A final thought on Homer - Saw a bumper sticker in town that describes Homer during the summer tourist season “Homer Alaska, a quaint drinking village with a fishing problem."

We are now in Soldotna, a small town inland on the Kenai Peninsula. Soldotna is famous for salmon fishing. The record salmon was caught right here, it weighed 97 pounds! So the reds are running right now and Alaskans are wading the Kenai to fish with huge nets. They just stick the HUGE net in the water and wait for fish to stumble into it. They limit out in one day and then go home to process their fish. This form of “fishing” is covered under Alaska’s subsistence laws. If you are an Alaskan you get a subsistence permit to hunt and fish for your family. Only permanent Alaskans residents can do this.

We went to the Soldotna Progress Day Parade yesterday. It was so much fun, a real hometown America parade. The American Legion and the VFW had patriotic floats, several churches had floats, the Boy Scouts marched, there were several ladies driving pink golf carts tricked out for Breast Cancer Awareness, there was a baton twirling club, a large Dachshund Club (wienie dogs in Alaska?) Kenai’s rodeo Queen rode in the parade, a man carried an American flag with 49 stars walked in the parade and talked about protecting our freedom, there were loads of patriotic signs, support the troops sign, religious signs, several politicians running for the senate and governor were in the parade tossing candy and passing out brochures. Loved the conservative values represented in this parade.

Maggie was a big hit at the parade, tons of kids wanted to pet her, adults wanted to know all about the really pretty and well behaved dog. After the parade we walked to the craft fair. It had started sprinkling so we put Maggie’s coat on her. At the craft fair kids were calling out Maggie’s name and running up to see her coat! When we left the fair kids were yelling “Bye Maggie.” Who knew she would be a kid magnet.

Speaking of Maggie, it’s 10:00 am and the princess is still in bed. She has her servants trained to not disturb her in the morning so she can get beauty sleep (I think that’s why she is so pretty.) She won’t be happy when she finally gets up, it’s sprinkling and Maggie hates the rain (even with her rain coat on.) Poor Maggie treated like a commoner. Just heard the jingle of dog tags, the princess is awake. I don’t think I’ve mentioned that Maggie is big on yoga after a nap. She’ll do several repetitions of downward facing dog and upward facing dog before she’s ready for a walk.

Today we will drive the coastal route past Kenai and Nikiski. Even with the rain we should have some great views of the volcano Mt Redoubt across the inlet.