Thursday, June 30

Here we are at the beginning of the Mineral Creek trail.

This is about where Sharon decided she was not going any farther despite my urging that there truly was a water fall around the next bend.

Barb and I continued and there was a waterfall about 1/2 mile around the next bend!

A Harbor seal. There were several of them catching fish next to the fish hatchery

This guy had a nice sized salmon that he caught near where we were standing.

This sea gull was very interested in whatever the sea otter was eating.

A vacation is not complete without a picture of a sea gull.

Another sea otter

I could watch these guys swimming and floating on their backs all day long. Even if it is cold.

Rain, rain, go away! We are still in Valdez, and so far the best day was the day we got here. Yesterday wasn't too bad, just a little overcast, but today was just plain gloomy. Breakfast was interesting. I don't think Mr. Bichler realized that he was eating salmon in his eggs or else he was very, very hungry. I still haven't told him. Sharon doesn't want fancy breakfasts, she just wants eggs and bacon. (well she really wants cookie dough or ice cream but we haven't found a bed and breakfast that serves that!) We were told that a 7-8 ft. brown bear has been hanging around the fish hatchery and also some black bears with cubs but we didn't see them this morning. We dropped Andy off at the B & B and Sharon, Barb and I did the Mineral Creek Trail. We only did about 3 miles of the 12 mile loop but we did make it to the first water falls at Horse tail creek. It rained on the way back but not very hard. We ate at the Old Town Burgers again and have decided that they have the best curly fries ever. After lunch we picked up some snacks for the 5 hour ferry ride tomorrow and then drove back to see if we could see any bears. We didn't see any bears but we did get some great photos of several harbor seals and some sea otters. It has steadily gotten much colder all day but we still enjoyed watching the seals and otters. Tonight we are going to eat at a restaurant out near the Valdez airport.