We started our day's walking by heading back to the Library and Museum. We enjoyed the exhibits and spent a couple of hours here then "stretched our legs" and walked to one of the downtown restaurants for some Chowder. ("New England Style") Well lets just say that we New Englanders can make it better. We did walk up and down the streets and photographed all of the Murals we could find. And we had a handy guide card (with 16 locations)from the library to help us, but there were a few more too. I had found six and photographed them yesterday. We must have put on a few miles with this task for when we returned to the camper our legs were quite tired.
After Lunch we returned to the Library Community Room for a 25 minute video about the 1964 Earthquake and subsequent Seismic (Tsunami) waves. It included recollections of survivors and was followed by a 4 minute video of the school children's artwork project that they created 2 weeks after the event. It was very heart-breaking. We learned that 12 died as a result of the disaster and it devastated the Port and Rail system at that time.
Our camper on the town beach campground is right in front of some of the remaining posts from the dock structures that were destroyed at that time. The Earthquake was one of the largest ever recorded in the USA, 9.2 on the Reichter Scale and lasted well over 4 minutes. It produced several great tidal waves, the first of which hit the town with in minutes as sections of the bay floor slid from the opposing shore and created a huge swell 20 to 30 foot high. Then all the water drained from the bay and headed back to the ocean! 25 minutes after the quake and this huge wave returned with a crest wave that was estimated at over 100 feet high and racing towards the town at 100 miles an hour. There were huge fires that resulted from the rupture of the towering oil storage tanks and oil tankard train cars that were loaded along the shore.
Today the harbor supports large cruise ships, numerous fishing vessels, marine tours and more.
We finished our walking by heading all the way back down to the boat docks and checked out the latest fish that came in from the charter vessels. There are several seafood markets and processors and we picked up a package of cod and one of halibut. They were caught within the past week or so and frozen. We shall try the halibut tomorrow. We may want to go back for more as the price was great!
If you get a chance go to Exit Glacier it's a short ride away and a terrific hike to within a few yards of the glacier itself. We stayed in Seward at the USAF famcamp just a short distance from your location. Neat town! When we were there we also had cool and rainy days.
ReplyDeleteWe were waiting for the sun to shine. And the weather is supposed to improve a bit tomorrow. We plan on heading to Exit Glacier first thing in the morning. (after chores) We agree, Seward is a great city! We cooked up some great halibut for supper and I made a nice chowder with the leftovers for tomorrow. That ought to take the chill off. We walked all the way from our camp on the shore to the visitors' center for the last pic / mural today. The Kenai Fijords NP mural. We stopped at their building in the fishing pier and got my NP stamp!
Delete