Anchorage, Day 1

We got woke up this morning to gray skies and light rain.  I say got woke up because the lodge was built like an old western street with the wooden walkway.  That was cute, but there was a problem.  It was very noisy when someone walked along the walkway.  We had the room closest to the office.  Starting at 6:00 everyone in rooms above ours must have gone to the lobby for coffee at least 5 times.  We didn’t get any sleep after 6:00.  I imagine the same thing happened yesterday but we were too tired to be disturbed.  Light rain didn't help our messy car.  We used a bottle of water and paper towels to wash the dirt off the license plate, the thing that is used to lift the hatch, and the back lights.  That looked funny.  It didn’t matter because we had to drive over the same construction mess again.  We ate breakfast at a neat restaurant called Rose’s Café run by a lady from the Philippines who told me my accent was so bad she could barely understand me.  She said I must be from New Orleans.  She had a very heavy accent that I could barely understand. This conversation happened yesterday when we ate breakfast there.  Of course, I told her we were from North Carolina.  This morning when we went in, she called out, “North Carolina.”  I really liked her personality.  Yesterday, the servings were huge so today we shared.  Rose had one of the “trailer signs” advertising her business. 

We drove from Denali to Anchorage which is about 250 miles.  The road goes through Wasilla which is a larger town than I had imagined.  They even had a Target. 

This is the first motel we have messed up on.  It had two stars on Hotwire and Joy told me I should never get anything less than 3 stars.  The hotel is clean but run down.  I don’t think these beds are going to be very comfortable.  It feels like sitting on springs so I can’t imagine what it will feel like when we lay down.  After checking in, we drove into the city to the Visitor Center.  From there, we took a trolley tour of the city.  The trolley driver/tour guide was a young man who had been raised in Anchorage and knows the city.  In an hour, he could only hit the highlights.  He did take us to several places we intend to go back to tomorrow.

The weather forecast for Seward for Wednesday is for rain so we have made the decision not to risk spending the money to reserve seats on a whale watching boat.  Therefore, Wednesday morning will officially start the trip back home.  Our plan is to go through the Cassiar Mountains, see Glacier Park and Yellowstone and who knows where else.  Unfortunately, we will have to go over the worst part of the Alaska Highway to get to the turn to the Cassiars.

The lobby was in the center of the motel.  You can see a hothouse that was beside the lobby.  Our room was the first one that can be seen where the lobby sign is hanging.  There was lots of stomping as people went to get their coffee.

Rose had one of the trailer signs.

The mountains look totally different when the skies are dark and the mountains are covered by clouds.

Some of the cloud formations were pretty.

Wasilla is a larger city than I expected.  They even have a Target.

The Visitor Center had a sod roof with grass growing on it.  I imagine this contributes to the insulation but did look a little unusual.

I didn't realize when we signed up for the trolley tour that we could have done horse and buggy.

This is Cook Inlet which runs into the Gulf of Alaska and the Pacific Ocean.

This picture was taken at 9:40.  It was still light outside.