Seldovia Is For Sale!!

Praying for no rain and three seats on the boat, we went down to the spit and found Rainbow Tours where we did NOT have reservations.  Good luck for us, they had available seats and we were off to Seldovia!!  But not before admiring this beautiful motorhome.  It's a real one alright, has wheels and everything!!  I think this is one for Nick's blog.

They said just go down to Dock 2 and we'd see the boat.  They were sooooo right.  Our boat was the Rainbow Connection, equipped with an all female captain and crew!!

This harbor looks a little better than the one at Ninilchik ... at least the boats can get out!!  We left at low tide and returned at high tide ... I'm sure there was at least a 10 foot water depth change.

But first, a tour of Gull Island where the locals are raising families right and left!!  

Nests are everywhere, with all the birds fighting over them!!!  Seagulls, kittiwakes, oyster catchers and many more.

These guys were picking up bits of grass and seaweed to enhance their front porch.

For a moment, I thought I was in the Pirates of the Caribbean movie ... here's Skull Rock!!!

Every island had some arches to be photographed.

In the 40's and 50's, you could come here, stop at an island, build a small house ... and voila!! you own the island.  How cool is that???

                                     

There were a few puffins, but they spend so much time underwater, it was hard to get a picture.

Lots of otters on this trip ... the moms were all holding their babies tight to their chest.  The babies are as big as the moms!!!

This guy kept raising up to see what the fuss was.  With a flip of their tail, they disappeared underwater.

Just inside the Seldovia harbor was a raft of otters.  Like in Monterey California, they wrap themselves in the kelp to relax and snooze.

The boat edged a little too close for comfort here, so mom and baby headed down!!

Finally we docked and walked up the gangplank.

Several fishermen were cleaning their morning catch of rock cod and salmon.  The heads are kept for bait ... everything else except the fillets, goes to the waiting gulls.

As we headed through town on Main Street, we noticed most of the buildings were for sale.  I'm not sure if this is a sign of the times or not.  I might be interested, but am pretty leery of the property.  When the 1964 earthquake hit, the boardwalk and surrounding houses, dropped four feet, and flooded the buildings.  The mountain behind the town was subsequently dynamited to provide fill for the harbor, as seen here.  In the right earthquake conditions, this fill could become quicksand, like in San Francisco.  The building on the right with room for a store below, living quarters above, is going for $350K.  The hotel in the center would make a great house!!!

Remember I said there were some free thinkers here??  Patty's favorite was Big Butt Bakery.  We stopped in to check out the goodies, but left without big butts.

The Persevering Ofishoffal Ripe Rev. Kevin of the Church of Cod, really wasn't in business here.

We talked to the local residents, hanging out six feet above the street level, about the best place to eat.

The Tidepool it was ... however the service here was nothing to be remembered.  Granted, they were VERY busy ... but I had to scrounge around to find a third chair for our table.  15 minutes to get menus, 45 minutes to order, the two waitresses just couldn't keep up.  The food was excellent, except my "hoagie roll" fish sandwich came out on a hamburger bun, which is how Patty had ordered hers.  Patty and Dan's spicy rock cod chowder came out loaded with cod ... mine had one small piece.  Two pieces, when I dropped part of my sandwich in the soup.  Then we hear "out of chowder", which probably explains why I had 90% tasty milk.

Around the town were these amazing chainsaw statues ... I thought this one was cute until I read the title!!

This is how the original town looked ... these buildings around the back were not as damaged by the earthquake and were salvaged.  There are no roads in or out here, access is only by water or plane.  You can bring your car here on the ferry, but must leave the same way.  Tourism is down and fisherman don't buy many chatchkies!!!  I did purchase a couple of sand dollars from Keeper, a nice young kid accepting donations for saving wildlife.  

The town square, maybe 20' wide and 75' long, was full of more beautiful Alaska flowers.  This was the only orange one in the neighborhood.

On the way back, our slower Rainbow Connection was passed by every boat on the water ... this Commercial Bay Explorer had a load of fish on back, some of which they were cleaning ... this explains the huge numbers of seagulls following closely behind.

At the end of the Homer Spit are the condos ... this is the entire lot of them.  I'm too afraid of earthquakes and tsunamis ... the only place for these to go is under water!!!

Back to the harbor at the end of another fantastic day in Alaska!!!