R&R weekend: Part 1

Our flight from Chitina to McCarthy, AK
Originally uploaded by Bendini

There's a lot to catch up on, so I'm breaking this down by day.

In Alaska, there's a saying that one of the locals told us: "Anchorage is only 50 miles away from Alaska." In other words, to really understand and appreciate Alaska, well... you can't be in the city.

Chitina was a 5-hour drive from Anchorage. We took two vans to lug ourselves (and a few duffle bags of luggage) up there. Before we went, we were asked to 'pack light,' which seemed to be the story of the trip. It wasn't long before we realized that this was because the planes we were taking to McCarthy needed to be weight-balanced and could only take 180 pounds of luggage at a time, in addition to the passengers.

Before I get to the flying, I want to tell you a little bit about Chitina. Not only does the downtown have its own one-block footpath, it is a town of all of five blocks. Uncle Tom's is the only bar (alcoholism is quite prevalent in a good number of places in Alaska), the general store is the size of a singlewide trailer, and the people who live there won't let their kids out alone because bears run rampant in the area. From Chitina to McCarthy, there is one road that takes about two hours to drive, but the road is built on top of the old railroad tracks, and often times, cars in bad shape will often get a flat tire, or break down from such driving hazards as the railroad spikes that still stick out of the pavement in spots. This is the main reason a lot of people prefer to fly to McCarthy, which is only a half-hour plane ride in a small Cessna plane (not to mention it has a gorgeous view of the Chugach Mountains and the Kennicott/Root Glaciers).

Our team broke into a few planes of 5 people each to make this flight. Some were a bit fearful about getting in such a small aircraft, but the pilots were quite experienced and informative, and once we were in the air and flying above the mountains with our headsets on, we all seemed to relax a bit.

We finally arrived at the Kennicott Glacier Lodge before the 7pm scheduled dinner of Prime Rib and mashed potatoes, which was to die for. Coming from sleeping in a church on sleeping bags and buying snacks to having our own full bed and upscale dinners was definitely a welcome change, even if for another day and a half.

After dinner, most of us had a drink on the porch, which overlooked the hills and glacier and caught up a bit. We stayed up just long enough to realize that the moon doesn't actually 'rise' this time of the year in Alaska; instead, it simply comes up around 10pm, while the sun is still setting, gets about 10% of the way in the sky, and drops back down under the mountains before midnight (yes, while the sun still hasn't set). It's very surreal.

This, and the fact that the portion of the glacier that sat in front of our lodge was buried under two and a half feet of dirt and rock (more to come on this), made us feel like we were literally standing on the edge of another planet. Then again, it was good to know we really were in the middle of nowhere.