Just got back from a couple weeks in Alaska, with three days in Seattle added for good measure.
I love Alaska. It’s beautiful, it’s low(er) stress than most of the lower 48, it’s got superb fishing and hunting, and folks are darn friendly.
My oldest daughter and her husband (who’s military) and their two kids (my first two grandkids!) live in Anchorage (on base). They’ve been there for four years. And they absolutely have embraced the state. They love it.
We did a lot in the almost two weeks we were there. Every two years the joint army / air-force base (JBER) has an air show called something like Arctic Thunder. The show runs on Saturday / Sunday, but they have a family day on Friday. We went. It wasn’t crowded. We had lawn chair seats right on the edge of the tarmac, and it was SO COOL!
We saw various types of planes flying in different formations; the two most interesting were the F-22s (Raptors) and F-16s (Fighting Falcons). I believe the F-16s were flown by the Thunderbirds. Not sure who was flying the F-22s. The day was very windy and it was hard to hear the sound system part of the time.
These planes (and pilots) were amazing. Planes zoomed down the runway, flying upside down, or sideways, or next to another plane only 18 inches away (their undersides near each other …. one flying upside down and one flying right side up. And they do barrel rolls together. And then there are four planes doing the same thing … and doing barrel rolls.
The F22 can change direction so fast it’s absurd. They can go from ~2000 mph horizontal to straight up vertical in an instant (nearly) and then switch back and head the other way in a mere heartbeat. I guess that’s why they wear suits to handle the G forces.
Hey, I’m not going to claim to be knowledgeable or even an expert in any of this, but it was impressive and was a heck of a lot of fun. My kid and grandkids enjoyed it, and so did this 63-year old dude.
We went down to Valdez for a couple of days. I had been there once before and really enjoyed it. It’s a lovely area. There’s a big salmon hatchery just oustide of Valdez, and tons of sea lions wait outside the gates each afternoon to get their fill of salmon. Those sea lions weighed in the 1500-2000 pound range.
Driving around the area, everywhere you turn you can see a postcard opportunity. It’s kind of like the Grand Tetons or Yellowstone, only there’s a bunch of them.
Denali national park is large (the size of Massachusetts) and its mountain (Denali) is the tallest (not the highest, but the tallest from bottom to top). Valdez is close to Wrangell – St. Elias national park, which is the largest of the national parks in the U.S. Don’t quote me on that, but I think it’s right.
Wrangell is larger than Connecticut. Wrangell is LARGER THAN SEVEN YELLOWSTONES. The largest glacier on Wrangell is larger than the state of Rhode Island. Wow.
Superlatives mean nothing in Alaska.
People say that everything is big in Texas. It’s bigger in Alaska.
And not nearly as crowded.
I’d move there in a heartbeat if I could get the kids and grandkids up there too!
That’s the news for now.
Cheers, y’all.