Day 1 - Anchorage

For what should be obvious reasons, I decided against posting about the vacation we are currently on on this blog before we return to town. Our house is occupied, the kids are well taken care of, but why push the boundaries?

As I write this I am actually sitting on the 8th floor of a hotel in Fairbanks, Alaska.

Most people reading this blog have a fair idea of where Anchorage is (southcentral AK - pretty much draw a line straight down and a little to the west from the Fairbanks dot on the map to the right!) - about 300 miles south of where we are now.

A while back, we had a little windfall and Allen talked his mom into coming to visit/take care of the kids while we went on a vacation. We've only been married 8 years and haven't really done anything like this since our honeymoon! With a new baby coming soon it's unlikely/impractical that any adult-getting-away time would occur in the next couple years so despite the fact that I'm basically term with this pregnancy, we planned a trip around the state.

We started off (as all things have to, if you're leaving town) with an Alaska Airlines flight to Anchorage. The flight crew was in excellent moods - the pilot came and addressed the passengers directly instead of via the PA, and the stewards had a good time with it. They said we "couldn't have picked a better day to fly" and indeed, the flight was quite pleasant and smooth! I've been on some really nasty flights in the past so it's always nice to have clear weather and relatively smooth conditions.

Once we landed in Anchorage, we obtained our rental car (booked at a discount - the whole thing cost us $20, tax included) and did a little shopping. Anchorage traffic is always a little overwhelming to me - the drivers are pretty aggressive, people are all in a hurry and there are a TON of them! I grew up north of Anchorage in the Mat Su Valley so it's not as if I'm unfamiliar with Anchorage and the surrounding area, but every time we come back in it seems a little more big-city-ish.

We went out to dinner - saved the leftovers for Day 2 (more on that in a bit!) and retired to our hotel for the evening. We didn't want to shop too much - any trip by a bush Alaska resident to a town like Anchorage involves massive amounts of shopping - Costco, Wal-Mart, specialty stores we don't have (craft stores, salons, etc.) because we had a big day the next day and needed to keep our luggage contained.

More in the next post!