DAY 46 (6/18): Back to Alaska's Interior (North to Nelchina)

We left Seward bright & early and headed to a Glacier nearby called "Exit Glacier" - it got it's name because of it being the "exit" route of the early explorers there.

We did the hike to the overlook. The interesting (and sad) thing about visiting this site is that they have identification markers to show how rapidly the glacier is melting due to climate change - a foot per day 😞

The hike was pretty easy and with nice views.  We saw a lot of people going up to the Harding Ice Fields, which would have been an 8.5 mile hike - we decided to skip that one and continue on our way up north.

 Dad had some fun with the antlers at the Visitor Center, and we saw a moose along the road!

From the Seward highway we drove through Anchorage to get to the Glenn Highway.  Found an AMAZING Hawaiian place in Anchorage (I suspected there might be good Hawaiian/Asian food here, but wow, were we surprised).  Hula Hands is owned by "Uncle Bill" who served in the military and ended up in Anchorage.  He also owns a German restaurant called West Berlin (he was stationed in Germany as well) in addition to the 3 locations of Hula Hands.

In Palmer, which is just a bit out of Anchorage we stopped at the Musk Ox Farm.  This is a non profit farm that raises this curiously cute large mammal that is closely related to a goat!  The musk ox sheds it's hair every spring, and this hair is harvested (combed) to create a fiber (yarn) called "Qiviut".  This is quite expensive stuff, as the ox only yields about 4 lbs of hair per year and the hair has to be sent to Peru to be processed (they deal with a lot of cashmere there and qiviut is similar to cashmere in that it does not have the barbs that wool has)...it is also warmer and lighter than cashmere.

Our tour guide Laurie is a first grade school teacher and enjoyed taking a pic with dad!

Our day is over when we finally reach camp (Slide Mountain RV Park).  We had a hankering for some steak, so when we stocked up on groceries in Palmer we picked up a juicy rib eye!

GOOD NIGHT!

Miles driven: 279 (Seward to Nelchina)