Kodiak island is the second larges island in the US, roughly the size of Connecticut. About 6,000 people live in the city limits of Kodiak and about another 7,000 on the island. About 3,500 brown bears live on the island, most of them in the Kodiak National Wildlife Range.
At breakfast I heard people say they saw otters so I scanned the shore line with my binoculars and didn’t see any otters. But I did see a little pier full of seals taking a break. After our walk around town I check out the pier again and it was still full of seals.
We took a shuttle bus into town and wandered around. It is not nearly as much a tourist town as some of the ones we have stopped at.
We visited a Russian Orthodox church which is the result of Alaska being part of Russia until 1867 when the US bought Alaska from Russia for $7 million dollars. At the time it was called Seward’s folly. As it turns out it was a great purchase. The church is active with about 100 members on any given Sunday.
After wondering around town for a while and eating lunch at a Japanese sushi restaurant (a bit of a surprise in Kodiak) we visited the Baranov museum which documents the history of the town from its native roots to the Russian influence to the fur trade to the salmon industry. One of the exhibits had artifacts from a whaling ship called the Carolyn Frances. I’m pretty sure that Caroline (Carolyn) would not have done well on a whaling ship.
We have noticed all over Alaska the amount of flowers and other plants that flourish. In spite of the short growing season, the flowers are beautiful. That is surely the result of the large amounts of daylight they get and the abundant moisture from the rain. Some of our stops were considered temperate rain forests. Here are a couple of flower pictures from Kodiak.
The flowers also help brighten the day even though the weather may not be so bright. All in all, a very nice day.