Day Seven (Fri) -- Anchorage to Alyeska

Patte, Dave, Phil and I meet at 7:30 am for a walk to the Snow City Cafe -- a highly recommended local breakfast place.   We are seated right away -- all of us had great breakfasts -- not cheap but really good.  As we left there was a line out the door waiting to get in -- this morning our timing was just right.

We continue on our own walking tour around the waterfront of Anchorage passing the statue of Captain Cook as we meander over to the Visitors Center (opens at 9 am) to see about a Trolley Tour.   Again -- good timing -- we got the last four seats on the trolley.   Joe, our driver, has lived in Anchorage all his life -- he shares his knowledge pointing out sights accompanied by bits and pieces of Anchorage history like the critical role played by the Alaska Railroad in the very existence of this city.

We stop at Earthquake Park as Joe tells us about the  devastation on April 27, 1964 caused by the Good Friday Earthquake.   More amazing are the miracles that occurred that day which saved so many lives.   The Pacific Plate shoved itself under the North American Plate causing the earth to shake for 5 minutes and since Anchorage is built on blue clay -- and blue clay liquifies when it shakes -- the earth just swallowed everything up.   Earthquake Park used to be a neighborhood but now buried deep below are 75 homes and the bodies of  3 people who died that day.   It was very moving to look out over this woodland as Joe tells stories of  how people who lived there survived.

Our tour continues  by the airport with water runways for all the seaplanes --- it's like a marina for airplanes  --- we also pass a  2800 square foot house built entirely underground with a year round temperature of 68 degrees.   It was a wonderful hour -- we got a good overview of Anchorage.

We have just enough time to pop into Radio Shack so Phil can replace his lost cell-phone charger and Patte can get a battery charger for her camera.  By noon we are again under Mindy's care boarding a bus to the Alyeska Resort in Girdwood but we have some sights to see along the way.

Jessie, our driver, is a  high school Spanish in the winter.   He is a riot as he regales us with stories all the way to Portage where we board a boat which gets us up close and personal with the Portage Glacier.  We have a Narrator on Board from the State of Alaska -- she gives a tutorial on glaciers  -- how they name them and why glaciers always hold their blue color.   The size of these glaciers is mind boggling -- especially knowing they used to be even bigger.

Back on the bus with Jessie at the wheel Mindy tells us we will be stopping at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center but first there will be a quick detour to see a salmon spawning area.  The salmon in the stream are towards the end of their spawning period so there is not a lot of activity but it is always interesting to see wildlife in their natural habitat.

The Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center is a non-profit dedicated to preserving Alaska's wildlife.  They take in injured and orphaned animals year-round and provide large enclosures as close to their natural habitat as possible.  Any animal that cannot be released into the wild is given a permanent home at the center.  There are brown and black bears in an 18 acre enclosure -- the largest bear enclosure in the U.S.   There are Bison, Musk Ox, Elk, Caribou, a Moose, and many others.  It is a very unique place and a nice surprise.

After a twenty minute ride we arrive at the Alyeska Resort -- a ski resort in the winter where we will spend the next two nights.    It is a lovely, rustic place at the base of a Mt. Alyeska.   There is a cable car to the top of the mountain to see the view or to dine at the Seven Glaciers Restaurant.   Phil had the forethought to make dinner reservations for us a month ago -- Patte ran into a woman in the lobby who offered her money for her dinner reservation -- apparently they are hard to get.

We check in -- our rooms are great with a view of  the grounds and the mountains -- after a brief rest we take the 6:30 pm cable car for our 7:15 dinner reservations.   Seven Glaciers is wonderful -- definitely fine dining.   We are at the top of the mountains --- and are lucky to have the weather on our side --- the views throughout dinner are spectacular.

This has been a wonderful -- long day so after dinner and a brief walk around the hotel -- we are all ready for a good nights sleep.

Thanks for Reading! 

  Pat