Week One [Part One]

Our first week living in Anchorage has been awesome! Our first day was spent getting settled in and checking out our new city. We both love it here and are learning more and more about the city every day. Apparently, moose hang out in our neighborhood sometimes. There's moose poop in the front yard.

Anyway, We checked out the grocery store, Fred Meyer, which is located less than one mile away from our house. It's kind of like what Super  Target/ Publix/ Bealls/ Best Buy/ Kay Jewelers/ Ashley's Furniture would be like if they had a baby, but everything says either "Fred Meyer" or "Freddy's" on it. The only problem about shopping in Alaska is the fact that EVERYTHING is about 20-30% more expensive than in the lower 48 states. Even the chain restaurants are more expensive. No $5 foot-longs from Subway here! Also, most roads don't have lines, so you just have to guess what lane you're in. After a day of exploring, we went to dinner with our roommate, Melanie, to one of her favorite local restaurants, Arctic Roadrunner.

We had some good conversations over fabulous cheeseburgers before heading home and calling it a night.

The next day, Melanie invited us to go to Flat Top Mountain with her and good friend, Matt. We thought we were just going for a hike, but when we arrived to the park near the mountain, Matt handed us ice picks.

As we were "preparing" for our "hike," it started snowing. We began our 3,500 ft climb to the top of the mountain. It was probably one of the most difficult things I've ever done. The mountain is very steep

 and had a lot of soft spots where we fell into snow up to our hips! It was difficult to get out, even with ice picks.

Instead of helping me get my foot unstuck, Adam decided to take photos and throw snowballs at me. Grr.

We were so high up that we went through a little bit of a cloud.

The elevation was making it very hard to breathe, especially after being in Alaska for just a couple days. We hadn't had time to get used to the altitude. About 700 feet from the top, Adam and I had to stop because we couldn't breathe anymore! We took a little break before continuing.

We hiked to the other side of the mountain where we could see a good amount of Anchorage.

 

After checking out the sights, we hiked back down the mountain. There were a lot of steep areas where we just slid down, which made it really fun and scary at the same time because it was difficult to stop yourself. I tried stopping using my ice pick once, but ended up hurting my shoulder instead. Haha. We made it to the bottom of the mountain, then headed back to the house to get out of our wet clothes, take hot showers and get rested up for our next adventure.

The next morning, we headed to the rail yard to meet with one of the managers, Kim, who is in charge of taking all of the new sales representatives on the excursions that they will be selling on the train. The first excursion was to Kenai Fjord National Park for a 4-hour boat tour of glacier bays, islands and coastline along the north Pacific Ocean, or the Alaskan Gulf. There happened to be a spot open, so I was able to go with them. We took the company van down to Seward, which was about a 2 1/2 hour drive from Anchorage. The drive went by very quickly since we were all having a good time chatting, checking out the beautiful scenery and keeping an eye out for wildlife along the highway. It also went by so fast because we were used to non-stop driving! We got to see quite a few moose and bald eagles on the way. We learned about the earth quake that hit in the 1960's and saw a few houses that had been destroyed by it. We also learned more about glaciers and saw results of a few avalanches, both natural and controlled.

We arrived to Seward, which is a very small city with a population of about 800. The businesses are owned by the locals, with the exception of a couple hotels owned by HAP Alaska-Yukon and boat tours. While waiting at the dock, 

 

we saw a few sea otters playing near the boats. We got on the 85-foot boat with about 150 other passengers. Shortly after our departure, we were served chicken caesar wraps for lunch. The captain took us to a few coves, where we saw sea lions, seals, sea gulls, murres and a few other types of birds.

It was a clear day out on the water, however, it was freezing cold! Thankfully, they had free coffee inside the cabin. We were having such a great time experiencing this together, but about 2 hours into the tour, I started feeling sick and lost my lunch =( The bathrooms were descent, but the fact that they were located at the back of the boat made my stomach and equilibrium feel ten times worse. I couldn't believe I was getting sea sick for the first time on this awesome tour and I felt bad for having to leave Adam, but he had fun with the others in our group. I had to go inside and put my head down at our table for the rest of the boat ride to avoid getting sick again. Luckily, Adam has excellent photography skills and snapped some other fabulous shots, including some of the mountains a couple humpback whales!

I started feeling better as we were heading back to the dock, so I sat up and socialized with Adam and the couple we sat with in the cabin, who were from Anchorage. After leaving Seward, Kim took us to Portage Lake, where we saw beautiful mountains, hanging glaciers and lots of icebergs. This is my favorite shot I captured of the lake:

We walked down to the shoreline where were able to actually touch the water, which was about 4 degrees.

After taking a few photos, we loaded back up into the van and headed back to Anchorage. We saw more moose and bald eagles along the way. We also learned more about Alaska natives and wildlife, thanks to Kim and Richard, one of the rail guides that went with us. We had a great time and it was awesome meeting a few of the people we will be working with on the train for the next few months!