On the Road - Alaska!

Karen's Journal - June, 2000

I had the best time in Alaska! After 8 days up North, I'm back at work and back in the swing of things here in the desert, though my mind is a little messed up from the Alaska sky. It doesn't get dark this time of year! I would be outside at midnight, and the sun would still be out, just above the horizon, getting ready to finally set. By 1:30 or 2am, the sky would be a deep blue, but that's the darkest it gets in southern Alaska this time of year. As for the temperatures, during the daytime it was as warm as 80 degrees, and down by the rivers and bays, it was a brisk 50-55 degrees.

We travelled all over the southern region of the state. We flew first-class to Anchorage, then drove up to Palmer, staying at the Majestic Valley Wilderness Lodge. It's a small bed & breakfast place built into the mountainside, with nothing near it for miles except blueberries, mountains, and one other bed & breakfast place. We each had log cabins, spacious but no telephone or television. They did have hot water though! We made it over to the office too late for breakfast in the morning, so we drove to the other B&B and had breakfast at the Sheep Mountain Lodge. Though I would see bighorn sheep near Anchorage, there were none near this lodge. After breakfast we made plans to drive straight to Fairbanks, and aside from one quick stop along the way, we made it all the way there in about 7 hours. Along the way we saw salmon spawning areas, moose, several different rivers, the Chugach mountains, and drove alongside the Alaska Pipeline for nearly 100 miles. You can walk right up to it; there are signs that say "Please do not play on the pipeline!" Some of the roads are not totally paved; some are only wide enough for one lane of traffic at a time. We stopped at North Pole, AK, to see the 40 foot tall statue of Santa Claus, his 3 tiny reindeer (nobody knew which three reindeer were kept in a pen there...), and his shop, a big three-room toy/gift/souvenir shop. Santa is apparently there year-round to greet guests.

<--I wouldn't pose with Santa at North Pole, AK, but I did get the next best thing.  I think this reindeer must be Dasher, he sure ran fast.  I picked up a pile of gifts, and we were off to Fairbanks.  It's Alaska's 2nd largest city, about 50,000 people there. We had dinner with a client at an outdoorsy western-style restaurant, and I'll get to design a web site for a Native American artist. We drove around Fairbanks to see some of his murals, statues and other artwork around town. Everyone I met there was really hospitable, nice to talk to, very cool people. We stayed at the upscale Pike Lodge (cable TV!) and planned to fly to Arctic Village the next morning. Unfortunately, those plans fell through due to weather and we decided to drive back towards Anchorage. We took the alternate highway back, and it led us straight through Denali National Park.

<-- Near Denali National Park, home of Mt. McKinley, which was visible behind me...the photo came out too light :(...

When the clouds finally cleared, we had a GREAT view of Mt. McKinley (20,320ft), and wound up having lunch at the Denali Princess Cruises Lodge. McKinley just TOWERS over the other mountains...there are four mountains that stand out as being taller than all the rest, but McKinley dwarfs the other three.  The views were just unbelieveable. The highway is criss-crossed over and over again by the Nenana River, which has long stretches of raging whitewater. On the way back into Anchorage, we stopped at the spot where the Iditarod begins, and saw The Perfect Storm at the theatre next to the hotel.

<--Wasila, AK, where the Iditarod begins each year...

The following day we caught a flight to the tiny village of Aniak (you can only get there by air or boat). The plane held 17 people, and you had to duck your head to walk down its aisle. The engines were so loud they supplied passengers with earplugs. The flight was surprisingly calm though. We walked from Aniak to a nearby river, and took a boat down the Kuskokwim river to the even-tinier-village of Chuathbaluk (it means "blueberries" in Eskimo) and spent two evenings out there. The village is on one side of the river, and our house was on the other side. I got to visit a smokehouse, and watch salmon get smoked into strips like beef jerky. This time we stayed with relatives of my clients, and despite being literally in the middle of nowhere, they had everything from satellite cable to hot water to a pool table! The next morning we were up bright and early and ready to fish. Spent the entire day fishing for salmon (we stopped and pulled ashore for a couple of picnics, but were scared away by grizzly bear footprints the second time...). I caught one fish, a king salmon, maybe 13-15 pounds, really handsome little guy. We also caught a pike, a dog salmon and an 8-foot log. I brought the salmon home to Tucson in a fish box! We stayed out until 1am fishing; the sky still being very bright despite the time.
The next morning we visited Aniak by boat, and went to the general store. Again, I was surprised...for a place with no road access, it was pretty well stocked. Picture a Super-K-Mart squeezed into a 7-11. They had everything from milk, bread and produce to tires, toys, fishing licenses and furniture. We headed for the 'airport' later in the day. The Aniak airport is a two-room building, and the "baggage claim" area is a chute. A forklift takes a bucketful of luggage from the plane, and dumps it onto the chute, where it slides into the building. Worked for me :). After we returned to Anchorage, we rented another car and headed for the Kenai Peninsula. It was a 2-hour drive to Seward, and we stopped at the Portage Glacier on the way. The snow and ice are piled incredibly high there, and the nearby lakes have chunks of bluish glacier ice floating in them when they break off from the glacier. They look good enough to put in a giant glass of iced tea. In Seward, we stopped for lunch - the town had thousands of visiting tourists - on the 4th of July they have their annual Marathon Mountain Race....runners from all over the world show up to race. They go up and down the mountain, about 6 miles. We also visited the Seward Marine Life Science Center (Aquarium) and were able to see some puffins, seals, sea lions and king crab. The cruise ship Sun Princess was docked in Seward; we wandered around the docks for a while looking for sunbathing otters. No luck. I did get to see an otter....sort of....one of the eskimo tribes gave me a river otter pelt.... From Seward we travelled to Kenai, and at the Kenai Princess Lodge we had dinner with one third of the Buena Vista tribe, which is actually located near Sacramento. There are a total of 9 people in the tribe, but they've gotten approval to build an $8 million casino - I get to build the web site for it. Kenai is right on the coast, and the lodge offers incredible views.
<--Kenai Princess Lodge, Kenai AK

We drove back to Anchorage and packed up for a long flight home the next day....before we left Anchorage, we drove up into the nearby mountains to see the city from up high, and to check out the snow.

<--me getting a frozen butt :)  look Ma, no makeup!

   More fun at Flattop Peak near Anchorage.

The flight home went to Seattle, where we spent the 4th of July. We managed to get reservations for the Space Needle restaurant (you had to call a month in advance) and were there to see the many incredible fireworks displays Seattle and Tacoma had to offer. They had this fancy dinner served to everyone...it was really nice...its' been something I had ALWAYS wanted to do.

<--At the Space Needle entrance, Seattle, 7/4

We flew to San Francisco in the morning, but our connection from there to Phoenix was cancelled. We wound up with a few hours in SF, and saw the Golden Gate Bridge. I was back in Phoenix by midnight, but I was exhausted! It made for a slow drive home, stopping to rest over and over again, until finally I got into Tucson around 4am. My box of frozen fish stayed frozen! I can't believe how much of the state we were able to see in 8 days. Looking forward to maybe going again someday.