out, had caught a silvers. We saw the white board by the 'weigh in' station by the harbour, that the person who was in first place at that time, had a silver that weighed 17 lbs. We think once the silvers start coming in we 'should' catch lots of them, however, we're just not sure when that'll be. We were about 3 weeks too early. If we would have arrived around the middle of August it would have been a little better timing for the Silvers, since the Silver run is really late. Oh well, how were we to know?? We've had a good time though, even tho we haven't caught any fish yet.
We drive over towards Allison Point every evening, in hopes of seeing that mama grizzly and her 4 cubs, but so far no grizzlies. We've seen pictures of them though, one of the many photographers that hang around, showed us his pictures of them, and in one, the mama grizzly is standing .... great photos. Hopefully we'll see them before we leave Valdez. One evening we saw a bunch of black bears, at least 5, all in the same area, if they get too close to each other they chase each other off. Rather interesting to observe.
And we've seen oh so many eagles. We find a good place to watch wildlife and just sit. We have our binoculars and camera in hand where ever we go.
An accident in town at the harbour on Friday afternoon, a boat slid off a boat trailer, and trapped a man under it, he was flown by air to an Anchorage area hospital. The boat was still there when we went by Saturday. Here's a couple of pictures we took of it. Sure hope the man will recover.
On Tuesday this week we finally got to go to the Solomon Gulch Fish Hatchery. We had tried once before, but it was blocked off with a sign that said it was closed due to bears in the area.
But wow!! What an operation. Here's how its done....
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| Returning back to where they were born, the Salmon swim up the 'Fish ladders' from Prince William sound.... |
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| once there, there they corraled into a larger holding tank.... see the gate at the end, that gatewill then be raised to allow a certain amount of salmon thru to begin this amazing process... |
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| This is a type of fish wheel that as it turns scoops and deposits its load of salmon into the white plastic bins that once full, will be dumped onto 2 assembly lines, one line for the males and one for the females, where.... |
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| ....the males and females are separated, then arranged side by side, for easier and quicker processing. The workers harvest the females eggs and the sperm of the males......... |
those eggs and sperm are put into 5 gal buckets and moved into another building.
We took a hike up above the Civic Center and took some pictures of the view from the top of the town of Valdez and the Harbour.
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| See the big tanks across the bay thats oil in those...and the blue tanker there? Its one of about 30 tankers a month that must come in for oil, there's not any additional storage. They now have 2 big rigs that are kept close by, one at Valdez Harbor and one further out near where the Exxon Valdez hit a sandbar and spilled its oil, that are strictly for oil cleanup, IF it should ever happen again. because at the time of the Exxon Valdez incident they had no way to contain an oil spill, however since that time, they are VERY ready, should it happen again. Thats all those 2 rigs are for. |
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| Valdez Boat Harbour |
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| At the top of the trail about the town of Valdez |
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| This is a great picture of an 'adolescent' eagle....they don't get their black and white feathers until 4 or 5 years of age. |
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| This eagle was facing the wrong way, but thought it was so beautiful with wings spread out, it was an older adolescent, still had a few spots ...hard to see that in this picture.. |
And our drive thru Keystone Canyon...........................
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| Railroad Tunnel...........notice the sheer rock.. Its sooo beautiful in this canyon |
Keystone Canyon has several gorgeous waterfalls...
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| Horsetail Falls |
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| Bridal Veil Falls |
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| Strange way this water falls...looks crooked |
Then Sunday evening on our way back home, we drove by Allison point once again to see if any grizzlies were out....nope, but we found this bear crossing the road right in front of us...no one else around...(this was taken thru our dirty windshield.) He had just gone down to the water and was on his way back across the street to eat his dinner in the bushes.
and he was a very S L O W eater.. because we waited patiently
THEN..... he came back across the street after he was done, looking for more dinner....right in front of our truck. |
| He was over the embankment near our truck, when I went to the edge and looked over ....he was RIGHT THERE!! I hurried back inside the truck...then I took the rest of the shots within a close distance to the truck. |
he noticed me looking.........
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| then back across the street...with his dinner in his mouth |
Enjoy the pictures!!!
AND.....
P.S. WE FORGOT TO MENTION..... On Thursday August 9th at 8:43 A.M. Alaska Daylight Time, Gene and I felt an Earthquake. It was a 4.9, the epi center was about 50 miles from Valdez. It lasted about 10-15 seconds. It shook our trailer. pretty good, I was talking to my mother on the phone at the time, she said , "its just a bear outside, shaking your trailer ,".......weird feeling.
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