Hello All!

Gwyn and I spent a week in Anchorage, Alaska visiting our friend Sarah in September. Sarah spent the week touring us around, taking day trips to see glaciers, hike, visit a reindeer farm, and ride the Alaskan Railroad. We even ate fresh Alaskan salmon she had caught fishing before we arrived.

Our first day touring Anchorage, we visited the Anchorage Museum, saw local art, and learned about native life prior to the colonization of the state. There was even a section in the museum for sled dogs, the history behind them, and the famous story of Balto and his pack running vaccines across the state.

During the railroad trip, we rode through the Anton Anderson Memorial Tunnel which measured 2.5 miles long. It served both cars and the train and ran on a strict schedule. We had to wait 40 minutes before we were allowed to go through the tunnel to reach the train before last call (we barely made it). Once we left Whittier, we road to the Spencer Glacier and got to hike a short trail to see the glacier. I had never seen one previously and was pleasantly surprised it had a blue color to the ancient ice.

Another day we went to the town of Talkeetna, ate a hearty meal at one of their local restaurants, checked out a museum about the town as well as Denali National Park, and could even see Denali from the parking lot. We didn’t have time to make it to the National Park on this trip, but seeing it from a distance was awesome. The sheer fact that it was so large and we could see it from so far away puts the size of the mountain into perspective. While we were around town, we also got to meet their mayor – a cat name Aurora.

One of the last days we spent in Alaska, we went to a reindeer farm in Palmer. We were able to pet the reindeer as long as we didn’t touch their antlers, feed moose, and see other animals like musk ox, as well as American buffalo. It was a nice pit-stop and a fun way to wrap up our trip to the state.

I’d love to go back sometime, maybe a little earlier in the season. Still, with layered clothing and a heavy-duty raincoat, we enjoyed our time exploring the last frontier.

Over and out,

Whitney