A Day To Explore

We have passed this little museum complex in Cooper Landing on the Sterling Highway many times on our way to Soldotna and each time I have mentioned to Bob that I would like to stop and check it out. Sunday was another dark, rainy day and we had nothing on the agenda at Spruce Moose, so we decided to do a little exploring on the Sterling Highway. Our destination was the museum and the Skilak Wildlife Recreation Area. The museum is located in the old pioneer school and post office buildings at mile post 48.7. It is easy to miss the turn into it without the little sign they have on the edge of the road. It is a very fascinating complex. We started out in the old post office building which is full of all types of memorabilia from the early 1800's. There are pictures of the early settlers, trunks, etc. After browsing in there for awhile, we headed over to the other building where the fully articulating brown bear skeleton is housed. As you enter the door, the display facing you is the skeleton of an 800 pound , 20 year old brown/grizzly bear killed by a collision with a pick up. As a project in 2002-2003, the students from the Cooper Landing Elementary School cleaned the flesh off the bones, wrote brochures about bear anatomy and put the skeleton back together. It must have been quite a project and it is quite an amazing display. They have a collage of pictures of the students that took park in the project and a copy of the book that they put together with the anatomy of the bear, diet, bear safety, etc. The display is named Dead Bear Walking. According to the volunteer we spoke with, they estimated that the bear would have reached close to 1000 pounds, prior to hybernation, if it had not been hit by the truck. What a fantastic job they did on the project. It is well worth stopping by the museum - just to see the quality of work they put into the display.
After leaving the museum, we headed south on the Sterling Highway to the Skilak Wildlife Recreation Area - in hopes of seeing moose or bear or any type of wild animal. This is suppose to be a prime bear habitat and we were ready for a bear encounter. After all, everyone who has stayed at the chalets, has seen bear and moose and eagles in the wilderness. When we go out - we see beautiful scenery, but no animals. The Skilak Lake Loop Road is 19 miles of gravel road, no hunting allowed, so what better place to see some wild life. Well par for the course, we bumped along the wash board road and the only wild life we encountered was one squirrel that crossed the road in front of us and two teeny, tiny ducks on Rock Lake that were catching mosquitoes or small insects that were hovering over the lake. They were so small, we could barely see them. Can you believe it!! We are going to be the only people who have been in Alaska for close to 5 months who have not had a moose, bear, bald eagle, etc encounter of some sort. How embarrassing. Oh well, we have had lots of birds visiting the feeders at the 5th wheel and we do still have the raven "kids" stop to visit us once in a while and we have the bunnies who enjoy the gardens. On our way back thru Cooper Landing, we turned off Sterling Highway onto Snug Harbor Road which runs on the south side of Kenai Lake. We have always wondered about this road and our curiosity got the better of us today. We found that it becomes a gravel road shortly after leaving an area of cabins on the lake. It parallels the lake for several miles and eventually ends at a dead end. We did notice, with some concern, that the leaves on the aspen and birch trees are already starting to turn yellow and it is only the middle of August. This is not a good sign! I have already noticed that the flowers in our gardens around the chalets have reached their peak and are starting to die back. The columbine is finished and the daisies are going to seed. I have been transplanting plants to other areas from the big flower garden at Wild Rose - in hopes that they can get established before the cold weather sets in. Bob has already been warning Gary that when the first snow flake falls - we are out of here!! Who would have thought that we would be looking at the end of summer already. Actually, I don't even remember there being a summer!