NORTH TO ALASKA 2025 - DAYS 30 & 31 - VALDEZ, GLACIER LAKE AND ALLISON POINT

Waking up in Valdez was a real treat with the view out of the front windshield. From what we gather, it's usually rainy or dreary or clouded. So we really hit it on two spectacular days in late May.

As I said in the last blog, the campground we were at was right on the edge of the water of the Bay for Valdez. This is part of Prince William Sound.

This large tank next to the campground we believe is one of the petroleum tanks for the incoming gasoline or diesel fuel. But we didn't smell anything...

The buildings for the campground are on the right. They house a large community area with a social space, five individual shower rooms each with their own bathroom. There was also a laundry area and some reading materials with a take it or leave it plan. I left a few things on the table of extra camping items. People could take whatever they could use.

Here's the link to the campground we were at. As I said in the last blog, they have a larger campground further in the middle of town that is more of just a gravel lot. The one that we chose was their "adults only" unit that was down along the edge of the water in a little secluded area. At $65 a night it was a little pricey for full hookups. But we preferred to spend a little more and just relax for a few days.

https://www.bearpawrvpark.com/

Lining the drive into the park are all of these beautiful wildflowers. I believe they are a form of wild roses? They smelled absolutely wonderful.

We took a walk down the road to a little place called Ruth Pond by their convention center.  We noticed these beautiful flowers in a planter that appear to have been there all winter. So obviously they are hardy enough to winter over, or maybe because it's such a rainforest area the temperatures don't get as drastically low? Valdez is the one ocean side port in Alaska that does not freeze over in the winter.

As the tide crept back in, our shoreline changed, and the waters were coming higher up to the rocks. You can see the line of the high tide in this picture below. 

I can't tell you how lovely it was to just look out the windows and see scenery like this anytime we glanced outside of the motorhome windows.

After our second night, it was time to move on. The cloudy skies had moved in in the rains had started again. 

We decided to start packing up and we were going to head out and check out two possibilities of places to camp just outside of Valdez. 

The first one was located out near the airport just before Glacier Lake. 

https://greely.armymwr.com/programs/valdez-campground

We drove on through. It was okay, and one loop did have electric sites. But there really weren't any beautiful scenic views or anything to enjoy. It would have been fine for camping if you were busy day-touring around the area. 

Then we drove further on up the road to a special place called Glacier Lake. 

The melting glacier waters create a milky greenish blue opaque look to the eye. It's from pulverized rock, suspended minerals and the glacial silt. So everything has this soft looking seafoamy greenish blue color.

This lake literally still has chunks of ice floating in it and pieces of icebergs from the glacier up around the corner.

I zoomed in the camera out to some of the hunks of glacier ice. The bright blue color is from being compressed and squeezed so tight during its movements many many many eons ago. It can absorb all colors except blue. So that is the color you see reflecting off of it. As pieces break off you can see the bright blue glacier color.

Local outfitters will rent you kayaks to come out here on the lake and paddle around amongst the iceberg. You can go up around the corner and paddle to the glacier. The water is somewhat dangerous because as tall as you see the mountains around you, that's how deep it goes underneath the water too. It's like floating around among the tops of mountains and underneath it goes down many hundreds, if not thousands of feet deep.

We watched three kayakers paddling around and finally come in out of the icy cold water. We have seen other videos of people paddling around here on a beautiful sunny day and it looks absolutely magical. But on this particular day with the rainy sleet coming down, I don't think theit paddle experience was quite as enjoyable.

We stood there for a while on the shore and literally took pictures of pieces of icebergs. Lol, what kind of tourists are we?

From there, we drove back out to the main road. Looping down a little further to the east is a road called Dayville Road. 

It goes out past where the original town of Valdez was. Back in 1964, there was a huge earthquake which created a monumental tsunami wave. It wiped out the entire town. It was a 9.2 on the Richter scale. 32 lives were lost that day in an instant. 

They decided to relocate the town in a different section of the bay. The remnants of the old town are out this direction. We drove past that area because there was some road construction going on and instead turned down Dayville Road to go to another interesting place.

This is the Solomon Gulch fish hatchery which is known for attracting sea lions, otters and even grizzly bears when the salmon are running.

Visitors can take a tour of the processing plant. We chose not to. But then also visitors can park in the adjoining parking lot to observe any wildlife that comes in by the mouth of the river. Although the Chinook salmon are supposed to be spawning at this time, we didn't see any action going on. 

The tide was in high and all we saw were silly seagulls... Flopping around and squawking and making a lot of noise. 

We met an interesting gentleman from Wisconsin who lives near Steve's brother in Neenah. It's funny how many people we are meeting from Wisconsin, once they see the license plate on our motorhome. Or when Steve is wearing his Green Bay Packers sweatshirt. 

We moved on from the fish hatchery further down the road towards the Fort Greeley Army base. They operate a campground right outside the entry to the base. It really is just rows of parking in a blacktop lot. But it's all along the water's edge and during the summer months I think this place is just packed. Especially during various fishing seasons.

https://greely.armymwr.com/programs/allison-point-campground

We found a great spot to park and paid at the self-service pay post. It was $25 without any hookups. But we decided because of the great view we would stay here.  The sun had peaked back out even though across the bay back at Valdez it was cloudy looking and rainy.

We were parked next to these bushes that were in full bloom. The scent was really heavenly. Especially in the damp weather, the aroma was even stronger.

On one side of the motorhome we had the waters of the bay, and on the other side we had a rising hill covered in pine trees.  It was quite a pretty spot, even if it was a black-topped parking lot.

We cooked up a chicken dinner, that I baked in the oven. We settled in for the night and the rain had started pitter-pattering on the roof. It really makes for a peaceful relaxing sleep with those sounds in the motorhome.

Here's the You Tube video link that goes along with the last couple days:

23 miles traveled today

3,732 miles so far