Day Eleven - Debarkation

Yesterday was a long, sad day. Packed up and ready the night before, out of the stateroom by 7am, too tired to eat. Vancouver was warm and muggy, although I did get some nice shots of the forested landscape, the Lion's Gate Bridge (yes, it's just a bridge, but that's not the point) and some little lighthouses and interesting buildings.

We met with others leaving for similar destinations at 7:30am, said goodbye to the people we'd spent some time with and were herded through the terminal and onto the waiting bus around 8am. When the border guard came to inspect our passports he asked if I was bringing in any goods from Canada. I said, "We were only in the terminal," and everyone laughed. Our driver, Pascale, was originally from New Orleans with a fabulous Cajun accent and told us all about the Vancouver/Seattle areaa on our 3 hour ride back to the Sea-Tac Airport. She was great. I snapped the Space Needle from the bus.



We flew out at 3:05pm Seattle time (6:05 local) on Alaska Air for our return trip, which meant no use of digital cameras on takeoff/landing (?), no movies and no complimentary food on the long trip home. They offered a snack for $5.00 but I'd already bought a bagel sandwich at the airport for $8.00, so I'd had enough overpriced food for the day. We sat with a family with two girls under three, which was entertaining or loud depending on the point in the trip. Tracy, Terry, Melissa and Rebecca were from Juneau and would be visiting New York and Toronto. It was fun to be the tour guide for a change, giving them the local time for their watches, pointing out landmarks on our descent and giving them advice as to what to see. I got a nice picture of the sun setting behind us around 10:30pm local time.

We arrived around 11:20pm, got our bags pretty quickly and climbed into a taxi. I started my lonely car in front of Karen's around 12:20am and fell into bed around 1:20am. I can't believe it's over. But I will enjoy the memories and pictures for a long, long time.

Day Ten - at sea

It’s so foggy outside they have to keep sounding the horn. I'm glad I took a "leaving Ketchikan" picture earlier. The “Princess Patter” gave us a long list of bodies of water and landmarks – Hecate Strait, the Queen Charlotte Islands, Vancouver Island, Blackney Passage, Johnstone Strait towards scenic Race Passage, Seymour Narrows, Discovery Passage, the Straits of Georgia and finally the Lion’s Gate Bridge to our berth in Canada Place. It looks like we may not see many of them. I’ve heard it’s also very rainy in Vancouver. We have to be completely out of the cabin/stateroom by 7am and at the disembarkation point by 7:30. The bus leaves at 9am and I hope the entire 90 minutes in between isn’t taken up with the embarkation and inspection process. We should at least be able to take some pictures of Vancouver, since the park is directly across the street. I know it’s a business and they have to have time to make ready for the incoming passengers but it makes the last day much too long for us.

The fog started to lift after we left Vancouver Island (I only know we were there because we stopped to pick up Canadian pilots. There must be some legal issues with having ships piloted in Canadian waters by other than Canadian nationals) and now we can see foggy, snow-capped, tree-lined mountains, very much like the Alaskan coast.

I’m putting off packing because I just learned that Canada doesn’t allow ANY liquids in our carry-ons – not the 3-ounce bottles we bought specifically to comply with the US regulations, not even my tiny bottle of hand sanitizer. I don’t know how I’m going to do this. I may have to check my carry-on. Sigh. This is way too much trouble to go through for a country I’m not even visiting.

I’m going aft now to check out the last sunset of the cruise. I hope to get online from the airport to post this before I get home. I’ll have to wait to sort out my 350 pictures.

Oh - we did pick up the people we left in Juneau. I never spoke to them, but that must have been quite a story.

Day Nine - Ketchikan

Last stop, getting in at 10:00am unless the missing people caused us to be late. I still don’t know if they’re on board. I can see forest outside our window. Our “Princess Patter,” the flyer they distribute each night to brief us on the next day’s destination and activities, says that clocks are being turned ahead one hour tonight, as if we weren’t already confused enough. The farther south we go, the earlier the sun sets. I heard there was a normal sunset yesterday but I missed it. We’ve decided it’s only been really setting since we left Glacier Bay. Alaska is on its own schedule.

We disembarked at Ketchikan and learned that the late people did not make it to the ship before we left Juneau. I hope they got to Ketchikan.

We went for a walk in town after breakfast. This tunnel is in the Guinness Book of Records because there are stairs next to it, roads over and through it, and, at low tide, room for boats to go under it.

We were on the tour to Totem Bight. I’d never heard of a bight before, but the spellchecker has. It's a wide bay formed by a bend or curve in the shoreline. We got to see a nesting bald eagle and her mate, who also screamed for us throughout our visit. Got some decent shots of him and some of the rainforest, too. There was a clear path for the tourists and the rest of the forest floor was mostly muskeg (bogs) covered with sphagnum moss. Our tour guide, Tanya, was fantastic. She is from the lower 48 and came to Alaska eight years ago because she’d been to all the other 49, and then ended up staying on. She was adopted into the Tlingit (pronounced Klinkit) tribe, which is very rare, because she reminded the chief of his late sister. Her Tlingit name means “Princess of a Prince, who gives everything away.” She told us about potlatches, which are kind of like feasts where gifts are given to all the guests and everything you have with you is a gift. She didn’t realize that included the car she drove to the party. Fortunately, the Tlingit man she gave her car to married her a few years later and she got her car back. She explained totem poles and the types (honor, dishonor, funereal, memorial, storytelling, identification and family, I think were all of them). Contrary to what I thought, they have little or no spiritual significance. She gave us some general reading hints (red bodies mean a bloody death, adornment with faces indicates power, upside-down characters are dead, feathered headdress indicates a woman) and was very interesting. Although all of the guides, without exception, said they loved their jobs, Tanya didn’t have to tell us in so many words. It was obvious. She told a funny story about a recent upgrade to the Ketchikan “International” Airport. They had the same automatic doors that most airports have, where a sensor in the mat opens the door. One day a baby black bear stepped on the mat and climbed onto the baggage carousel, entertaining one and all until mama bear tracked him down and stepped on that same mat. They called wildlife services from under cover, got the bears safely into a helicopter and off to the forest when a second baby stepped on the mat! Back comes the helicopter and the process started again. Needless to say, there are no more automatic doors at the Ketchikan Airport.

Caught the sunset at 10pm while sitting on the balcony with some mint tea. Goodbye, Alaska. Sigh.

Day Eight - Juneau

We got here while we were asleep, so there are no arrival pictures. Since Juneau is the state capitol, I thought this was our best chance at civilization and shipwide wifi. I am still out of luck. Surprisingly, the only port so far that had wifi was Whittier – our embarkation point. If I’d known that, I would have logged on sooner while we were there. Vancouver will probably have it but I don’t know how much opportunity there will be to use it.

There is a lot to see and do here in Juneau. We are only taking a quick tour and a visit to Mendenhall Glacier, which is apparently the main feature here, but there are hiking, fishing, flying and zipline tours. Who knew there was an Alaskan rainforest?

Mendenhall is much more visible than Margerie and much more accessible, although I overheard a man saying he never wanted to get on another bus for the rest of his life. By the time I realized there was a path to the waterfall next to the glacier, I didn’t have time to get there and back before the bus came back to pick us up. One of the park service workers was a Brendan Caley from Wisconsin and he was fun to talk to. Another was a Juneau native who’d never left the state until last year when he went to college in Utah. Cute blond boy. I asked what he thought. He said he found it very dry compared to rainy Juneau and was surprised by the sunny days and blue sky. “I always thought the sky was white.” Plus, the weather was more variable there and he didn't like getting into a hot car and burning his hand on the seatbelt hardware. Juneau is probably the most temperate area in Alaska, with a mean winter temperature of 32 degrees. He said it does occasionally get “pretty dang hot” as in the 90s, but the norm is in the 70s for summer. He said he couldn’t possibly take anything in the 100s and he’d probably melt.

I did get beautiful pictures, and also snapped the taxidermy of the glacier (black) bear and Alexander Archipelago Wolf. Our bus driver said there are four colors of black bear: black, brown, glacier grey and something else that I don’t remember. He also said that since much of Juneau was carved out by the Mendenhall Glacier which pressurized the landscape, the ground is actually rising about an inch a year. We learned that there is a spot in Juneau called the triple threat because it’s on a fault line, a flood zone and an avalanche area. That’s where they built their school complex. Not exactly kid friendly.

We saw several bald eagles from a distance on the bus. The time at the glacier was much longer than we were originally told, which left no time to see any of Juneau on our own. I asked if we could be dropped off in town to save us the walking-back-to-town time, which gave a handful of us about 35 minutes to wander, take pics, pick up souvenirs and get back to the ship by all aboard. It was really rushed and harsh but I did pick up the little nothings I wanted and we were right on time. Saw two bald eagles from the cabin but they were flying, so I couldn’t take pictures of them. It took the last-minuters not quite 10 minutes to board and then it turned out that three people were still missing. They have such tight security here that I can’t imagine anyone sneaking on without being detected but I was told that is more often the case than that they were left in town. The captain announced that if they didn’t call in and they weren’t found after scouring the ship within a few minutes of our scheduled departure time of 4pm, we were leaving. We left 15 minutes late and there was no announcement as to whether we left with or without them. Lucy, we’re ho-ome! I spoke to a crew member at the front desk and she said if the missing people were crew, there would be no waiting for them, they would have to meet the ship at the next port and then gather up their stuff and go home, no questions asked. I guess the rest of the crew would have to pick up the slack.

Harris and Mingdhi, breakfast companions from the other day, took the Glacier Gardens Rainforest tour and we met up with them at the glacier. He shared some of his pictures with us. You would never think to find that type of flora in Alaska. There were some trees that died, were re-planted upside-down and the roots covered with flowers. I don’t know what kind of trees or why they died. But it was strange and beautiful.

Day Seven - Skaguay

So many of the cruisers are itching to get back on dry land. I love the water and could stay here forever. I could so work on a cruise ship. Karen said I could do the rail coach tour guide job except that I would spend too much time talking to individual passengers and never get to all of them. I could do it if my job depended on it, though.

We woke up this morning and opened the curtains to a wall of trees. It was very surreal. It must be a cliff face or something, but there seem to be ads painted at the bottom. I just turned on the cruise channel on the tv and the cruise director said that it’s a mountain and the paintings are the logos for cruise lines that come/have come to Skaguay. I don’t understand the purpose, but that’s fine.

Skaguay is very tiny. The temps don’t seem to be going below 50 degrees anywhere, which is great. Perfect walking weather for me, although the southerners are sporting everything from sweaters to earmuffs. There is one main street named Broadway, which is funny because we went to “the biggest little theater on Broadway”. It was a little show about “Soapy Smith” a con artist who was instrumental in establishing Skaguay and then was found out and shot. The actor who played Soapy, Jonathan Baldwin, graduated from my high school. Small world. I took a picture of practically the entire town from the end of the street, where there is a Centennial Park and a statue commemorating the snow fleet and the establishment of Skaguay in 1897. They also have a little airport as many towns here do, but this one is an international airport because they fly in and out of nearby Canada. They are also the only international airport without a control tower, which may or may not be a good thing. The tour really had nowhere to take us except to a lookout point, which was beautiful. There was a historic cemetery tour, which got surprisingly good reviews from people I spoke to. I will say it again – everywhere you look is a picture.

Had a flashback to that I Love Lucy episode where she got left behind on their cruise. So far, so good. Our cruise cards are our IDs, credit cards and boarding passes. We have to pop them into a machine on our way out and then show them at three different checkpoints on our way in, including the machine and a baggage x-ray. My guess is that the machine logs us in and out like a time clock.

Karen wanted to see the Motown show and asked only that I sit through one song with her. Assuming it was the same group we saw on Tuesday (I can only tell what day it is by the destination), I was leery and rightly so. These guys are so white they almost define the expression. Almost completely "soul"less. There’s one guy who is always just a touch behind the beat and he annoyed me. They came bouncing onto the stage and I was ready to bounce out of the seat right then. I dutifully sat through the song and when they started the second, I left for less scary destinations and more photo ops.

I invited Karen to read the blog today and she wondered why I wasn’t talking about the food. I suppose it’s because it’s not all that important to me in the scheme of things and it’s my blog. I will say that I like the buffet because of the choices and portion control, and if I don’t like something, I don’t feel obligated to tell anyone and can just leave it on my plate. Not so with the dry duck a l’orange we ordered from the assigned restaurant last night. Karen wanted to eat there at least a few times as long as we were here, so I had escargot last night for the second time in my life. They were excellent. I offered one to Karen and she not only enjoyed it, but took the dish from me so that she could put some bread in the garlicky sauce. She wanted me to say that she had cold cucumber soup last night (thumbs down) and iced pineapple/banana soup tonight (thumbs slightly up). She had some trouble saying beluga and it came out “bugela”. She didn’t ask me to add that, though. Our busboy was Raj and he was adorable.

Day Six - Glacier Bay National Park

Glacier Bay is such a historic and wildlife-rich place that there are no shipboard activities while we’re here. There is only a lecture in the library that is being simultaneously broadcast into the cabins (and to which I’m listening as I type). He is talking about conservation, which is refreshing but incongruous in this atmosphere of luxury and excess.

There are no words to describe the landscape of mountains, glaciers and water. We saw a bald eagle sitting on the ice, otters (from a distance), and the Margerie Glacier doing a little “calving”- splitting off of some ice. I actually caught that on camera! It sounds like thunder – just like I imagined an avalanche would sound. Then we went into Cooks Inlet and saw the Johns Hopkins Glacier, in a cove where the stellar seals have a protected habitat. Afterwards, we sailed to the Marvel Islands in the hope of seeing some sea lions, who were asleep on the tiny beach and hard to make out.

We went to the show again, this time starring Mickey Finn and his wife, Cathy Reilly. Cathy is a former Miss America contestant and the only woman to be inducted into the National Banjo Players Association. I never heard of them, but they are (or used to be) pretty well known. Their show was totally hokey and, although she was creative and obviously talented, I didn’t like the sound of the banjo with songs that weren’t meant to be heard on it. Karen said I don't have to sit through these shows with her anymore as long as I don't make her walk in alone.

Had a late dinner afterwards (lunch kept me full through dinner time) from where I finally saw whales for the first time, ever! Not their whole bodies, mind you, but puffing from the blowholes and back and fluke several times over. Thank you, Lord. It was amazing.

Day Five - College Fjord

Woke up early, anyway. It finally feels colder but I don’t know the temperature. My guess would be low 50s. Took more pictures of the ridiculously amazing scenery. It was still overcast but the naturalist said it’s actually very clear because the tops of the mountains and glaciers are visible. They reflected in the clear water of the cove and it was totally breathtaking. She told us that we were 4½ miles out from Harvard Glacier at the mouth of the fjord, which is much closer than they usually get. I looked up the name of the area and learned that it's called College Fjord because exploration of the area was funded by the Ivy League schools. Along with Harvard Glacier, there are glaciers named for Bryn Mawr, Wellesley, Yale and others. Glacier ice is far more dense than other ice and is a striking, bright blue. I have space on my memory card for over 800 pictures and at this rate I might take almost that many. I hope my camera batteries last the trip!!

Went to the show called “Piano Man.” It was cute. It’s now almost 10pm and I’m starting to see blue sky for the first time in two days. This is one of the only times in my life when awesome is one of the only truly appropriate words to describe what I’m looking at. It’s hard to believe it could get any better. I can’t imagine what the Garden of Eden could have been like, if this is the fallen world. Just incredible.

Day Four - Embarkation!

We were too tired to brave the three-hour round trip it would take to spend time in charming Talkeetna when we arrived yesterday and had to be at the lodge for our ride back to our train by 11:30 this morning, takealongs packed and ready in the hallway by 7am for the last time until next week. Bummer.

Talkeetna station is too small (i.e. almost non-existent) to cope with the Princess Tour ship traffic, so they actually set up a separate area especially for the Princess coaches. It is literally in the middle of nowhere, with two port-a-potties and a gravel parking area next to a random part of the main train tracks. Too funny.

Our train to Whittier is one owned by Alaska Rail and leased to Princess Cruises, and it’s different from yesterday’s train. These cars have only one level, windows up the sides and curved almost all the way to the top of the roof, with tables and seats more like diner booths and open space under the banquettes for our carry-ons. We were at the end, again, but this time there was only good news. It was a four-seat grouping and no one was in the booth across from us, so the couple we were initially sitting with, Susan and Jim, moved over and we each had an entire booth to spread out in. No smoking is allowed even on the platforms between the cars this time, so there won’t be any residuals wafting through each time the doors open. We were told by Nicole that this trip passes a lot of wildlife, such as moose, caribou, bald eagles, bears and tundra swans. As I type this (1:52pm Alaska time), we are zooming through the forest at a great clip, so they must all be on vacation, too. It looks like we may be outrunning the overcast. Or maybe it’s just my bleary eyes. I never would have thought that so much sitting could be so exhausting. This was the best of the transports, though, because it was roomier and we kept popping up to take pictures. Everywhere we turn is a sight to remember. It’s crazy.

We arrived at the ship, the Island Princess, around 7pm and wandered around, trying to find our cabin. Then we enjoyed a quick buffet dinner and the fantastically entertaining (not!) muster session was upon us. A necessary evil, I know, but I wish someone would tell these people that those lame jokes sound as embarrassing to us as they do to those telling them. And somehow those lifejackets never get any more attractive or less cumbersome. Ran into Paulette who lost Judy in the muster session, and the couple I sat with at the Aurora Symphony, whoever they may be. Had some giggles.

It’s 10pm and we’re just hanging out in the adorable cabin on Aloha Deck 12, practically next to the bridge (and, happily for Karen, right below the buffet). We have a little balcony with a sliding glass door and I keep running out there to take the most amazing pictures. I may never do anything else the whole time! The weather is still overcast and it’s looked to be about 5pm EDT for most of the day. It still does. It seems there may not be ship-wide wifi except in port, either. I will have to make do with that, as the access provided in the meantime is sporadic and satellite-driven at $.40 per minute, but only if you purchase 250 minutes at a time! We are staying on the ship for the next two days and getting off in Skaguay on Thursday for tours and such. It feels so good to finally unpack and not be living out of my tote. And no getting up just to pack my pjs and park my bag outside at 7am - yea!

Where are we?

Day Three: Denali/Talkeetna

We had to be up, packed and out the door by 6am to get on the waiting tour bus. Most of us are still jet lagged, so it's quite the experience. This vacation thing is stressful! Denali National Park is big and...big. We drove around a lot looking for wildlife and seeing just a mama moose and her baby while still at the first stop. Saw one Dall sheep through someone's telescope, some snowshoe hares a little too close up (I didn't have to use the zoom to take the picture - no fear), a single harlequin duck and a gray jay (a blue jay, except not). Went to the interpretive section of the park and saw a model home that the railroad people would have stayed in. The mosquito is apparently the unofficial state bird of Alaska. They should stock repellent with their courtesy shampoos. Maybe instead of them. Seriously. Then on to the Visitor's Center in a place that begins with a P (Primrose?) to meet up with a Native Alaskan, another Athabascan Indian named Lindy Alexander (Dixie's cousin). He told us what it was like growing up in the bush off the land. Showed us some snowshoes and Native clothing, joked around. I asked if it was fun for him. He said sometimes, but it was getting old. I can't even imagine.

The permafrost has an interesting effect on the trees. It was hard to photograph from the bumpy school bus, but certain sections are referred to as the “drunken forest” because the trees literally lean in different directions due to their struggle for survival. The bus tour took about 4 hours including stops and then we had to wait another hour and a half at the train station where the weather finally started to cool down, in order to take another 4 hour trip to the hotel 40 miles from Mt. McKinley. It's more of a layover than anything else, since we have to leave again for Anchorage/Whittier by noon.

The double-decker train to the next hotel had a dining room downstairs in each car and nice plush seats up, mostly set up the same as the dining car with little tables planted between facing seats. We ate with Paulette and Judy, who are sisters and funny. We were at a tiny table at the end, with all the room we could want to stash our stuff. That was the good news. The bad news was that we were at a tiny table at the end, where we were overlooked for much of the trip. We were so tired it didn’t matter much. One interesting thing Penny, the tour guide, pointed out was the “Hundred Year Meadow”. Beavers are very active in this area and when they build a lodge, silt eventually fills in behind it and they have to build another one. This process repeats itself year after year and the clearing we passed took about a hundred years to reach a point where there was no river left for the beavers to dam up. She also told a may-or-may-not-be-true story about little Cantwell. It’s remote, as are many towns in the interior, and there aren’t many televisions around, so the locals would gather at the bar. One night, they were watching America’s Most Wanted and whispered to each other that the bartender looked a lot like the man they were profiling on the show. They contacted the FBI and a team was sent to check out the situation. Sure enough, the bartender was one of the ten most wanted. They met with the mayor and while he was out of the room, they conferred with each other and decided that the mayor looked familiar, too. Sure enough, the mayor was also one of the ten most wanted. Ever since, they’ve said you can’t hide well in Cantwell. They told us "funny" jokes ("Do Juneau the capitol of Alaska?") and that the town the tv show Northern Exposure was modeled after, Talkeetna, was where the train stopped so that we could be driven yet ANOTHER hour to the Mt. McKinley Princess Lodge in Denali State Park. I don't know what the difference is between the state and national parks but it was exhausting. The coach driver, like the others, talked pretty much non-stop. He showed us where the electric support stopped and total self-sustenance began, and said the hotel was completely self-sustaining. The Mt. McKinley Lodge was very nice, with a neat trick to help the guests remember exactly how high Denali is - the main restaurant is called the "Twenty three twenty" - 20,320 feet. Even forty miles away and half obscured, it was an impressive sight. Met a really fun young man at the front desk of the hotel. We chatted silliness and hot sauce for 40 minutes after I asked what I needed to ask. Then he thought I should see the Aurora Symphony show featuring photography by Leroy Zimmerman(?), which was so amazing that it looked more like Industrial Light and Magic than reality. We couldn't find Karen, who was busy being tired and wondering why I was hanging out at the desk for so long, so she missed out on her free ticket. Signed up for a "wake-up" call in case Mt. McKinley/Denali came out to play while I was asleep and took a picture of half of it in case that was all we were going to see - which, as it turned out, it was. Right now, it's 11:15 Alaska time and it looks like maybe 7pm. They tell me the sun grazes the mountains sometime after midnight and then just arcs back up again. At this rate, I'll be able to see for myself!

The day has finally arrived!

Day one: June 20, 2008

Karen is taking me along with her on a fabulous trip to Alaska. I've tried not to think about it for months because I'd never be able to think of anything else but this is it. It's finally here. Slept some – so excited! Made my granola last night for the long, provisionless plane trip. I was so tired that I couldn’t remember what I’d packed, so I unpacked twice before setting out. Argh!

Got to the airport on time but didn’t have my luggage properly balanced for walking through the corridors. Finally figured it out after we got to the airport in Seattle.

The trip out was beautiful – clear weather, interesting terrain below. This pic looks like clouds, I know, but it's actually the Rocky Mountains. (Click on it to see it full size.) I was assigned an aisle seat but there was no one else in my row, so I sat staring out the window and taking pictures for most of the 5 hours and 20-some minutes, occasionally glancing at the two movies they showed on the little screens hanging from the overhead sections. The first one was Definitely Maybe - I think. I don’t know what the second one was. Kate Hudson, Matthew McConaughey and buried treasure. Was parched and the fabulous Farook kept me supplied with water. He said I’d had one and a half of those large (two liter?) bottles by the end of the flight and I sloshed my way onto the gangway.

Seattle/Tacoma (Sea-Tac) Airport sits in the shadow of Mount Rainier. Just beautiful. And the whole area is very green. The airport is small and the old section has wooden floors. They have bronzish fish inlaid into the other floors. Very cute.

The flight was punctuated by musical outbursts from a May Palmer, an outspoken former Rhode Islander who was going to sing for the troops in Fairbanks. She and Karen talked the entire three hours. I tried to sleep.

The hotel was about five minutes from the airport. Serviceable, with wireless access in all of the rooms. Had dinner under the scariest chandelier ever. We're in Alaska!! I can't believe it.



I took pictures out of our sunny hotel window at 9:30pm, 3:30am and 7:50am Alaska time. The Weather Channel said sunset was around 12:30am and sunrise around 2:50. I have to check that tomorrow.

Our take-along bags that we didn’t want to lug had to be outside our room for pickup by 7am to be brought to the next stop, so we had to be pretty much ready to go by then. Not exactly relaxing.

Day Two: June 21, 2008 – Fairbanks

Took Karen’s advice and stayed up as late as I could to get acclimated to local time. Unfortunately, she didn’t take it and woke me up at 4:45am after I’d fallen asleep around 10pm. At least we were up in plenty of time to be packed for our 7am baggage pick up. We left for our Discovery Riverboat tour along the Chena River at 8am and it was slow and entertaining and lovely on a sunny, 82-degree day. (Who knew I'd get sunburned in Alaska?) Fairbanks has the broadest temperature range in practically the entire state - down to 60 below zero in winter and well into the 90's in summer. We saw scenery, sled dogs, fish skinning, costume making and old hunting structures. Susan Butcher, the famous three-year consecutive Iditarod winner, lived here. Her husband, Bill Munson, and daughter, Jessie, showed us the dogs and talked about raising, training and living with them. When there's no snow, they run the dogs around a mile-long dirt track pulling Bill on a quad with the engine removed to take the place of a sled. I took a cute portrait of Cobra, who was very excited to see us. We also saw Dixie Alexander, who skinned a salmon with warp speed and does the most amazing skin and beadwork. Her costumes are on display nationally, including at the Smithsonian. She said it takes 6 to 7 months to complete one, not counting the tanning. She was amazing. Our guides were two Alaska University students, Rebecca and Ida. Rebecca is an Athabascan Indian (that's her posing in the handmade parka with the sunburst hood) and Ida is a Yupik Eskimo. I wanted to take a picture of them together but Rebecca was off somewhere, so I got Ida and Liz, instead. Liz is also an Athabascan Indian, from a town of 100 people about 500 miles away. The temperature continued to rise and by the time we got off the boat, it was well over 80 degrees. Just like home. I couldn't believe it. This is the summer soltice, the longest day of the year. It's a very big deal in a place where the sun doesn't shine at all for months at a time. There was a street fair in Fairbanks proper and there were various celebrations planned under the midnight sun, which, of course, we would have to miss. We had another three hours on a coach to Denali National Park (on which the driver talked non-stop about the history, government, schools, his family, etc.), where we're staying at the largest hotel in the entire state of Alaska – the Denali Princess Wilderness Lodge. Nine hundred rooms in several buildings scattered over a complex shaped like a hilly figure eight right next to the Chulitna River. The scenery is fantastic – almost impossible to believe. I may replace yesterday's sunshine pics because it's so much more amazing here. Poor Fairbanks.