Monday, Aug. 11, 2014 – First Ride in Alaska! Drive to Seward

Up early, as we had to be back to the barn by 8:00, according to what the wrangler had told me. Arrived 10 minutes early, found a spot to park the RV, said my good-byes to Hubby (he couldn't come because his broken bones aren't quite healed enough, and four hours is just too long for him at this point) and went out to meet the group. It took longer than I expected to get going, after 9:00 by the time we pulled out from the barn, then got stuck several times by construction before making another stop to pick up three more horses. A helper then ponied those three down to a parking area at the (almost) end of the road, where we were then matched up with our horses. I got a pinto gelding named JJ (funny, since that's a nickname for me as well), and after EXTREMELY brief instructions (not enough for the novices, in my mind, but not my job), we headed down the now private section of the road. I had read somewhere that the trail would be through forests and would end up on a beach before heading to the barn, leading me to believe it would be a linear path. Not true on any count. We switch-backed dramatically down the gravel road, dropping 700 feet in about a quarter mile, ending up on the beach immediately. We then headed east (away from the direction of the barn), and went across the mud flats at low tide. We walked, and walked, and walked for about 3 miles or so, before coming to a river crossing, but because of all the rain they'd been having during the last week or so, the river was too high to cross, so we stopped for lunch (we had to bring our own). A half hour later, we mounted up, crossed over to above the high tide line, where, on the edge of some foliage, we headed back the same three plus miles. For the entire time, our wrangler, Mark, never stopped talking. Some people have done reviews where they praise him for being such a character, but I found his constant chatter pretty annoying after the first 90 minutes or so (sooner, actually : -). When I tried to move to the other end of the line to get away from it, I ended up next to another customer, also named Mark, who had the same affliction. I tried to drop behind the line to get away from it, but the helper insisted on being last, (though that wasn't the case coming out, just going back), so I never once got to enjoy a moment of Alaskan peace on the ride. I realize some people treat a ride as a social event, but I'm not one of them. I like to commune with nature, to get a sense of the history of the place, not to mention the beauty of the glaciers across the inlet, but all of that was overshadowed by the constant yammering of the two Marks (sigh). Oh, well, at least I still got to ride in Alaska! The first of at least two, and hopefully more rides over the next three weeks. I managed to force a couple of trots in, just to "catch up" and move around the others, but despite several inquiries about cantering, it was never in the cards. From the descriptions of all the rides I've read about in Alaska, this one seemed the most likely to have some canters, and the mud flats certainly lent themselves to it (wide open and flat), but no dice. Better luck next time. Finally, we got back to the road, climbed up the side of the hill, and said our goodbyes. I hitched a ride with customer Mark back to the barn, since we were already more than an hour behind schedule, knowing Hubby had been expecting me at 2:00 and it was now past 3:00, nearly 3:30 by the time we got through the construction and back to the barn. We got started almost immediately, as we had a four hour drive to Seward. In my original plan, we were going to drive to Seward tomorrow, and just to the 1.5 hour Dog Sled tour, but Hubby decided he wanted to do the All Alaska Tour, which starts at 11:00 and includes lunch, a trip to the Exit glacier, and several other activities, which meant we needed to get most, if not all, of the trip done tonight. We headed out immediately, made a stop at Sodoltna for gas and a couple of groceries, and kept going. As always, the trip back seemed shorter than the trip out, particularly along the section of road where we had already been, then turned south to Seward at the crossroad. The closer we got to Seward, the darker the clouds and the more the rain. We had escaped it during the ride (though I was fully prepared, wearing my long riding slicker), but now it was starting to come down in spades. When we were about 15 miles out of town, we started looking for someplace to spend the night, again trying to find someplace not directly on the road. We found the perfect spot, a trailhead for river fishing access that had an entrance that was all but blocked from the road by a row of trees. We settled in, again not bothering to put the slides out, had some dinner and snacks, watched a movie (I finally found the culprit that was making my DVD player not work, a bad cord! Fortunately, I had an extra.) and settled in for the night.