Sunday: We left Talkeetna and stopped by the lodge. Fancy ooo-lala! We sat on the balcony that overlooked the mountain range that includes Denali. Denali was hidden in the clouds, but the mountain range was beautiful. Denali is only seen 30 percent of the time.
Went into the lodge and saw the biggest, scariest grizzly ever! A ten year old girl shot it 32 yards away and the second shot 112 yards away. That bear was a whopping 2000 pounds. It took the hunting party 2 days to skin it and bring it in. I told you these girls are something else.
Made it to Eklutna Lake north of Anchorage by lunch time. We are camping in the woods, but a short walk takes us to a beautiful lake surrounded by mountains on all sides. Defiantly a cereal bowl effect. The green sloops of the mountains and the snow that dusts the top is almost surreal. Such a peaceful place. This is a reservoir that could provide enough water for every Alaskan. It replenishes itself faster than people can use it. Since there is so much dead wood on the beach people have constructed tee-pees to shelter them. I imaging a tarp is thrown around them to keep the sun and wind at bay.
All through the camp are signs about bears. We read this to bring home the point about food.
A needle falls to the ground.
An eagle sees it,,
deer hear it,
and a bear smells it.
This campground is full at the moment and we were blessed to get a site, but tomorrow it empties out as people go back to work.
Evan is in his glory. First fire in Alaska. My Bush man in his environment. The needle doesn't fall far from the tree as we have raised a few bush men too.
I don't miss the news and Evan has not even looked at a news feed. We really don't know what's going on in the world and not the least worse off. Evan has slept really well. Maybe it's the fresh air up here because it certainly isn't the mattress on this bed. I'm thinking this trip is going to cost us a lot more than travel expenses. A new mattress will probably be in the works soon. After all, we have slept on the same mattress for 30 years. Hey, no judgement...we bought a really good one all those years ago.
Tonight's dinner was a combination of most leftover foods. Evan said it was the best dinner. We bought pretty much just what we needed. I do not wish to throw away food so I'm being creative as best I can.
Tomorrow after a lazy morning of coffee and breakfast and maybe another fire and walk to the lake we will head down to Eagle Lake. It's a bit closer to Anchorage and a clear reminder to me that this trip is winding down. I'm coming home refreshed and ready for what God has for me. I am eager to open my porch to friends, family and neighbors as summer starts full throttle. And I want to make that spinach garlic, cheese bread. Look the recipe up. It's called Talkeetna Spinach Cheese Bread.
Alaska is a great place to visit. The dark winters would bother me and quite frankly these long days make me lose track of time. I'm sure the darken blinds are a thing up here. I'm watching people outside wearing shorts, short sleeve t-shirts and flip-flops. Burr! I'm in at least three layers. Temps in the 60's is a heat wave up here. They also make birch syrup. We make maple but Burch's are very plentiful. Buckets hang from many trees along the road.
It's 11:02 Sunday night (it's still light out) we were just awaken by an earthquake. I didn't like that one bit. Our camper rocked back and forth like we were going over deep and long pot-holes. Evan went out and talked to another camper and he said that they have them at least once a year but, "this was a good one". Good one??? For the life of me I can't see the goodness in any earthquake. Took me awhile to get back to sleep. Found out it was a 6.0 magnitude.
So skip the fire, we're outta here!!!
Since our trip has had some cancellations we are going to leave Wednesday instead of Friday. I just pray we can get a ride home. I'll work on that even if it's an Uber.
I love you all!😍😍😍😍😍
