Day 36: Anchorage, Alaska

We started this free day with a visit to the Potter Marsh Wildlife Boardwalk, south of Anchorage on the Seward Highway.  This marsh was unintentionally created during construction of the Alaska Railroad in 1916 and 1917 when the railroad track embankment impounded several creeks and limited the tides.

Potter Marsh Wildlife Boardwalk

The boardwalk is about  ½ mile long, and it is elevated on stilts over the marsh.  We saw many ducks, seagulls, dowitchers, and other birds we could not identify, plus a muskrat (thanks to Nancy and Dan who told us what it was – our first thought was that it was a regular rat, but we had never heard of a rat diving underwater  and staying there).  There was also a creek that came in from the Turnagain Arm of the Cook Inlet which had a good number of large pink (hump) salmon

We also visited the Alaska Zoo.  While it has been many years since we have been to a zoo, we were impressed with this small zoo.  The animals’ environments were very natural, and they had a lot of space to move around.  The zoo was in a wooded area, and walking the paths was pleasant.  Each “cage” had a history of the individual animals which told you where they came from – most were orphaned or sustained injuries that prohibited them from being returned to the wild.

My favorite animals were the polar bears, which came out to drink and seemed to be communicating with each other.  We also liked the snow leopard, and the wolf pack.  The wolf pack was made up of 6 siblings, and I guess we liked them as we could see how our husky is a wolf descendant.  We also got to see the Dall sheep up close unlike in Denali National Park where they were high up on a mountain.

Polar Bears

Dall Sheep

From there we went by Ship Creek.  This is a local spot near downtown Anchorage for salmon fishing.  The creek runs through the port and along the ocean water of Cook Inlet.  There is a large pedestrian bridge, and we did see some large migrating salmon.  There were several anglers downstream fishing with reels and rods, but we didn’t observe any salmon being caught.

Fishing

Pedestrian Bridge

We ended the day by visiting Earthquake Park.  This park is an interpretive park commemorating the 1964 Good Friday earthquake which devastated the Anchorage and South Central Alaska area.  That quake was the largest recorded in North America and lasted 4 minutes.  This area of Anchorage had homes before this 9.2 magnitude earthquake hit.  Besides the massive damage in Anchorage and other parts of Alaska, the quake caused an entire neighborhood of approximately 70 homes in the park area to collapse into Cook Inlet.  Although time has erased a lot of the destruction, you can still see the dramatic cliff drop-offs where the homes slid into the Inlet plus some concrete pilings still remain.  This quake also created a Tsunami which devastated low lying areas such as Kodiak, Seward, and Valdez.  We also walked several miles along the Tony Knowles Coastal Trail which cuts through Earthquake Park.

Cook Inlet

Cook Inlet

We thoroughly enjoyed this relaxing and gorgeous free day with temperatures in the 60’s and lots of sunshine.  We got a lot of exercise too!


Submitted by Rig #17

Robbie, Arnie and Kaycee