Anchorage and home!

Anchorage was a very nice city to spend a couple of days. The first night in we made it to the Captain Cook (a 5 star hotel) and were very underwhelmed. I thought it would be a great place to end our trip, but the pool was not included in the $220 a night room fee. They wanted $10 a piece for pool priveliges. That would be $100 for two days for the family, about the price of a season pass in Tremont! Well, I went down to the desk and pointed that out nicely, and told them we traveled 5,000 miles to get here by car, and they signed me up for the Captains Club for free! I felt like Mark Scott... Well, the toilet shifted when you sat on it, the bathroom fan was broken, and the TV's were consoles - So we had to watch the "Truman Show" on the laptop. Then when the guys went down to swim, we were told that Mitch and Joshua could not swim because they could only swim at certain times, and this ain't it. So we did not swim in Anchorage (although Cory and Chris go in fine. Go figure...)
Well, the next day we did laundry, and then head out to eat lunch with the Yar's (Scott, Elizabeth, Scotty, Tabitha, and the other one). It was a blast to talk with real Alaskan's. That night we watched the "Truman Show" and went to bed at midnight.
The next morning we layed around on our bed and watched Dirty Harry movies. We tried the swimming thing, but that didn't work, so we took a hike to Flattop Mountain. It was an awesome hike, and we got in way over our heads. At the top of the mountain, it was very rocky and Mark got a big gash on his leg during a landslide. There were people there (Alaskan's probably) with little kids on their shoulders hiking up this thing. I thought I was going to loose one of the boys! Chris and Cory waited about half way up, but me and the boys made it to the top. Then, when we started going down, Mitchell cut himself on a rock and it started bleading like crazy. I ripped some strips of my shirt and made a bandage, and we started our descent. It was quite a site! Mitch had a blood soaked rag on his hand, and we were all filthy. We made it down, however, and have a good memory!

That night we tried to nap, but excitement was pretty high for the plane ride home. We drove to the airport, parked the van and we were off! It was a blast on the plane, as everything Mitch and Joshua saw was new to them. I watched a movie on the first flight, and the kids watched a movie on the second. We met Brian, Adam and Matt at Ohare and had a great talk with them, and then took the Farney van home. The drive home was uneventful. It was good to be home.

Our next vacation...

Denali...

The trip from Tok to Denali was our last big drive. We stopped in Delta Junction to celebrate the end of the Alcan. Available for purchase were certificates for $1 that are signed by the local travel guides saying that you completed the Alcan; an option we turned down.

We spent the afternoon in Fairbanks, but it is a city the size of Pekin, so we just ate lunch there (a great Italian meal) and left. The picture of the fountain is in down town Fairbanks on the riverfront. On to Denali!



The first night in Denali was warm. We have really figured out this tent thing. When we awoke, we took our time getting ready, then went White Water Rafting. Since these are glaciar fed rivers, we had to wear lots of clothing and these "Dry Suits" that really did keep us dry. Since we went to alaska without any coats (doh!) we had to borrow some clothing from the rafting place. The first part of the trip was an easy float trip. I sat next to an 81 year old woman (Angelica) and her grand daughter Zoe. Angelica was born in Germany and was a hoot. She had two replacement hips and was scared to death of any whitewater. On the second half of the trip, sans Angelica and Zoe, we got to do class 3 and 4 rapids. It was really awesome! We have concluded that the Juchems family is not going to waste time on class 1 and 2 anymore. We finished the day with a meal in town and hit the sack. This was the night we were afraid of, since the weather report said it was going to get down to 43. However, when we awoke on Saturday, July 1, were were toasty warm. I did turn Mr. Heater on at about 3am, but I am not sure we needed it.

The top of the "Big Mountain"Denali was awesome, but not quite as awesome as we thought. The top of the mountain was unseen by us. It is never visible from the gate of the park, so you have to take these shuttle busses into the park. Well, we took the "Fish Creek" bus which goes about half way into the park. It was an 8 hour trip but you can get out at any time and just take off walking. Our intention was to get out and hike a bit and then get back on a return bus, but we were afraid we could not get a return bus for a while. So we had an 8 hour bus ride! Chris and I really enjoyed it, but the kids slept most of the way. We saw 8 grizzly bears, two moose, some caribou and a ground squirl (at 5:30) along with some beautiful scenery. The grizzly bear pictures were a little dissapointing because of the distance, but trust us, we saw them. Our bus driver's name was Lee and he was an older guy that had done everything. He gave us a commentary during the trip that was great. When we got to Denali, the clouds were covering it. I did get a picture of the base of the mountain.

This is the base of Denali (I think).

After the big bus ride, we drove to Anchorage (about 4pm) and got to the Captain Cook at about 8:30...