Traveling with the Jones — Sharing Travel Discoveries

Exploring Homer, Alaska: the Pratt Museum

by Janis on August 29, 2011

During a recent visit to Mr. Jones’ hometown of Anchorage, I made a three-day side trip to Homer, Alaska – a small city on the Kenai Peninsula immortalized in Tom Bodett’s As Far As You Can Go Without A Passport: The View From The End Of The Road. It was my first visit to this ‘Cosmic Hamlet by the Sea,’ famous for its spit, creative residents, halibut fishing and the Salty Dawg Saloon.

Friends showed me Homer’s highlights and recommended I visit its Pratt Museum.

The Harrington Cabin, part of the outside exhibits at Homer’s Pratt Museum, shows Alaska homestead life of early 20th century.

Visiting Homer, Alaska: the Pratt Museum

The Pratt is a natural history museum featuring a cornucopia of exhibits delving into the history, environment and human experience of Alaska’s Kachemak Bay region.

This display gives an upclose view of the lynx and its large furry paws that act as snow shoes.

Hosting 30,000 visitors each year, the Pratt Museum includes indoor exhibits ranging from art to local legends to mounted bears to the Exxon Valdez oil spill. Outdoors, the historic Harrington homestead cabin showcases early 20^th century life in Alaska.

Facts about the size of brown bears are more easily understood with this example.

Founded in 1967, the Pratt Museum was as Homer’s centennial project celebrating the U.S. purchase of Alaska from Russia.

Visuals like this one comparing the size of an oil tanker with a school bus educate visitors of all ages.

Sam Leon and Vega Anderson Pratt

The museum is built on land donated by Sam and Vega Pratt, located on her family’s original homestead. Sam moved to Homer in 1936, where he met and married Vega Anderson. Both artists, Sam worked as a fox farmer and commercial fisherman before the Pratt’s started Vega’s Art and Gift Shop in Homer, selling art supplies and a variety of merchandise.

Sam and Vega were active members of the growing community of Homer and when the Museum opened in 1968, Sam served as the first volunteer curator.

Click here for details on planning your visit to the Pratt Museum.

Have you visited the Pratt Museum in Homer? What was your favorite exhibit?

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Exploring Anchorage, Alaska: Binky the Polar Bear and the Alaska Zoo

by Janis on August 22, 2011

We are visiting Mr. Jones’ hometown of Anchorage, Alaska, and staying in what Miami Herald columnist Dave Barry calls a “two-bear” hotel. Seeing the two bears in the lobby reminded Mr. Jones of one Barry’s columns on Alaska from 1995.

In his DON’T FEED THE TOURISTS column, Barry writes about “Binky” — a polar bear at Anchorage’s zoo — who became famous after chomping on a tourist that climbed two fences to get closer to him.

Binky died in 1995 but he’s immortalized in a Wikipedia page with a photo of him with the tourist’s tennis shoe in his mouth.

Reading about “Binky” made me curious, so on Sunday we drove to 4731 O’Malley Road to experience the Alaska Zoo.

The Alaska Zoo focuses on arctic, sub-arctic and similar climate species living mainly in outdoor enclosures where you can visit them year round. More than half of the animals ended up at the zoo because they were injured, abandoned, or orphaned.

Some of our favorite animals:

The Amur tigers

The black bears

The snow leopard

Love this cat’s enormous tail.

The brown bears

The lynx, the only cat native to Alaska. It’s large furry paws that act as snow shoes.

And the polar bears, of course. Notice the tall, secure bars to protect those who think it’s a good idea to climb over fences to get closer to wild animals.

Take a shuttle from downtown Anchorage

The Alaska Zoo is open daily year round except for Thanksgiving and Christmas. If you are visiting downtown Anchorage during the summer, you can catch a shuttle bus to the zoo. The bus picks up visitors six times a day at 4^th and F Street, next to the Anchorage Convention and Visitors Bureau Log Cabin, with hourly return trips.

Have you been to the Alaska Zoo? What’s your favorite animal?

If you have children and are planning to explore Alaska with them, check out AK on the GO, a blog that focuses on with kid-friendly activities and travel in Alaska.

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Cruising the British Isles: Invergordon and Inverness — why all these “Invers”

by Janis on July 30, 2011

We’ve recently returned from a 14-Day Celtic Circle cruise around the British Isles on Holland America Line’s ms Prinsendam. This post is part of a series detailing our discoveries in port and on the ship.

Why do the names of so many towns and cities in Scotland start with “Inver”?

Only to the second port of our cruise and we’ve been to Inverkeithing, Invergordon and Inverness.

Along a similar line, what’s a “loch”?

When we took a shore excursion to Loch Ness and Inverness from the port of Invergordon, our tour guide on tour bus #5 was full of information.

A “loch” is a lake, she explained, while “Inver” means the “mouth of a river”. Many towns and cities in Scotland are named after rivers, i.e. the city of Inverness means the place at the mouth of the Ness River, which runs from Loch Ness, or Lake Ness.

Located on the banks of the River Ness — with a castle towering above — Inverness is the capital of the Scottish Highland. Inverness seems more like a peaceful tourist town than a capital city.

Invergordon is the port town for Inverness, and gateway to Loch Ness and the Whiskey Trail. Invergordon was a boom town during the oil heydays in the 1970s, but today it’s fairly quiet.

Oil drilling platforms are plentiful in the waters around Invergordon near the cruise port – but they are not drilling. The platforms are towed to the waters around Invergordon temporarily for repair and safety checks.

Like many towns with an oil boom past, Invergordon is trying hard to reinvent itself – with oil platform repair, call centers, and tourism.

Directly across from the cruise pier, the Invergordon Museum details the history of the port and the Highlands area.

In the town, a series of murals covers the sides of buildings.

Public bus service connects visitors to Inverness, but not to Loch Ness.

Have you been to any Scottish cities named “Inver”…? Which ones?

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Cruising the British Isles: In Search of Nessie, the Loch Ness Monster

by Janis on July 29, 2011

We’ve recently returned from a 14-Day Celtic Circle cruise around the British Isles on Holland America Line’s ms Prinsendam. While onboard the 835-passenger”˜elegant explorer’, we visited 10 ports in Scotland, Ireland and England. This post is part of a series detailing our discoveries both in port and on the ship.

It’s difficult to get to Loch Ness and Urquhart Castle from the cruise ship port of Invergordon using public transportation. Since we wanted to see first-hand if Nessie “the Wee Beastie” really inhabits Loch Ness, we booked a shore excursion through Holland America line.

Our bus drove through the highlands about an hour and a half to reach the ruins of Urquhart Castle, a place of turbulent history on the hills proximately overlooking the deep waters of Loch Ness. Nessie was rumored to inhabit the water near this castle.

We don’t like long bus rides, but this one provided incredible views, from trout fishing streams to hills and valleys covered in heather to sightings of the rare “Belted Galloway” breed of cattle that look like Oreos.

Whether the wee beastie Nessie lives below the Urquhart castle or not, the deep waters, and surrounding green hills make a beautiful spot to climb the ruins.

What a glorious view on a sunny day! We had about 45 minutes to explore the castle ruins, museum and gift shop.

In the nearby town of Drumnadrochit, there is a “Nessie” in a lake, giving us all the opportunity to shoot grainy photos from the bus.

Next, our tour headed to Inverness, where we had an hour on our own to explore the capital of the Scottish Highland. On the banks of the River Ness with a castle towering above, Inverness seems more like a peaceful town than a capital city.

Do you believe in the Loch Ness monster?

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