Seward

From Anchorage to Turnagain Arm

Early in the morning, after having had the usual "breakfast in the room", we make a digression to Wasilla, where we have to buy some gadgets at the Iditarod Centre. The morning is quite cloudy, we cross Anchorage for necessary supplies and continue towards the Kenai Peninsula. Although it is still a liveable city, after ten days of country life, the idea of ​​seeing traffic lights and urban traffic immediately leads us to regret the desolate lands of Interior that we have left. The Hwys are always three if not four lanes even in the central area. The downtown may be small, but the size of the city is enormous compared to the population that lives there. A typically American concept of the city but enriched by the Alaskan love of not stepping on neighbors' toes.

We take the Seward Hwy to leave the city and go along the Turnagain Arm on the north side. Here we have a whole series of points where we can make stops, since it is an area where the arm of the sea that penetrates for a few dozen kilometers creates splendid landscapes. We meet the first of them at Potter Marsh, a swamp 16 km from Anchorage where large colonies of aquatic birds live, easily visited via hundreds of meters of walkways. An explanatory panel explains how frogs living in ponds have been able to modify their internal structure.

Whittier and the Anton Anderson Tunnel

Along the coast road we stop briefly at the Chugach State Park Headquarters, where there is a snowplow train that was used during the harsh winter seasons to keep the railway between Seward and Anchorage clear. Let's make a couple more stops on the Turnagain Arm. There isn't much to see as the further inland we go, the darker the sky becomes. We can only imagine the magnificence of what is in front of us. However, we have another card to play in two days when we return from this obligatory route.

Let's ignore, at least for the moment, the detour that leads to the Kenai, to better see the Portage glaciers which descend almost to sea level or remain hanging as if on a perch. We can barely imagine what it would all look like on a sunny day. We decide to pay a visit to Whittier, attracted more by its strangeness than by the beauties that can be admired there.

In reality it is not as bad as it might seem, of course the construction of a small village in such a place could only have to comply with the needs of military secrecy. It is located 18 km from the Seward Hwy. Perhaps the village with the worst weather in Alaska and there is no denying it since today it gets worse to the point of bordering on intense rain, so much so that for the first time we have to take out the umbrellas that have remained dry until now. And it is probably due to its frequent fogs that the American army placed an important base in this bay during the Second World War. The location protected by the mountains and the ice-free Prince William Sound throughout the year did the rest.

It is connected to the rest of the country by land by a long 2.7 mi. tunnel, theAnton Anderson Tunnel, built on the railway line. In fact, trains and cars pass on the same street in alternate directions. When we arrive the wait is half an hour, but we are not demoralized either by the wait or by the rain. It so happens that in the morning in a supermarket in Anchorage we caught a slice of salmon and the opportunity was right for us to kill time by creating tasty sandwiches. When they give us the all clear at 12.30, lunch is already over and we are ready to go and have a coffee in the "centre" of Whittier. The passage through the tunnel costs $12 return and is not very suitable for those who suffer from claustrophobia. It was built to allow trains to pass through it and its dimensions have not changed since it was also opened to vehicular traffic.

Whittier and Begich Tower

However, there is a pleasant marina in an area where some shops are crowded, called the Triangle, and there is at least something to see. The hinterland, however, is truly squalid: there is a large barracks where around 80% of the locals currently live, Begich Tower, a 14-story building. Perhaps the only residential building we saw on the whole trip.

When it was a military citadel the population of Whittier lived in a single building, the Buckner Building, now abandoned. The rest are warehouses or small fish processing factories, all amidst the wreckage of abandoned vehicles. There is probably more to see as curiosities than as real tourist attractions. If the day was beautiful you could instead admire the waterfalls that descend from the glaciers looming above the town. All immersed in a deep green, and it couldn't be otherwise, given the abundant rainfall that occurs throughout the year.

Hundreds of dead trees stand nearby. It is a phenomenon that is often seen and always reminds us of the 1964 earthquake, when large wooded areas were flooded by the salt water of the tsunami.

In the rain towards Seward

Under pouring rain we return to the Seward Hwy to begin the wet exploration of the Kenai Peninsula. We ignore the detour to Hope which we will visit the day after tomorrow and head south. We go directly to our destination with two short stops in places where, despite the rain, the landscape is splendid. At 4.30pm we reach our destination in Seward and we work to get hotel accommodation.

Next we visit the Alaska Sealife Center, which helps us understand the life of fauna and flora that inhabit the shores of the Sound. Here too the information is for a non-scientific audience and tends to give an explanation to everyone's simple whys, thus revealing a mass of hitherto unknown notions. To better understand what we have just seen, let's continue with dinner with a mix of fish. Final walk to the Small Boat Harbour, the small port where the fishing boats are also docked. Around it are the fish processing factories.

We will have to reserve the Mt. Marathon for a future occasion, in fact on the mountain overlooking Seward it rained all day and thinking of reaching it with a walk was not very healthy. Along the steepest route, a race with a 3 mi circular route takes place every July. in which due to the roughness of the terrain accompanied by the emphasis of the competitors it seems that the primary medicine center has a lot of work.

Seward it is perhaps the most beautiful village encountered so far. It has an urban plan, has a beautiful wooden promenade overlooking the sea and has a first-rate maritime museum. It is also the docking point for cruise ships that depart from the USA, go up the Pacific coast in the Inside Passage and disembark here to take wealthy clients on the train that will take them north, flying as far as Fairbanks via Anchorage and Denali.