The Kenai Peninsula with Dad & Wayne

The silver Hyundai sparkled in the Alaskan mist. It rumbled a bit as it rolled into the dirty driveway, like a lawn-mover perpetually hijacked into a crude woodchipper. The Dad and Wayne had arrived to Talkeetna, Alaska, July 30, 2010 vis-a-vi their rental car courtesy of Cowboy Bob. They had come to pick me up, and civilize me.


I had bad news to tell them. Or rather, embarrassing news. Our expedition hadn't made it to the river after all -- the same river I had incessantly mentioned over the course of the prior seven months of preparation, research, practice and lust.

The two baby boomers carried that mischievous grin of a newly licensed teen on their faces. Here they were, in a new state, a wild state, devoid of wives, work, and the shackles of respectability. Clearly, they were having a great time.

It wasn't long before we had them deep in the muck of our ill-fated adventure, recounting the horrors and risk, the dastardly Mother Earth, who's ornery side had shown in the Alaskan tundra, her gentle embrace akin to a porcupine's rear end. We had jounced into the wild with unrealistic expectations. Arggg! It had been another learning experience after all!

So, with Talkeetna and clouds and cold and wet behind me, I was eager to board Tom & Wayne's Hyundai ark, and head south to the peninsula they call Kenai (kee-NYE). The drive takes a hairpin loop around Turnagain inlet before heading south and West. We stopped at the enormous "cocktail on the rocks" outside the tunnel to Whittier. It was cloudy, misty, and cold. In fact, based on our experience, the weather is always shittier in Whittier. Perenially, the weather akin to "bear scat". Moose pellets. Gringo cheese! Porpoise piss! Colder'n a witch's sandpaper tit!

It was our very first glacier of the trip and we commemorated it by demeaning its diminutive stature (it was about a mile away) and standing in Soviet formation on a submerged sidewalk shooting haphazard photos with our point'n'shoots and threatening to push each other overboard.

So, we headed deeper into the Kenai. The peninsula is a majestic and wonderful land, mountain ranges splice the damp tundra, and salmon charged rivers follow along the road so you can glimpse the satisfied fishermen taking their daily max. Arriving in Homer, we ate Chinook salmon lunch and headed to a rented yurt in Kachemak State Park, Tutka bay.

Dad and Wayne nimbly hopped into the tandem kayak for an evening float amongst the bald eagles and shrouded peaks. The tides can be very strong in this part of the world, so we kept a safe distance from the beach, as there were very few places to safely dock the boats. The coastline was a sharp, steep shale overgrown with lowland spruce and gurgling with hidden brooks flowing to the sea...to the sea. That night we ate a hearty dinner of Sandwich.

On the opposite side of the bay, there was a small lagoon housing a hatchery that we got a chance to check out the next morning. With fish leaping over the bow of our kayaks, and birds swirling above, and blue skies, it was sublime.