Anchorage

Day 200 – Flying North for the … Summer

This morning’s breakfast came with a wide variety of options all packaged in plastic or polystyrene.  While our fellow diners helped themselves to extra polystyrene plates and cups and cracked open their individually packaged breakfast cereal, they tutted at CNN and talked about how evil BP and the big oil companies are! 

Our first flight of the day was from Fort Lauderdale to Houston (we pay to offset the carbon emissions of our flights in case you’re wondering), the lady next to us was a bit strange, but saw the picture of Evie and Daphne on our desktop and was off.  We spent the next two hours talking about her dogs!

In Houston we changed to our 7 hour flight to Anchorage.  This time the guy next to me was a bit more normal.  He’d never left Georgia and the surrounding states but was following his fiancé to Anchorage where she’d accepted a job as a nurse and the enticement package that comes with it.  He had a Biology degree and a passion for algae (more interesting than it sounds), so we talked science and engineering for a while.  He also had a well rounded world view and we discussed topics like the US dependence on oil and the teaching of Creationism in school science classes.

Erin meanwhile amused herself by flicking through the shopping magazines, like our dogs need further encouragement to climb on the furniture.

  
Our first view of Alaska out the window.

The bus driver from the airport was very friendly and helped us get to our hostel without an issue.  The hostel was in a bit of a dodgy area but seeing as it was still broad daylight until well after midnight that didn’t pose too much of a problem.  We walked into the nearest restaurant, a Mexican place, and walked out a bit later feeling quite ill, very greasy.  To make matters worse we couldn’t wash it down with a beer because they wouldn’t accept our colour passport copies as proof of age (you can get a drivers licence at 16, buy firearms at 18, but you can’t drink until you’re 21 and even then it’s a struggle sometimes!).

Day 201 – Family Reunion Part 1

In the morning we walked across to Oscar Gill House, the B&B we’d booked with Marg and Jeff (Erin’s parents) who were arriving today.  The owners kindly let us borrow their bikes and we went for a ride around town.  First we rode down the waterfront along the Tony Knowles Coastal Trail to the airport where Erin turned around after seeing her Mum and Dad’s plane fly overhead and wanting a shower before they arrived.  I kept going past the Frisbee Golf Course, up Campbell Creek got lost through the University and came back down Chester Creek.

 
Oscar Gill House

Up the Tony Knowles Coastal Trail.

The view back across downtown Anchorage from the trail near the airport.

When I got back Marg and Jeff had already been and gone, accompanied by Marg’s cousin’s wife Kim who lives a couple of hours south of Anchorage.  Erin had waited for me to get back for lunch and so we headed to Glacier Bay Brewery where we had a delicious thin crust pizza accompanied by some even more delicious beers.  The cask conditioned IPA was a real highlight, so nice to have some beer with flavour!

Marg and Jeff got back from sightseeing late afternoon and after some present swapping and catching up, Kim took us to a seafood restaurant for dinner, where Marg and Jeff got an introduction to US portion sizes - even the salads were too big to finish!

Day 202 - Embarkation

After a fantastic nights sleep in our little cottage, an even better shower and some French toast for breakfast, Kim picked us up and we drove a short way out of town to meet Marg’s cousin Ivan.  Together they took us on a tour through the massive outdoors store where they pointed out various deceased Alaskan wildlife – the most convenient introduction they could think of!

Some trophies with the tools of the trade lined up for sale underneath.

It’s important to get your children accustomed to firearms at an early age (yep, they’re toy guns).  To be fair, in Alaska there is a genuine need for so many guns, most Alaskans live very close to nature (moose wander the streets of Anchorage) and a lot of the game captured is eaten.

Next we headed up the hill on the outskirts of town for a view back over Anchorage and Prince William Sound.

Tabletop Mountain.

We also stopped in at the Fisheries and Game (who Kim works for) to have a look at some more stuffed animals and some other bits and pieces.  Then Kim indulged Jeff and I with a stop at a gigantic second hand bookstore.

Finally they dropped us at our shuttle bus to head for Whittier where our cruise departed from.  The first thing the shuttle bus driver did when he had us on board was start criticising the Australian Government, especially with regard to the proposed mining tax.  Pretty rich coming from a resident of Alaska, which has a 25% percent resources levy which is distributed directly to Alaskan residents by cheque each October!

View over Prince William Sound on the way to Whittier.

The shuttle made a stop at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center.

A brown bear having his lunch.

Some bison.

A curious caribou (I was going to call it a reindeer until I realised that may result in me being chastised by someone like Sean!).

Righty (I may have made that up), the one winged Bald Eagle.

The scenic waiting spot, Whittier is accessed by way of a one lane tunnel shared between vehicles and trains.

Whittier, the strange little port town where all the 300 residents live in one apartment building.

Our ship the Island Princess by contrast houses nearly 3,000 passengers and crew.  We got aboard, found our ‘staterooms’ and went exploring.  The ship has two swimming pools, too many bars and restaurants to count, two theatres, minigolf, a basketball court, gymnasium and a health spa. 

After only an hour on board we were summonsed to our muster area for a practice evacuation where we got to put on our life jackets and jog the stairs, but disappointingly didn’t get near the lifeboats.  It was strange given people were still boarding!  For dinner we hit one of the many restaurants, where we could select food from hundreds of buffet choices.  It was all a bit luxury after so many months backpacking.