Last Days in Kodiak...

NOAA Teacher at Sea:  Tammy Orilio

NOAA Ship Oscar Dyson

Mission:  Pollock Survey

Geographical Area of Cruise:  Gulf of Alaska

Date:  2 July 2011

Personal Log:

We arrived back at the City Dock in Kodiak early Wednesday morning, so I had all day Wednesday and most of Thursday to explore the area.  One of the science team and I set off around noon on Wednesday to check out the town, and boy, did it feel good to finally be off the ship!!  18 days is a long time to be confined to one space!  The area where the Oscar Dyson is docked is an "industrial" area, with lots of fish processing plants and canneries, and you could definitely tell even if you weren't looking- the smell was that strong!  Once we got past the industrial area, we were in the main part of the town of Kodiak- lots of little shops catering to fishermen, some restaurants, lots of bars, and a few little gift shops.  We first went to a grocery store because we wanted to buy some candy (one thing we didn't have on the ship!) and as soon as I got inside the store, I started feeling some "dock rock."  It didn't last very long though, thank goodness!!  We walked around a little more, then stopped in to the Kodiak Visitors Center, where they've got displays about all of Kodiak's wildlife.  A few of us went out to lunch for sushi later that day- you could definitely tell the salmon was fresh!! Later on, we went to a Mexican place for dinner, and I gotta say, Mexican is not very good up in Kodiak!  

Big bear chase me!  (Who knows the movie?)

Mrs. Pearce used to work here!

The marina. 

On Thursday, Jason (the other TAS), Rick (one of the scientists) and I went to a place called Fort Abercrombie to do some hiking before we left later that evening.  It's got campsites, hiking trails, and remnants of World War II stuff there.  I'd love to go back and camp there sometime!

Jason & Rick on some of the artillery.  

What an amazing view.

It kind of looks like a monster with a big mouth.  

Clouds over the mountain.

Lake Gertrude in the foreground.

Little waterfall.

Jason and I were on the same flight out of Kodiak on Thursday evening, and we both also had a long (about 3 hour) layover in Anchorage, so we ate one last good Alaskan seafood dinner at the airport, and looked at some of the Native Alaskan art they had there.  I left Anchorage around 9 p.m., and was unfortunately stuck in the middle seat for the LONG nearly 7-hour flight to Houston.  Since I was stuck in the middle seat (and the guy next to me kept spreading his legs into MY space, grrrr) I didn't sleep much on the flight.  As soon as I landed in Houston (about 30 minutes later than scheduled), I had to get right on my last plane to Fort Lauderdale.  I was back in the warm South Florida climate around 11 am Friday, and totally wiped out from traveling!  Here are some of the last pics from my trip.

The Kodiak Airport.  That's all of it!

You can see the Oscar Dyson- it's the second ship from the left. 

The town of Kodiak.