7/22/2009 Come On SUN!

We need to see the sun! Cloudy days, day after day, is not a good thing. We need to feel the sun warm our skin, to give a different hue to our surroundings, to make things bright! We need the sun! TODAY!

Well, it didn't happen but at least it wasn't raining. It was just a cloudy and overcast day. It looked like it trying to come out but it didn't quite make it. Maybe tomorrow. (Taken from the kitchen window)

We went for a ride just to get out of the house. We stopped down by the waterfront to see what the fishermen were doing. I couldn't help but notice the seagulls.

Boat going out of the harbor.

We took a ride through the business section of Homer and turned right. Here's the views from there.

That bright section, just barely left of center is a huge glacier.

Another view of glacier, taken just up the road.

Some pictures taken on the way back.

Its this thin five mile strip of land that is known as the Spit.

We stopped at the Islands and Ocean Visitor Center to pass some time. What a nice surprise this was.

Our first stop was this....

It was set up much like a science room in Any School USA. There were eight stations and each table had someone there to explain what was going on there.

For example we stopped at this one table where a man sat with a computer showing where earthquakes had taken place over the past 40 years in any section of the world. Each dot represents an earthquake and depending on the size and color of the dot determines the magnitude of the quake. We had him focus on the Mid-Atlantic states and not even a handful of teeny tiny dots showed up....but then we knew that anyway.

Another station showed how volcanoes erupted by mixing baking soda and vinegar. That station just made me want a salad.

Another station had the kids make a volcano out of paper-mache.

I was most taken with the aquariums around the room.

Done here, we moved on to other areas of the visitor center.

There was a mock up of a cabin of years gone by and the "man" in the doorway gave a talk on what life was like in the life of a trapper.

A closer look of the "man" in the doorway. I think these things are called holograms.

This is a jacket made from Arctic Seal intestines and sewn together with grass. Uh, I'll stick with my hoodie from Gap, thank you very much.

More scenes from the center.

We watched a short movie about the boat in this picture below. It is a floating laboratory that studies the ocean, the birds and the wildlife in the Aleutian Islands. It is here that the health of oceans the world over is determined.

There was some beautiful metal work that was done around the building. Here the elevator was surrounded some of this handiwork.

A wall sculpture...so intricate.

Done inside we took a walk on the trail.

It looks like its the end of the season for this plant.

Yet, it looks like the beginning of the new life for this one.

We got home and had the roast and fixin's that had been cooking all day in the crock pot. Evening time brought TV and computer time.

This was our day.