Alaska: Seward to Girdwood to Anchorage to Talkeetna (Day 9 - 9/4/11)

Overview

Girdwood
Alyeska Tram
Lunch at Glacier Express
Stop at Walmart in Anchorage
Arrive in Talkeetna
Check into Meandering Moose Lodge
Laundry and Vikings/FB with pizza

Leaving Seward

With another long, gloomy travel day ahead of us, we decided to sleep in and pack our things up before having a later breakfast in the lounge and checking out.

It wasn't too bad a drive to Girdwood, except for the weather being so dreary and drizzly outside, so we didn't have much of a view. We happened across a long bike relay race which went, from what we could tell, from Seward to Anchorage; what a day for that!

Girdwood

We planned to make a stop in Girdwood to take advantage of our BOGO tram ride to the top of mount Alyeska and have lunch there. We arrived right around lunch time, and the weather wasn't looking any better, but we decided to go anyway.

Alyeska Resort Tram Ride

There was a great view of the Alyeska resort from up here, but with it being so drizzly and gloomy, it's kinda jaded in the picture.

Glacier Express

When we got up to the top of the mountain, we were hungry, so we stopped in at Glacier Express for some lunch.

Mark had the chicken strips and fries while I had the battered halibut and fries.

We could have very easily split a meal up there and both been stuffed, but we didn't.

With the weather being so dreary, cold, windy and rainy, we didn't stick around long, but we did peruse the little bookstore before taking the tram and heading back down the mountain.

We made a short stop in Anchorage at the Walmart to stock up on more water, pop and snacks before heading back on the road for the drive to Talkeetna.

Talkeetna

We arrived in Talkeetna around 6pm and checked into Meandering Moose Lodge for the night.

Meandering Moose Lodge

The lodge was beautiful, but to get there you end up on miles of dirt roads and feel completely lost until you see the next road that the directions say is supposed to be there. It didn't seem as long the next day heading back into town, but it felt like we were driving forever!

We were pleasantly surprised with our suite in the upstairs of the lodge, which was enormous with a beautiful view, a huge master bathroom (complete with laundry facilities!), and some comfy chairs and TV, allowing us to feel a little more at home and relaxed.

The view out our window was beautiful, and I spent a lot of time just watching the golden leaves fall off the trees and blow gently to the ground there.

We planned on this evening being a pretty lazy one, including leftover pizza from Christo's Palace for dinner, a little catching up on Seward pictures on Facebook and Picasa, and watching Vikes pre-season game while doing laundry.

Fortunately, we had a washer and drier right in our beautiful suite, so we didn't have to cart loads up and down the stairs.

After feeling like sedentary bums, having been in the car all day and comfy chairs most of the evening, we decided to go for a walk to see if we could come across any wildlife shortly before sunset.

We came across these cool old broken down vehicles on our walk and decided we needed pictures with them lol


It started getting darker, and while we were anxious to see wildlife, we weren't anxious to have a big bear sneak up on us in the dark, so we started to head back to the lodge. We had heard some grunting earlier whenever we walked by this one particular site, so we knew something was in the woods, but we didn't want to encounter it when we couldn't see as well!

Just as we were beginning to think we were going to be completely out of luck as far as wildlife sightings go, we happened across a cow moose and her calf in the woods just right out by our lodge! Of course, it was getting too dark to get a decent picture of them, but Mark got some great video footage!

We hung out and checked them out for quite some time, then headed back to the lodge to finish up laundry and get some shut eye.