Up They Came Photo Gallery Baycrest Bluff © Bill Scott The north shore climate has been cooling over the last 24 million years, as revealed by the study of plant fossils. Ancient exotic trees such as elm, maple, oak and metasequoia were replaced by cool northern birch, alder, willow and spruce. A complex of braided and meandering rivers once covered the entire Cook Inlet basin, depositing sediments that hardened into thick sandstone layers. Coal developed in swamps between stream channels. Much of today's landscape was formed as glaciers advanced from the Alaska Range and Kenai Mountains, overriding the Cook Inlet basin numerous times. Two terraces along the bluffs mark the upper limits of ice flowing down Kachemak Bay at different times. 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5

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