Well, Zak and I are back from our Alaskan Adventure and all I have to say is it just wasn't long enough!!! We arrived late Thursday night, loaded up in a bus with all the other recruits who were all (minus about 2 or 3)on the same flight as we were and were dropped off in front of our hotel. After a good, albeit short (Alaska time is 2 hours behind Mountain Standard Time), nights sleep Zak had to walk across the street for a morning of interviews, followed by a great lunch of fresh salmon from a famous Anchorage restaurant, tours exploring the wiles of Alaska within the Anchorage vicinity, a team-building scavenger hunt (where, among other things, he saw 5 Moose in an hour and a half!) and a catered dinner in a Chalet.
I, as well as the other spouses, were given a quick tour of the office where our spouses were interviewing, dropped off alone in downtown Anchorage and left to our own accord, strangers in a strange land...so, you ask, what did we do, all day, in a strange city? Go to the mall of course...I didn't know anything about the city, where -to- go- what- to -do -and -the -sort, I had no transportation, and the only other option was to sit all day in the hotel. AND, while my husband was eating fabulous salmon, I was across the street eating at the Food Court in the mall. Sad, yes I know. We, "the spouses" were however, invited to meet our husbands for dinner at the Chalet. Thank goodness for that.
Although Friday was pretty lackluster, Saturday couldn't have been more of a contrast! We met up , recruits and spouses, ate a quick lunch, loaded up in the bus once again and began our travels south, down the Seward Highway.
'Where to' you ask?
'You will just have to wait,' I reply!
For the journey is as magical as the destination.
As we head south toward Portage, Alaska to the right is the Cook Inlet. An icy body of ocean facing west, across the Cook Inlet stands a variety of impressive, snow covered mountains looming over the frigid waters on the Kanai Peninsula. I wish I could have had the bus driver stop so I could take some pictures because I have never seen anything quite so beautiful. To our left (east-ish) stood the sharply rising peaks of the Chugach Mountain range also covered with snow. Larger, more rugged peaks than those of the Rocky Mountains.
An hour south of downtown Anchorage we finally cross the city limits...a little strange, the bus driver announced that the city of Anchorage is, if I remember correctly, somewhere in the vicinity of 2000 square miles making it one of the largest cities in the U.S. in terms of square mileage. Another 15 minutes brought us to the Byron Glacier trail head. No snow meant that we could explore the glacier up close, climb all around without the danger of falling into a crevasse. It made for an amazing adventure! Here are some pictures of Byron Glacier.
