Back in 2005 when Leah and I got married we took an Alaska cruise. I would never have expected to enjoy a cruise, but this was different. First, we flew to Anchorage, from where we took a train ride into the interior of Alaska for a few days. We got to stop along the way at a few interesting places, and then we went back to Anchorage and boarded the ship. The ship traveled mainly at night, stopping at several small towns for us tourists to do our thing. We thought we would share some of our pictures, a few at a time.
The plane trip had two legs. The first was from Atlanta to Seattle. We flew over Mount St. Helens just before we reached Seattle. The captain pointed it out. I might or might not have recognized the mountain otherwise. A few years earlier I had driven with some friends up to Mount St Helens, but it was so foggy we couldn’t see anything. This was actually quite a good view. Click on the pictures for larger views.
Mount St. Helens through the window of the airliner as we neared Seattle.
We spent one night in Anchorage before boarding the train for our trip inland. This was in late May, so the nights were not long. The hotel had really thick curtains to darken the room. It was broad daylight when we went to bed.
The mountains viewed from the train.
The train trip was fun, even not including the side trips for sightseeing. But we always knew there was one great, big sight awaiting at the turnaround point of our inland trip. I’m cheating a little here, because I could take pictures only out the side windows or from the last car, looking back from where we had been. So the only way I could get this shot was to take it as we left to return to Anchorage.
Denali, the Mountain formerly known as Mount McKinley
The highest mountain in North America is every bit as impressive as you might expect. This is a view from the lodge where we spent the night before a bus ride into the park for a closer view. We got closer, but close is a relative term in Alaska.
We’ll put up some more pictures later. I hope you enjoy them.
At a time in my life when it’s almost guaranteed that I already know at least 7 out of 10 of the “things you probably don’t know about fill in the blank,” I knew about Denali, I knew about McKinley, but I didn’t know that the former had replaced the latter. Good going! (Except that the word “Denali” sounds tropical to me. Well ok, and maybe it will be in the not too far future.)
I had a panic attack and had to check to make sure I had it right about Denali and McKinley. That’s one of those “facts” that I can’t remember where I learned.
That’s also something that happens more and more frequently.