On to Anchorage

Day 21, Thursday, August 13th

We woke up to a light rain, said our goodbyes to Beth and Scott, and by the time we were leaving Healey and on the road, it was pouring! It rained a good steady rain all the way to Anchorage. We had had some hope t get another glimpse of Mt. McKinley while driving down the highway to Anchorage, but the clouds were at treetop level with no mountains in sight.

Driving along, we got to Wasilla, of Sarah Palin fame. We stopped and had lunch at a great café. No sign of the Palin family, but a pretty little town once you got off the main highway running through town.

We then made another interesting stop at the Headquarters for the Iditarod Dogsled Race. This is the most famous, and one of the most difficult dogsled races in the country. Here is a little descriptions from their website: “You can’t compare it to any other competitive event in the world! A race over 1150 miles of the roughest, most beautiful terrain Mother Nature has to offer. She throws jagged mountain ranges, frozen river, dense forest, desolate tundra and miles of windswept coast at the mushers and their dog teams. Add to that temperatures far below zero, winds that can cause a complete loss of visibility, the hazards of overflow, long hours of darkness and treacherous climbs and side hills, and you have the Iditarod. A race extraordinaire, a race only possible in Alaska. From Anchorage, in south central Alaska, to Nome on the western Bering Sea coast, each team of 12 to 16 dogs and their musher cover over 1150 miles in 10 to 17 days.
http://www.iditarod.com/

At the Headquarters, they have all sorts of race photos and videos and paraphernalia that are really fun to look at. We were also finally able to get a few more questions answered about the people who took a dog team up to the top of Mt. McKinley. They actually did take a small dogsled and they arrived at the top with five dogs. They started with seven, but found that the dogs pulled too powerfully and had to send two back!

We got to meet the son and daughter-in-law of the man who started the race, and then, as a highlight, go on a ride in a wagon pulled by a team of actual Iditarod racing dogs. They went FAST! These dogs just love to pull. They are so beautiful and excited. As we were trying to decide if we should do the ride, another older woman who had just done it said, “Oh go ahead. Life is too short. And once you’ve done it, they can never take it away!” Good advice. Patti is smiling that she never intended to have this trip get her so interested in dog sledding, but it is really a fascinating subject. Who knew?

So now Anchorage. Alaska’s largest city. One of the statistics that really cracked us up was that there are over a thousand moose that live within Anchorage city limits! In the city, hanging out in parks and in people’s back yards! Okay! We are on the lookout for moose. They live amongst the nearly 280,000 city residents.

Today Dick was able to get the oil changed on the car and check that it was still in great shape. We have now put over 5,000 miles on since leaving home on July 23rd!

It was strange to go from supreme wilderness to the city, but there are also so many wonderful Alaskan experiences to be had here. We spent the late afternoon at an Imax movie about Alaska and then one on the Good Friday Alaskan Earthquake of 1964, the worst earthquake in all of North America. 9.2 on the Richter scale. Lots of damage, caused tsunamis and killed 114 people.

Supper was a couple different kinds of fish chowder (salmon and halibut) that were delicious. The evening was spent catching up on reading, phone calls and getting this blog back up and moving. Having a great time! More to come.