I've lived in Alaska for forty-eight of my fifty-one years, so far; forty-four of them here in Ninilchik. I have never seen it rain quite like this; hard enough to fill up a five-gallon bucket a time-and-a-half in one day...

Although it's more than a quarter-mile to the river, I could hear Deep Creek roaring over the rain, from inside the house; I drove the three-wheeler over to the bank; I couln't see anything, but I could hear trees crashing and snapping and rocks smashing together...

I went out the next morning, over to Hugh Boyd's bank and took some pictures; then, I went into town to see what happened...

The river bottom has changed considerably, huge slides from the banks, all up and down the river, both sides; vast areas of the riverbottom have been stripped of vegetation, and overlaid with tons of gravel, sand, and silt. Who knows what it will do the the salmon?

I did see fish jumping in Ninilchik river, just abouve the bridge, just inside the "No Parking" sign, the next morning after the rains had died down. It looked like a steelhead; it jumped twice, heading downstream..I saw one upstream, about two-and-a-half miles (just below Brody Bridge.

Deep Creek looks a lot worse; the bottom is scoured down to gravel over large areas, and the river has split into multiple braided channels. The water is still high; the weather has been rainy since, although nothing like the BIG rains...

The buttons on the side link to pictures of the village, being flooded by Ninilchik river. To see pictures I took of Deep Creek go here: Deep Creek