Homeward bound

Posted on July 8, 2013July 8, 2013 by Dusty Roads

Back at the hotel we retrieved our carry-on’s and made ourselves comfortable in the lobby of the Hotel Captain Cook.

It’s a very nice hotel all polished and shiny with lots of shops to explore.

Eventually we moved outside to sit in the sun while we watched them load our luggage onto the bus for our trip to the airport.

One stop in Seattle, very briefly, and then the red-eye to Newark. From Newark a short hop to Albany, NY. Lots of time to review the trip in my mind.

A few quick facts I ran across during our Alaskan Adventure.

The Alaska Flag: The Big Dipper & the North Star on a field of blue.

State Motto: North to the Future

State Fish: ( Bet you can’t guess) King Salmon

State Flower: Forget-Me-Not

State Tree: Sitka Spruce

State Mineral: ( Another obvious choice) Gold

State Gem: Jade

Sport: Not hunting, not fishing…it’s Dog Mushing

State Bird: Willow Ptarmigan

Native People: Eskimo, Aleut, Athabascan Indians, Haida Indians, Tlingit Indians, Tsimshian Indians

On the Summer Solstice (June 21) Anchorage gets 22 hours of functional daylight.

The largest Salmon caught in Alaska weighed 97 lbs.

The largest halibut weighed 459 lbs.

The average snowfall in Anchorage is 69 inches. 42 miles away , on Mt Alyeska, the average snowfall is 650 inches.

The Northern Lights are most often seen between September and March unless you are above the Artic Circle.

Day at the Zoo

Posted on July 7, 2013July 7, 2013 by Dusty Roads

It’s the last day in Alaska and I’m so glad we are spending it at the Zoo. I love zoos. I even went to the zoo in Hawaii.

So we arrived via the Zoo shuttle right to the entrance. When it’s time to leave the shuttle will pick us up right in the parking lot. There’s even a little bench to sit on while we wait.

We bought our tickets and picked up our maps and followed a family of rambunctious little ones onto the paths. The paths cross crossed and meandered so we picked the “must see” animals and figured we’d go there first. Grizzlies were on that list but they were also on the far side of the zoo.

There was a little deer in an exhibit that was just full of mischief. A Maintenance worker was repairing the enclosure and she just followed him everywhere trying to chew on his pants. When he finally shooed her away she took off to pick on a poor , abused looking turkey that shared her enclosure.

The tiger was sleeping and wasn’t going to move for anyone.

The wolves were pretty riled up. They paced along the fence line. A family with very young children were watching. The wolves seemed to be fixed on the kids. Did they think they were prey? A snack? The kids started making howling sounds and the pack joined in.

Once the family moved on the pack dispersed back into the trees in their habitat.

We saw a snowy owl, one of the birds that winters in MA and that I am still trying to get a photo of in the wild.

There was a beautiful bald eagle. They are so majestic that it always makes me feel bad when I see them in captivity. On the other hand many of the captive eagles were injured and couldn’t be rehabilitated enough to survive in the wild. I guess being captive is better than the alternative.

We passed the black bear, a moose hiding in the shadows, and a pretty little red fox snoozing in the sun.

We got a close up look at the caribou.

We crossed a bridge over a pond and watched the swan whose very presence owned the pond. I’m not a “birder” but I think it was a Trumpeter Swan. We have “Mute” Swans around home and it wasn’t that. The bill was black while the Mute Swans have yellow bills and a black eye ridge.

Silly me spotted a squirrel and the picture I got of him is one of my favorites.

There was a good exhibit of the Dall Sheep so we finally got to see this elusive animal up close.

Finally we spotted the grizzly bear enclosure. They weren’t cooperating any more than the wild ones. One was sprawled in the brook in the shade down in a corner of the enclosure. No good angle for a picture. The other one was in a hollow taking a nap. His big foot and an ear about all that could be seen.

By now we’d spent more than an hour so we needed to hustle back to catch the shuttle. We passed the otters and stopped for a minute at the Polar Bears.

We skipped the musk ox and probably a few other animals but time was now of the essence. It was harder to find our way out of the zoo than in!

Finally the exit and timing was perfect. The shuttle was pulled up and waiting.

Anchorage

Posted on July 6, 2013July 6, 2013 by Dusty Roads

As Mr. Roberts would say “It’s a lovely day in the neighborhood.” And that would be very true here in Anchorage. Sunny and warm, a perfect day! We ate breakfast in the hotel. When we were ready to go exploring the doorman pointed us in the right direction. It was just a couple of blocks to the Visitor Center, a sod thatched log cabin right there on a main street.

Our plan for the day was the Anchorage Zoo. There was a shuttle from the Visitor Center right to the Zoo. We got there just after the shuttle had pulled out so we had about 30-40 minutes to wait. I wandered the street exploring the souvenir shops while Sandy went into the Visitor Center and chatted with the ladies working in there.

Nearby was a Cultural Museum. That would have been interesting if there was more time. The totem poles were different.

One of the stores had a big plush bear in front of it.

Another was called “Once in a Blue Moose.” How cute is that !

I loved the Blue Moose totem pole by the door.

Look at that! They have a sign post! The first time I ever saw one of these was in Hawaii. Its a sign post with the distance to other places like North Pole. San Francisco, Seattle, Boston and so on. It’s always interesting to see what places made it onto a sign like this.

A trolley was offering city tours and if we’d had more time that would have been high on my list of first things to do. Trolley tours at a new location are one of the best ways to get the “lay of the land” but since we were only going to be here one day the zoo was a better choice.

When the Zoo shuttle arrived and we got settled, the driver told us how nice it was to finally get sunshine and warm weather. Like everyone else she said spring had come late this year. Normally the weather we were getting now should have started 2 weeks earlier. Just our luck!

It was about a 20 minute ride to the zoo. We were dropped off right by the entrance. We’d have about 1.5 hours before we’d have to catch the shuttle back so we could get back to the hotel for our shuttle to the airport. The driver said it was a little zoo and that we’d have plenty of time.

Maybe now I’d finally get to see some of the iconic Alaskan animals that had been eluding me.

Wilderness to City

Posted on July 5, 2013July 5, 2013 by Dusty Roads

We relaxed in the sun until our bus arrived. Still cool in the shade, it was T-shirt weather in the sunshine. Amazing the difference from when we started this adventure.

Right on time our bus pulled up and once again we went through the head count process as we boarded the bus, this time we were heading to Anchorage. I wondered if it would be quicker than our trip from Whittier on the train.

Going into Talkeetna was one very popular tour that we didn’t get to do. For one thing it involved another bus ride of about an hour to get there. I needed to move now, not ride another bus! Talkeetna is an interesting little town. The TV show Northern Exposure was based on the town and yes , they do have an Annual Moose Dropping Festival. Another claim to fame…the mayor is a CAT! Yes, a feline. And it holds office hours. I would have been able to get my “kitty fix” if we’d taken the hour+ tour into town.

Mayor Stubbs

Alas, this will have to wait for another trip. I was feeling pretty mellow. This was a longer vacation a than usual and a lot more packing and unpacking and climbing on buses and long train rides and…well, I’m not complaining, but I think I was slowing down.

Our bus driver was pleasant, chatting about the different towns we passed. It was all highway so we made good time. At about the half way mark we got a rest stop at a little ice cream shop.

As the bus pulled in I spotted him. Our eyes met and I knew, just knew, we were destined for each other.

“Pierre” was soon sitting next to me and on his way to Anchorage.

“Pierre”

I haven’t been one to buy souvenirs for myself since I started lugging the camera with me. The pictures are usually my memorabilia. But I couldn’t leave “Pierre” behind.

As we entered Anchorage we hit the first traffic we’d seen in all of Alaska! We were in a “Thoroughly Modern City. ” The driver said that moose might be found wandering the city streets and I had seen that on the Discovery Channel too, but we didn’t see any moose on the loose while we were there.

The driver took us around the block a few times pointing out different places to go for dinner or drinks. Like a mother hen he warned us not to go past certain streets after dark. Well who needs to? It doesn’t get dark until after 11pm!

Eventually he pulled up to the Hotel Captain Cook.