2 days in Alaska

My grandparents have been spending their summers in Alaska lately, and my Mark cousin and Uncle Larry were headed up to Anchorage to gear up for a bear hunt and fishing trip.  Mark and I had been talking about me trying to fly up and meet them for some time, and for a change there were actually enough open seats to get me up there!

After working from 4 am- 6pm on Saturday August 1, I quickly changed clothes and hopped on a flight to Seattle.  From there I had about six flights to try and get to Anchorage on.  I gave up on the first one and wisely switched terminals to hop on board another one that departed 30 minutes later.  I was rewarded with an entire exit row all to myself.  With plenty of legroom, power outlets at every seat, and a movie on my laptop I made myself comfortable for the 3 hour flight to Anchorage.

I arrived around 1 am.  I only had 11 hours to kill before Uncle Larry and Mark arrived from Tennessee!  I had actually remembered to pack a pillow and planned on finding a quiet corner to at least sleep for a few hours.  However I discovered that Anchorage is a 24/7 airport.  It doesn't quiet down.  So I was only able to bag 2 hours of fitful sleep before resigning myself to Netflix and plane spotting around the airport.  It is always neat to see the constant stream of 747s in ANC.

Finally Uncle Larry and Mark arrived, and I met up with them at their Delta gate.  Then we all went to baggage claim to get their gear, and Grandpa and Grandma met us, along with my Grandpa's sister and another family friend.  The first order of business was food.  Uncle Larry treated us all to great food at Sourdough Mining Company.

The rest of the afternoon we went around Anchorage visiting some tourist shops, Earthquake Park, and then finally began the 1 hour drive up to Wasilla,   On the way we did stop and do a short hike to Thunderbird Falls, and stopped by an old Russian Orthodox Church.

We were staying in the church Grandpa and Grandma had been working at.  We got settled in, ate some dinner and got ready for our big day the next morning.  We would be doing a lot of traveling.

To start things off, we went to the Iditarod Headquarters in Wasilla.  They had some nice exhibits, a film to watch, and then got to see some retired sled dogs.

We also stopped off next to Wasilla Lake.  In the winter time, it is where they start the Iditarod race.  We could see Denali far in the distance.

After this stop we began our journey up Hatcher's Pass.  The scenery changed from forest, to scrub brush, to bare tundra.  It was quite the transition.  We stopped several times along the way to take pictures and get out of the van.

We stopped at the top of the pass, and Mark, Uncle Larry, and I did some more quick hiking.  We went up a steep switchback trail to get some better views of the surrounding area.

The real treat, however, was on the East side of Hatcher's Pass.  We arrived at the Independence Mine.  Some of the buildings had been restored, others left where they were built, deteriorating.  It was now an Alaska State Park.

The mine was opened in 1938 and over the course of 5 years almost 6 million dollars worth of gold was removed.  During WW2 it was shut down, and then reopened for a little while until gold mining was deemed unprofitable.  It was officially closed in 1951.

We all ate lunch, and then toured the ruins.  One of the lower water tunnels, dug to connect with the upper level mine shafts.  Cold water runs from the mountain, and out the still intact entrance, although it is gated.  It kept the mine at about 38 degrees.

On the drive back down we were going to go through Palmer, before heading back to Wasilla.  We stopped along the Little Susitna River.  It's fed from glaciers and snow melt above Hatcher's Pass and the surrounding mountains.  The water was a deep glacier blue.  It was beautiful.

Once we were in Palmer, we drove around to see the gorgeous views of the mountains and farmland, and briefly stopped at the Musk Ox Museum.  I can't say I've ever seen a more beautiful landscape to farm in.

We also stopped at an overlook outside Palmer to take some pictures of the Matanuska River.  I was blown away by the gorgeous scenery of the "braided river" and the surrounding mountains.

That night we all went out to eat at the Noisy Goose in Palmer.  It was a great restaurant with plenty of entertaining signs hanging everywhere.

The following morning I was up bright and early, and Uncle Larry drove me back down to Anchorage so that I could catch my flights back to Spokane.  I actually use a Positive Space ticket to get home, so I wouldn't have to stress about getting an open seat.

Vancouver, BC

In April I flew up to Vancouver, B.C. to give presentations for work.  Me and one of the guys on our project decided to stay an extra night to give us a chance to explore part of the city.

We took the Skytrain to downtown and started our adventure.

After briskly walking through Chinatown, and suddenly finding ourselves in the middle of drug requests, we made it to a stretch of water.  The view of the mountains was amazing.

There was lots of people mulling about enjoying the sunny and warm afternoon.  We basically continued walking along the waterfront for a good hour or so, before cutting through a large park area to get to the south side of the city.

We sat on the beach and watched the sunset over the ocean, before walking back into downtown to catch the Skytrain back to the airport, and then have the hotel shuttle driver pick us up.

Riverside, CA

I had a couple days off work, so I went down to Southern California to visit my cousin Townsend at college.  I got out on the first flight from Spokane, to Portland.  On the way I got some gorgeous photos of Mt. Hood in the morning sunlight.

                                           (Mt. Hood, with Mt. Jefferson in the distance)
  I decided I'd rather spend a few extra hours waiting in Portland to get a seat on a flight that was wide open, than be packed into a full one.  The extra wait was worth it.  I flew into Santa Ana/Orange County airport and Townsend picked me up.

We walked around his college, and then went out to the Aviation department's location, next to the small airport.  One of the instructors gave us access to the flight line and we got to walk along looking at all the aircraft, including an old C-47 from WWII.

That evening we went to the cafeteria there... I wish I could have had food that good while I was in college.

In the morning Townsend drove me up to Ontario, and I flew back to Portland from there, on one of the Alaska flights operated by Skywest.

On the way, I was trying to get a picture of Mt. Shasta.  I'm 99% sure it was Shasta, but I couldn't get any great pictures.

Day Trip To San Diego

Wednesday, February 4, Jason and I had planned on going to Seattle for the day.  We weren't really keen on waking up too early, though, and we ended up getting to the airport too late to get seats on the STAR flight to Seattle.  At the last minute the gate agent changed us over to the Salt Lake City flight, and it was a spur of the moment trip to San Diego from there.

It was a quick hop to SLC, and then we literally boarded an Alaska flight right next to the Horizon plane we stepped off of.  From there it was about 1.75 hours to San Diego.  Warm sun greeted us.  We rode the bus to downtown, from the airport, and I took Jason through the Maritime museum.  We also splurged a little on a lunch at Anthony's Seafood Bar & Grill.  I had an appetizer of clam chowder, and then a fish platter.

Included in the admission was a harbor cruise (which I didn't do last time I was in San Diego).  So we got about a 45 minute boat ride on an old harbor patrol boat that the museum operates.

At that point we still had some time to kill.  So we went to the Santa Fe Depot and took one of the trains to "Old Town".  When we got there we browsed a couple shops that we didn't find interesting.  However, we finally found Old Town hidden inside an old park.  It's not easy to find if you don't know what you're looking for.  We only had time to explore a couple buildings, one of them being a cigar shop, and a couple general stores.

We didn't leave without a couple samples, and made sure to grab one for a friend in Boise.  Unfortunately we didn't have enough time left to explore the rest of the shops.  It was pretty neat though, with everyone dressed up from the 1800's and running the stores.

We caught an Alaska flight back to Portland.  Our plan was, to hopefully run down to the Horizon gates and make the last flight into Boise for the night.  And if we were too late, we would be in position to catch the first flight into Boise the following morning.

Unfortunately for us, we were seated in the back of the plane and everyone took their sweet time getting off the plane.  Then, in the hurry to rush to the gate and make the cutoff time, we ran in the wrong direction.  When we finally made it to the Horizon gates we were 2 minutes late, and were stuck in Portland until morning.