Week Two At Klondike RV Park

Our first job was learning the reservation system on the computer and how to clean the bath/shower house. Our second job was to find a leak that showed up in the van. Al was wonderful crawling under the van a few times and bringing his mechanic friend overs to check it out.

As it turned out, a small fuel line developed a leak and will be fixed tomorrow.  So this meant not using the van except as our home (no problem). We took to the old "shoe leather" express.  

One of the places we visited was the Soldotna Visitor Center for the second time.  I had read about a special collection of ivory that was compiled by a man from Pennsylvania named Kunkle.  This peaked my interest since the name was familiar to me as a Pennsylvania Dutch name from the area where I was raised between Harrisburg and Hershey, PA.  The collection was in the Visitor Center and packed into the exhibit.  I did get a few shots.

Reading the article about the collection, I learned that many pieces came from First Nation people who are allowed to hunt the ivory bearing animals and carve it.

The Visitor Center sits on the Kenai River so we always take time to vist the beautiful water.

The steps are access points for fisherman.  A mother and her children were picnicking at another spot upstream.

Not far from the Visitor Center is the Soldotna Historical Society and Museum.  We went for the tour with some very knowledgable volunteers who took us into each building a shared the history of the area and time!

   Museum Visitor Center

    The schoolhouse.

                                

This model of a food cache doesn't show the actual height it would have been(much higher). Anything that could be frozen was kept here.  The poles that supported this cache are very small so a bear couldn't get a successful hold and eat all the winter store. Fascinating visit!

From the waters of the area, came Sockeye Salmon that we were privileged to share. A camper gave it to Al who shared some with us.  We quickly turned into a dinner to share.

Another footnote of our time here, is that we get to share our duties with two other hosts, John and Joann.  They have been here a few years already, so our a great help to us along with Al.

One of the things I love the most is the surprising visits with wildlife.  Here is a mother moose and her babies we saw along the road.  Most people really slow down and carefully pass the animals.

Some of the area around Soldotna looks like tundra (where we found the Kenai Lowland Caribou) in the foreground...

 

 And in the woods around the museum, we found these Prickly Roses blooming.  

And look what else I found at the Museum Natural Display getting a big bear hug from a Brownie!

          ALWAYS the best part of any picture for me!