Now for some more about our Alaska trip. Day 3 started with the helicopter ride to the glacier that I wrote about last time. Afterwards we went back into the little town near Denali park to meet up with our bus and the rest of the group in our tour. They actually had to rearrange the schedule for the day so that we could take the helicopter excursion – we left later than planned due to the weather in the morning. I’m glad they didn’t leave our little group behind.
We got a quick bite of lunch and then the bus took us to the town of Talkeetna. The town is very small and the buses can’t drive through it so they stop at the edge where the train stops and let everyone out. Then you walk into town.
Three rivers meet in Talkeetna – the Susitna, Chulitna and Talkeetna. People come to the town in the summer for fishing, rafting and as a base camp for expeditions on Mt. McKinley.
The tiny town doesn’t have a real mayor but they do have an honorary mayor – its a cat named Stubbs. We didn’t actually get to see him – but I did look in the general store where he is supposed to be. I found this picture of him though.
We walked around town – luckily the rain stopped for us. Strolled through some of the shops and the bakery and made a stop in the Brewery – Greg got some Raspberry Wheat beer and I got Salmon dip.
Our group boarded the bus and drove to Anchorage where we stayed the night. Since the skies were clearing we were able to see the Chugach Mountains.
Along the highway they have signs for how many moose have been killed on the highway. Over 100 moose each year are killed by cars. Anchorage is the most populous city in Alaska and has about 40% of the states’ population.
Greg and I took a walk down to the park at Cook’s inlet.
We also found this statue of a whale while we were walking through the city.
I’ll have more later about the rest of our trip.
