Saturday, November 17, 2007

The Long Road Home!

A 6 day trip, 3,800 miles by land, a few hundred by sea, narrowly missed 2 buffalo, a flat tire, a power outage at the Whittier Tunnel and 6 accidents from Palmer to Whittier later we arrived home in Yakutat.
Pictures:
1. The ferry ramp lifting us up to drive onto the dock, finally home! A number of our friends from the church were there to greet us and had a meal waiting for us when we got home, a special bunch of people!
2. Cache Creek, B.C. We got a taste of fall from
Portland to southern B.C. The beautiful colors
and smells were nice after seasonless SoCal.
3. Watson Lake, Yukon, minus 10 F. Yes, an abrupt
entry into winter, plugged in the block heater in
the truck.
4. Allison at night in Beaver Creek, right before
crossing the border. The road from Haines
Junction to Alaska is the worst on the entire
trip, massive frost heaves and cracks in the
road, we talked to a couple on the ferry that
had rolled their car there the month before and
their dog died in the wreck.
5, 6. The drive from Tok to Anchorage, 0 F in
Tok, the locals said it was warm, doesn't get
cold until 15 or 20 below. A beautiful drive
until Palmer and the Glenn Highway with a lot
of wrecks, glare ice conditions with people
driving 75, saw a car pass us and rolled over in
the next couple of miles with the people
trapped inside, glad to get to Anchorage!
7, 8. Auntie Ione and my happy parents with
Baby Quinn. They drove up to Anchorage
Saturday to spend the night with us there
before we got on the ferry.
9. It snowed all that night, an outside shot of
the hotel and my parent's minivan.
10. The Whittier Tunnel, the longest highway
tunnel in N. America. A power outage caused
us to question if we would make it to the ferry
and we ended up waiting in the car for 4 hours
for it to open and another 2 hours before
gettting on the ferry.
11. Sunrise on the Gulf of Alaska.
12. Ryder and Faith playing in the play area on
the ferry, Ryder loves it!
13. Mt. St. Elias and largest coastal mountain
range in the world, almost home!
14. Our little house, the tan and white place
above and to the left of the big white building
in the foreground.
15. The lift on the ferry, getting ready to drive
off!
16. Goodbye ferry! We were on the last ferry
until the end of May.
17. 4 moose quarters, the Holcombs graciously
shared their meat with us so we could stock
our freezer for the winter.
18, 19. The meat grinder and a lot of packets
of ground moose and roast, stayed up until
midnight butchering, grinding and packaging
meat. This time of year the days are short so
everyone stays up late and sleeps in, about 10
p.m. and I was bushed but we are slowly
getting used to the new schedule. Thanks for
reading!






















Sunday, November 4, 2007

A picture is worth a thousand words...



1 more day until our road trip, we will be making some changes...

Thursday, November 1, 2007

North to Alaska!


We were shocked tonight to learn that a ferry spot opened up on the last ferry of the year(had been filled up for quite a while). So we will now be bumping up our travel schedule to get to Yakutat on time. Thanks to Teen, I borrowed this picture from an archive of hers from last February. North to Alaska!