Lowell Creek Canyon in Seward, Alaska
A short video I took at Lowell Creek Canyon here in Seward.
That's Lowell Creek Canyon, right behind downtown Seward. I set the camera down on the rocks, hit record, and let it run for ten minutes. No edits, no filters.
It's right there behind town, but once you're back in it, it feels a lot farther away. Steep green mountains on both sides, the creek winding through a huge bed of gravel, and a patch of snow still sitting in one of the gullies at the far end, even in the middle of summer.
The creek doesn't go through town anymore
Lowell Creek used to flood downtown Seward pretty often. Water, rocks and debris would come right down through the streets. So in 1939, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers built a 2,068-foot tunnel through the mountain to send the creek out to Resurrection Bay instead. It was the first flood control project finished in the territory of Alaska.
All that gravel in the video is a good hint at why it was such a problem. The creek carries a lot of rock down out of these mountains.
Where it comes out
If you've driven out Lowell Point Road, you've already seen the other end. The tunnel comes out at the waterfall right next to the road, and the creek runs from there into the bay. I filmed that waterfall too, in my summer day video.
Fair warning if you go: it's all loose rock, and it's not a place to be in heavy rain. There's a reason they built the tunnel.
Mostly, it's just a nice spot to sit for a while.