Sunday after dropping off our houseguests at the train, DZ and I rode Campbell Creek trail out to the end near Dimond and Victor, then found our way to Kincaid and rode the Coastal Trail to Westchester Lagoon and back home via Chester Creek. I'm hoping to put together a guide to how to get from one trail to the other where there are still gaps. Here we checked where this long bridge at Taku Lake went (to Foxridge/76th and C.)
Here's a peaceful little spot right off of Minnesota and Dimond. You can see Minnesota in the background. One of the things I love about Anchorage's bike trails is that right in the middle of the city and busy intersections, you are in a quiet oasis lined with trees as though you were way out in the wilderness.
After the Campbell Creek trail ends around Dimond and Victor, we wandered through neighborhoods until we got to Jewel Lake Road and Strawberry. It's been interesting to see when DZ pulls out his camera - generally to get pictures of cars like this one. It turns out I got part of it accidentally while documenting the street. His picture when the car turned left didn't come out.
Finally we are getting back to dedicated bike trail. (When you double click to enlarge these, the pictures are much sharper.)
What should you do when you see people this close to moose and starting to get even closer? Last summer I tried to tell my visiting British friend that he was too close (and he was twice as far away as these people) when the moose charged at him and the others next to him. They ran and the moose stopped. When these folks began to walk toward the moose from where they are in the picture, I shouted to stay back, this was a wild animal with a baby. They did back up but when they finally walked on they muttered something to me. One might say it was their choice and the natural consequences would be more effective than anything I might say. But I remember the man who got killed by a moose at UAA after people had harassed it all day. These people might not have been hurt, but there would have been an irritated moose on the trail with lots of Sunday bike and pedestrian traffic going by. Someone else might have been the victim of their foolishness. On the other hand, we don't hear many stories about people getting hurt by moose so maybe I was out of place to interfere. I have to admit this moose looked extremely mellow.
Not far later we saw this mother with two calves. (#2 is still in the bushes here.)
DZ hadn't eaten much and was extremely happy to be able to get a hotdog from this vendor at the parking lot with the view of downtown near Earthquake Park.
I'd heard about some new outlet for fish at Westchester Lagoon, but hadn't seen it. 
This is from a Federal Site where the links don't work right on my Macbook using Firefox, but I tried what I did at the ABC site to find this:Chester Creek is one of several small salmon-producing streams in the Anchorage area. Chester Creek and its outfall (Westchester Lagoon) are heavily urbanized. Westchester Lagoon is maintained with an obsolete water control structure that is a barrier to fish passage. A new water control structure is under design and scheduled for construction. Anchorage Fish and Wildlife Field Office staff coordinated assessment of coho salmon passage into Westchester Lagoon (Chester Creek, Anchorage) with Alaska Pacific University. College students installed and operated video equipment to count coho salmon escapement through the old outlet structure for Westchester Lagoon. A new outlet structure to provide better fish passage is under construction and passage through the old structure will serve as baseline for evaluation of the new structure.DZ's bottom was getting sore, so we skipped the loop around Goose Lake and came home through the neighborhoods near Lake Otis.
Even though those people were jerks, they probably went someplace, muttered about some yahoo who told them to stay away from the moose and someone most likely clarified your point. (Someone said a prayer of thanks for you!) Moose look like big, dumb animals, but they are not!
ReplyDeleteI was a student of Dr. Bruno Kappes when he got trampled and people accused him of taunting the poor thing, when all he was doing was walking between buildings to go to teach a class. He was traumatized for a long time over that. (He has spoken of this publicly so I'm sure if he sees this, he won't mind.)
A few years ago, a neighbor called me on my cell phone. She was in her house and had seen me walking out to the woods behind our houses. She told me to freeze and not walk any more and told me where to walk and I made it to her place OK, and she invited me to her window where she'd been resting and I could see where a momma and a baby were hidden and I was walking right toward them, the path taking me between them. It would not have been nice if I'd kept going.