so it finally happened. i went to alaska to bask in the cold mist that is august in alaska. i've been wanting to go for about forever, and as i kid i always made my parents slow down on the road if i saw an alaskan licence plate. as such, one of the first things i did when we arrived (aside from sprinting out of the airport with a pair of binoculors, looking for bears) was take way too many pictures of licence plates.
this is what is looks like when you fly into anchorage. water, water, water, orca, water, land! also, and i'm not being coy here, alaska is REALLY far away. it took something like 12 hours from JFK. i should have thought about that at some point beforehand. and also, meagan and i sat next to the most annoying person on the plane into anchorage. why did that have to happen? we were clearly on a relationship trip, and were trying to play cards, and he was like,hey, what are those, cards? i would love to play. this guy was not my kind of guy, but he wasnt as bad as the old man who yelled at toby (for supporting capitalism, was it?) on the way to slovenia. that sucked.
anyhow, the aerodrome in anchorage is amazing because it's not a plane. also, there is stuffed 'wild' animals everywhere.
par example. this was at the luggage thingy, where there were many groups of men pickingup their guns to go hunting. i also saw a halibut the size of a car. neat.
this is what anchorage looked like when we arrived. it was cold and rainy, and because we were so tired from sitting next to professor choas we really didn't care.
we had a great meal of pizza and beer the first night at a place called the moose's tooth, and if you are in achorage i suggest you go because there are like 20 taps of their own beers. i was too tired to try them all, and during dinner meagan and i just sat and stared at the locals, thinking,"holy shit! these people are alaskans!" what the hell were they soing there?
the next morning meagan woke me up at 7am, we had huge breakfast at a place where everyone was chipper (actually, everyone in alaska was nice. what's up with that. they would just wave to you if they walked by. weird.) and then strolled around through the rain. meh.
there really wasn't much to do in anchorage if you dont have a car, so we ended up walking like 10 miles, trying to see the sites. during this day three good things happened: meagan spotted giant salmons,we both had amzing pie at a place called peggy's, and we ate what i think we both considered to be the freshest fish ever at a place called humpy's.
the salmon really were that big.
after anchorage we rented a car and drove north to find wild animals and maybe some more pie.
i really couldn't get over the scenery, and i have about 40 pictures like this one.
this is by the entrance to denali national park.
and this was just outside fairbanks.
we camped in fairbanks and then took in a museum that was stellar. the artisit of a current exhibition had great pictures and stories about the wildlife he took pictures of, stories like being attacked and pecked in the neck by snow owls. however, this guy was recently pulled from his tent and eaten by a bear. yikes.
everyone i spoke with had harrowing stories about bears/moose/cayotes. but not polar bears. the only sight i ever saw of polar bears was in a biker bar where some dude had hung up pictures of polar bears he had killed.
this was a big bear. and there were similar ones to this one everywhere. and i mean everywhere, like in restaurants.
after the museum i stared at a golf course, hoping meagan would suggest that i play. that didn't happen, so we drove north to chena hot springs and saw this. it's funny, because when we first arrived we were pulling off the road and taking pictures of all the really beautiful things, but by the end of the trip were kinda inured to all the beauty. meh,another rainbow. meh, another bald eagle.
the hotsprings was kinda like that show on nikelodeon, 'hey dude.' it was hokey,but we camped for cheap and the hotsprings was amazing. i think i'm finally cured of my monsterism. we also saw some "fresh" bear skat and bear print in the mud immediately off a trail we were hiking. awesome. i would have totally chased that bear.
i found a twinke for breakfast at our hotsprings campsite, but meagan didn't care because we woke up at 2am to see the northern lights but nothing ever materialized. (it did happen the next night, but we didn't try and wake up for it. shit.)
driving south from the hotsprings we saw a cow and her calf on the road. i mean, like right in front of us. being the super-duper idiots we are, we walked up to them, not knowing that if the cow saw us as a threat she would murder our faces off.
ok, after riding the moose for a while we went camping in denali park...
where i saw this jem. it may be better than the moose.
this is one of the many glacial streams in the park. meh, glacial stream.
and this is the view from our tour bus. insane. i mean, really insane.
fortunately for us, our tour guide was amazing and had great information to share about the park. unfortunately, he liked to read his poetry over the load speaker as he drove. also, this was the only caribou i got a picture of. crap. i did see one other caribou much closer, and it had antlers till tuesday, but it was in 5-foot tall brush and i couldn't get a decent shot of it.
braided glacial streams. meh.
yeah, so this is a bear. a wild, grizzly bear. with claws and teeth designed to make it easier to eat me. in it's grizzly mouth, where it has bear teeth. holy shit.
our tour guide made it know that bears really dont like meat and would much rather prefer to eat other things, like tobys. i also learned that moose eat something like 90 pounds of twigs every day, just like the wild alaskan toby!
this was the main cabin at one of the hostels where we stayed. it was great because all people talked about were bear/cayote attacks and close encounters. it was sweet.
this is mount mckinley, the highest peak in north america. meh.
ditto
ok, in this pic i was trying to photo document a blad eagle that was flying alongside our car for a bit. i couldn't get him in the pic, but as you can see, driving south to the kenai from anchorage is ahhh....beautiful. this is cook inlet and there are belugas in there. mooo!
we spent a day in seward where glaciars meet the bright blue water.
and we toured the marine life museum/aquarium. amazing. i learned that birds can swim.
i also learned that although giant crabs can really freak you out, they cannot give you crabs.
this may be the best pic. we camped right on the water by a glacier in downtown seard. we also had the best dinner of the trip in this weird, old town. fish, beers, dessert. incredible.
the view from inside the tent. sigh.
awakening in the tent.
ok, this is the sight driving into homer from seward. again, mountains and ocean.
embiggen this so you can see what i'm talking about. like most other places we went, it was too beautiful and looked more like a set in hollywood.
for our last night we rented a cabin on a farm on the beach. that's right. you heard me. a farmonthe beach. (the farm is actually owned and run by Jewel's aunt. funny.) anyhow, this was our private beach-front view.
and this was the cabin.
it's hard to see here, but the view was amazing. the tide was in when we arrived, but when we came back with supplies for dinner, the tide had gone out like 400 yards. what the hell?
in conclusion, we drove like 1200 miles and had great weather every single day but the first. i can't wait to go back with the idiots and get mauled by a puffin.
