It’s not often an entire post is dedicated to just one day, even less so just one hike. But I kinda sorta over-indexed on the photos for this one.
At the furthest south west tip of the Kenai peninsula, the road runs out at Homer. From there, the only way to reach Kachemak Bay State Park, the peninsula’s most remote southern wilderness, is by boat.
Armed with a couple of ham, cheese and Branston pickle sandwiches and a couple of beers for good measure, we joined a handful of other hikers to take a small water taxi from Homer marina to Halibut Cove. It was a cool boat ride, lots of sea otters chilling out along the way.
As we neared the beach at Glacier Spit, we were told the tide was too… low/high/up/down I don’t remember, other than it was far from ideal. But the skipper thought there was a chance we could time it just right between the waves to disembark. And then out came a ladder. Yes, a common or garden stepladder.
After watching a couple of the others successfully navigate the improvised gangway, I gingerly descended the ladder. Then like my life depended on avoiding wet feet at all costs, I launched myself up the beach arms and legs akimbo, only to find Darren was filming me.
Our route took us along the beach and then inland through coastal rainforest, the vivid autumn colors just bursting with enthusiasm to show us what they’d got.
One of the distractions along the way was the Grewingk tram – a pulley system used to transport people in an open metal contraption loosely resembling a tram across the very wide, very fast flowing and very cold glacial meltwater river. With some lighthearted banter around making a good 1SE video clip, I was the one put into the ‘tram’, while Darren tugged heartily on the metal rope to ease me into the middle of the gorge, way above the raging waters.
The intention was not to reach the other side, this was just a dalliance on our planned hike that continued on the same side of the river. “OK now, this is far enough, bring me back please!” I hollered. Too far away to hear each other properly over the roaring river, there was some pantomime gesturing on my side, mirrored by nonchalant shrugs on his. I caught something along the lines of “Damn blueberries” and “Top of the World” and “You thought I’d forgiven you, hah!” Or maybe I imagined it.
Turns out it takes a lot more huff and puff than you’d think to get some momentum going on the tram. And maybe a few less pies on my part. But eventually Darren’s relentless hauling on the pulley meant that I made it back to solid ground in one piece.
As we continued, we caught glimpses of the Grewingk glacier through the Fall foliage. (Side note – I know Fall sounds terribly American to the Brits but after ten years I’m pretty ambivalent about the vocab differences and quite honestly, just milking the alliteration here. I also kinda struggled with the name Grewingk, thinking it must be spelt wrong, what kind of word has a g then a k? One named after a Baltic German geologist apparently.)
I really wasn’t quite prepared for Grewingk Lake. One of those blow you away destinations with wait for it, icebergs floating in the lake. Not to mention we were surrounded by yellow-tree awesomeness, a full-on 13 mile glacier at the far end of the lake, and a poetic pebble beach strewn with weathered driftwood.
Out came the Alaskan Brewing Company Icy Bay IPA. We could not have staged a better beer for the photos – anyone would think Darren gave it some forethought. The Pleasure Town beer barely got a look in. As for the ham, cheese and branston sarnies, they didn’t last even long enough for a photo.
Not that it was exactly busy but I guess the other hikers had more foresight to plan their water taxi timing than we did. We thought we’d be twiddling our thumbs as our boat pick up time was way later than everyone else’s. But the silver lining was that we ended up having the entire lakeshore to ourselves to enjoy.
The final stretch of our hike took us up and over the saddle trail, past lots of fresh bear scat (but no bears) and down to our pick up point for the return boat ride to Homer.
Not quite a step ladder this time, but the makeshift steps still extended into the water and required maneuvering way beyond my natural agility. Somehow I collapsed into the boat unscathed. And this time, I was the one with the camera.
All that remained was the boat trip back. All in all, a fantastic day and for us a new addition to our Top 10 Hikes in the World Ever.
