Quartz Creek / Kenai Lake / Coopers Landing

Got to Quartz Creek on Sunday afternoon.   Scott and Tami, with whom we planned to meet with there, had arrived a couple hours before us.   Scott texted that our site was already empty.    Turns out they had an issue with getting their large rig into their reserved site and moved to “an emergency site” that was quite a bit closer to our campsite.   We had site number 10,  which turned out to be perfect for us as the lake was right out our door, with a great view from our patio.

That evening all 6 of us went out to dinner at the Cooper Landing Brewery. The beer was pretty good and the burgers were even better.

I checked out the group pavilion and a large fire pit with seating around it when hiking through the campground one morning.  It was right there, but hadn’t seen it while going around the campground on the roadway.  It was maybe 50′ from the road.

Scott & Tami came by our beachfront site in their kayaks the next morning on their way out to explore that very large lake.  It’s Kenai Lake and is a very beautiful color.  It’s also the source of the Kenai River.  And  just a few miles away is the Kenai Princess Lodge.  Lots of fisherman on that river,  all the way, some 50 miles to Kenai City.

We drove over to that Princess Lodge one afternoon to take a look at their campground.  It was pretty ugly.  We were both glad we didn’t choose to stay there.   Quartz Creek Campground looks like the Taj Mahal compared to that ugly campground.

The next day we took a drive out a small road on the other side of the lake to see where it went and drove all the way to this sign and decided to turn around there.  The fuel gauge was on empty, just prior to the light coming on by then and we needed to fill up the car before heading back.  The prices were pretty steep in Coopers Landing, so I put in a few gallons so we’d have 100-mile range if needed while towing to Wasilla.   While I was there I noticed this electric car Charging Station.  It seemed to be attached to a diesel generator to power it.   It wasn’t on.  My guess is it started up when you started to charge your car.  Had never seen anything like that anywhere in our travels.   The town seemed to have utility poles, but maybe it was a fast charger and needed a lot more amperage than the utility could provide.

We had happy hour on our patio almost every night except the last evening as Tami cooked an incredible brisket dinner for all 6 of us the night before we left for a campground in Wasilla.  We really needed a grocery run and laundry hookup  (sewer) prior to us heading toward Denali and 11 days of dry camping.

I did some diesel fuel price comparisons for the next leg and Costco was way less than all the other places, actually less than every other fuel station in all of Alaska and Canada, and the best part was it was right on our way to the next campground.    We left a bit early the next morning so we wouldn’t get to the Costco fuel station right at the noon rush.   It is an easy in/out if you look at the Google Maps Satellite View before you get there so you know which entrance to use, and which lane to use for diesel, and how to get out of there easily into a big, mostly empty parking lot so the Costco food run can be completed!   We are 40′ long plus an 18′ car and 6′ towbar making us about 54′ bow to stern.  Easy in and out of fuel stations is a must unless I want to unhook the car. (which I prefer not to do unless we are very close to our destination.)