Joe and Rachel Visit

My brother Joey and his girlfriend Rachel bought tickets to come up and visit Alaska 6 months ago.  When we told them to come the first week of April we thought for sure there would be plenty of snow but also hopefully more sun.  It might even be warm enough to pull out the kayaks.  We spent the whole winter sweating it, thinking maybe we'd told them to come too late and there wouldn't be any snow for them to ski.  It was definitely spring skiing, but we got two days of beautiful sun and a fairly empty mountain to ski on.  I think we packed a lot into the week they were here.  I had asked for one day off of work and then finagled my way into getting put on call another day so I only had to work one day while they were here, and then I left on their last day to go on choir tour.  They were really fun to have visit because they wanted to do a lot of things that we like to do anyway, and they wanted to just see how we live up here.  With good weather and that as the requested itinerary, how could we go wrong?

Day 1, Saturday:  Picked them up in the evening after a long travel day.  Although I wouldn't wish it on anyone, I kind of like it when people do the trip up here because it gives them some understanding of the dread that I have every time I get on a plane to go to the east coast.  Drew's sister recently flew home from Ecuador and we were kind of surprised to hear her flight was way shorter than ours was when we fly back to see his family.  They made it home for some pretty sunset time and lots of pictures our the car window of the drive home:

Drew had dinner waiting for us when we got home and we planned out the week, Rachel made a chart and deemed what was nonnegotiable and what wasn't. :)

Sunday, Day 2:  We talked Rachel and Joey into attending the branch with us, if for nothing else than people watching, but then ditched after sacrament meeting to get in our first ski day: 

It was the warmest weather I've ever skied in and being a Sunday, the busiest I'd seen it all year.  We had a good time though.  Joe borrowed Drew's snowboard and Rachel rented demo ski's from the local ski shop.
After a good day of skiing we met up with some friends for a barbecue dinner out on the flats.  It definitely got chilly, a bonfire would have been nice, but the sunset was really pretty and the tide didn't get us.  Everyone took a lot of pictures that night, especially of Wren, the always adorable dog.  It was fun to introduce Joe and Rachel to our closest friends here in AK.

Monday, Day 3: I had to go to work, unfortunately, but they had a beautiful sunny day, and Drew was off so he took them to the Conservation Center to see some Alaska animals:

Yes, that is Snickers in a tree! 

My favorite, the musk ox.

They also stopped and took a quick peek at Portage Lake, which was still frozen over.

They eventually made it through the tunnel and pried the plywood off the windows so they could grab some kayaks for an early season Kittiwake tour.  Looks like they couldn't of had a nicer day:

Tuesday, Day 4: I ended up on call and Joey and Rachel's snowmobile tour didn't sound so cool without a lot of snow so we spent a chill day in Girdwood doing some interneting and checking out the town.  We got out in the afternoon and did some cross country skiing.  It was really icy and tracked out, so it wasn't ideal.  It was Joe's first time, but he was a good sport. 

Wednesday, Day 5: From today on both Drew and I were off from work.  We packed up and headed north, stopping in Anchorage to pack up on food for the night before heading up to Denali State Park.  We rented a cabin on Byer's Lake, and stopped at the south viewpoint for a perfect clear view of Denali (Mt. McKinley).  

We brought snowshoes, but we didn't really need them.  We dragged a sled with all our food and wood for the stove, we each had a backpack, and we cut across the lake for a very short trip to Public Use Cabin #2:

The cabin had a great view of Denali from the window:

We dropped our stuff and went our for a stroll on the lake:

Taking credit for a half melted snowman.

Testing the ice over the stream...

We came home, got the fire going, dinner going, played some cards, read the cabin journal, and took lots of pictures of the mountain, the sunset, and the moon.  We had a perfectly clear night, but unfortunately no northern lights.  We've barely caught them at all this year.

Thursday, Day 6:  We walked back on the trail pretty quick and drove back to Anchorage, stopping at Talkeetna along the way.  We did some souvenir shopping, ate at the roadhouse, and checked out the Denali Brewery Company, the first of several breweries we hit up that day.  Drew and I ended up having a lot of root beer that day. :)

Rich caught up with us for the last two brewery stops, the very last of which was Moose's tooth.  We went crazy, ordering 4 pizzas, 8 flavors.  We finished it off with dessert. 

Friday, Day 7: We got in another day of skiing.  It was a bit cloudier but still nice, and the resort was practically empty.

After skiing we did a potluck dinner with the usual suspects.  Rich hosted us at the bed and breakfast where he lives, which is always a treat.  Afterwards we got a soak in at the hot tub.  Everyone made something delicious to be sure.  

The next day they took it easy and took off for Philly.  All in all we thought it was a good time had by all.  Maybe we can even convince them to check out Alaska again another time!  Hopefully we'll have a real bed and a real room to put them in next time!

Spring has Sprung

It seems like spring is getting here early this year, and I can't say I'm complaining.  If we're not going to get lots of snow it mine as well be warm and sunny.  It was also exceptionally clear skied for like 3 straight weeks in March.  We lost some snow to the warm sun, but it still made being outside totally lovely.  The days are also getting longer and I'm getting to catch some beautiful sunsets on my drive to and from Anchorage.  I actually called Drew one night to tell him he had to go out on the arm and see how beautiful it was with the sunset and this low hanging fog over the water.  He couldn't believe I wasn't stopping to take a picture and so finally I turned around and drove back to get a few amazing pictures, even if it made me late.  I don't ever get tired of this view on my commute:

We've also had an ongoing joke going on with our friends Aaron and Jennifer, who spend each of their weekends doing something fun as a couple.  Whenever we get out and spend the day together we joke we should post our excursion on Facebook so we can show them up.  No internet, so we didn't every put these on Facebook, but here they are from our little walk along Glacier Creek.

Our other big thing from this month is that we moved....again.  The owners of the house we were watching came home and we hadn't found a house to buy as we'd hoped.  So we ended up moving in to the first floor of a house of some friends.  They are letting us rent month to month so we are happy about that.  They do have a very steep driveway that with the melting and refreezing has been giving the Camry a hard time.  I lost it off the edge of the driveway my first day at home without Drew:

 Whoops...luckily a lot has melted since then and the driveway isn't near as slick as it was a few weeks ago.

I did end up going out on the flats for the first time a few weeks ago with some friends after work.  It was a pretty walk out underneath the highway and up to the water's edge.  It really felt like spring was there as the sun went down. We liked it so much we went out and BBQ'ed there with my brother and his girlfriend who cam to visit. (More on that to come.)  We're looking forward to many a BBQ out there this summer.  

Other than that Drew finally got out and did a little bit more back country skiing, even going two days in a row.  I think that's a record for the boys.  Here's a few shots from three of their trips:

Talking to me on the phone...

We had a great time with Joey and Rachel when they were here...more on that later!  Hope you are enjoying spring wherever you are!