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7 days DIY on land then Radiance southbound. 6/2/17 - 6/17/17


cruiseguy1016
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I have been on several cruises in the past but usually don’t write reviews upon my return. The couple of times that I have written them, they have been short and concise without much detail. Since the day we started planning this trip, I have relied on the members of Cruise Critic for input on how to make this trip one that would never be forgotten. I am writing this review to say thanks to everyone who gave me advice and to hopefully provide some insight to others that are planning an Alaskan Adventure in the future. I will try to include links to where we stayed, where we ate and the tours we took.

 

 

Background: We had been considering an Alaskan vacation for several years and in January of 2016, DW and I decided that we would plan the trip for 2017. We would be celebrating our 30th wedding anniversary in April of that year so this was going to be our anniversary gift to each other. We decided that we would invite our 26 year old DS and our 23 year old DD to join us. Naturally, they both said yes. During the past few years we have mentioned to our friends that someday we would be going on an Alaskan adventure and many of them said they’d love to vacation in Alaska also. When we told them that we were starting to plan for 2017, three other couples decided that they would like to join us. Coincidentally, two of the other couples would also be celebrating 30 years of marriage and the other couple would be celebrating 40 years, so all four couples would be celebrating milestone anniversaries while on our adventure. One of the other couples would also be bringing their 26 & 23 year old sons with them. Our kids all grew up together and are close friends. We were now a group of 12, three couples in their mid – late 50s, one couple in their early 60s and four young adults in their mid-20s. We all decided that we wanted to spend a week on land and a week on a cruise. My family and one of the other couples are members of Royal Caribbean’s Crown and Anchor Society so we wanted to cruise with RCI to take advantage of the perks we have earned with them over the years.

 

 

I’m a bit anal when it comes to planning my vacations. I wantto make sure I can do it at a reasonable price and I also want to make sure I know of all the things to see and do so that I don’t miss out on anything. We started looking at the various itineraries and the costs associated with them. We considered a northbound cruise versus a southbound. We weighed whether it was better to do the land portion on our own or through the cruise line.

 

 

After all of our research we decided that we would do the land portion first and then a southbound cruise. We would fly into Fairbanks on June 2nd, spend a week traveling between Fairbanks and Seward and then board the Radiance of the Seas on June 9th for a 7night southbound cruise ending in Vancouver, B.C. We wanted to book the cruise early to guarantee that we could get cabins in an area that we wanted and to know that we would get the lowest price. RCI released their 2017 Alaska itineraries on March 4th. We booked the cruise portion on March 8th.We decided we would do the land portion on our own for a couple of reasons. One, we thought we could do it for less money than what the cruiseline wanted and two, by driving ourselves we could stop where and when we wanted, we wouldn’t be committed to anyone else’s schedule. Our children all looked into whether or not it was going to be feasible for them to go for two weeks. Because of new careers and other commitments they realized that freeing up two weeks would be tough so they elected to go for only one week. They all decided that they would prefer to do the land portion over the cruise portion.

Edited by cruiseguy1016
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Another important part of our research led us to the Northern Lights coupon book. There were coupons in there for restaurants, accommodations and tours. The books were $55 but the savings we would get made it well worth the cost. More on that later. We ended up buying two of the books in December when they first came out.

 

Land transportation: After looking at all of the things we wanted to do on the land portion, we decided that we wanted to spend two nights in Fairbanks, two nights in the Denali/Healy area, one night in Talkeetna, one night in Anchorage and one night in Seward before we boarded the ship. Since the land portion of our trip was first, we needed to secure transportation for our land-based adventure. In March of 2016 we rented 3 mini vans from Hertz. We could have fit all of us in 2 vans but we thought 3 would be better because there would be more room for luggage if there were only 4 passengers in each van. Drive times between the various towns would be approximately 2 ½ hours and we didn’t want to have luggage on our laps or between our feet for that length of time. Having 3 vans would also allow us to go in multiple directions if we didn’t all want to do the same things at the various locations we stopped at. We were to pick the vans up at the Fairbanksairport and drop them off near the cruise terminal in Seward.

 

Flights: I suspected flights to Fairbanks would not be cheap. Most of us would be flying from Rochester, NY with the exception being my DS who would be flying from Charlotte, NC. As soon as we had the dates figured out, I started tracking flight availability and cost. There was one requirement we had for our flights; we wanted to land in Fairbanks before 6:00 pm. There is a four hour time difference between the east coast and Alaska. Getting into Fairbanks at 10:00pm would feel like 2:00 am for us which makes for a VERY long day. We found flights that left Rochester at around 11:00 AM and arrived in Fairbanks at 8:10PM. It was later than we wanted to arrive but we didn’t have to get up so early so it all worked out. We couldn’t all get on the same flight so we ended up with connecting flights in different cities but we all ended up in Minneapolis/St. Paul for the final leg to Fairbanks.

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Day 1 - Rochester, NYto Fairbanks, AK: Our group had different flight schedules but we all ended up in Minneapolis-St.Paul for the final leg to Fairbanks Our flights were mostly uneventful but some of the views we had from the plane on the flight to Fairbanks were spectacular.

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We arrived in Fairbanks at 8:30 which according to our bodies’ timeclock was actually 12:30. Our luggage was waiting for us by the time we got to the carousel so we grabbed that and headed to the Hertz rental counter. I have rented several vehicles in my lifetime but never had I experienced anything like what was about to happen. Despite the fact that they knew several people were going to be renting cars from them that night, Hertz thought one employee would be sufficient. To compound the matter, this one employee had only been on the job for 4 days. There were two other customers in front of us. We waited…and waited…and waited. I won’t go into all of the details but, by the time we had all three of the rental vans, it was 10:30 before we headed for our hotel.

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We had our rooms booked at the Best Western Pioneer Park. Best Western has two locations in Fairbanks. The one in Pioneer Park was further away from the airport so we wouldn’t have to listen to planes coming and going all the time.The rooms were $125.99/night plus tax. The check-in was a little slow (again, only one employee) and one of the rooms was not made up but we were just happy to have a place to lay our heads after a long day of travel. Before we could call it a night though, we had to find a cocktail to celebrate our arrival. We also needed something to eat after having not done that too much during our travels. 5 of the group decided to call it a day but the other 7 of us ventured out to find someplace to grab a drink and a bite to eat. The hotel clerk suggested The Big I. The Big I was a rather busy place and it took us while to get service. We ordered our drinks and were told that they didn’t serve food. We Googled a place that could satisfy our needs, chugged our drinks and headed out to the Red Fox Bar and Grill. We’re all from upstate New York and several of us are Syracuse Athletics fans. We walked through the front door and found a huge Syracuse banner hanging from the ceiling. Who would have thought we would have found a ‘Cuse bar in Fairbanks? We ordered a bunch of food and finally got to satisfy our hunger. By the time we finished, it was 1:00 AM (5:00 AM our time) and we were exhausted. We headed back to the hotel for a well needed night’s sleep.

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Following along we are thinking about Alaskan cruise for this Sept. DH has always wanted to do Alaska me not as much love the warm weather and beach's. So hoping to get a different perspective.

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Following along we are thinking about Alaskan cruise for this Sept. DH has always wanted to do Alaska me not as much love the warm weather and beach's. So hoping to get a different perspective.

 

DW's birthday in March. We have been on several cruises over her birthday. She loves to have her toes in the sand after several months of cold, snowy weather in upstate New York. This year she gave up her "toes in the sand" cruise so that we could take the trip to Alaska. I have been telling everyone since we got home to put it on their bucket list and if it's already on their bucket list, they need to move it up on the list. I cab assure you that you will not be disappointed with a trip to Alaska.

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Day 2 – Fairbanks: After a very busy day the day before, we all slept in a little this morning. By 9:00 or so, we were all in some stage of being awake and ready to start the day. The Best Western had breakfast included with the room. The food was typical of what most hotels serve on their breakfast buffet. After breakfast we decided to have a look around Fairbanks and our wandering took us to the Morris Thompson Cultural and Visitors Center. This was a very informative center with lots of displays and it gave us some great information on the history of Alaska and its residents. Outside the Center was this arch made from moose and caribou antlers.

 

 

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The one thing we had pre-booked in Fairbanks was the Riverboat Discovery tour. We had read lots of great reviews for this and decided it was something that we all wanted to do. The trip turned out to be more than I had expected. There was a guide that spoke for most of the time that we were on the boat. The 4 hour tour headed south on the Chena River. As part of the tour, we got to see a sea plane land and take off next to the boat.

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The pilot pulled alongside the boat and our guide spoke to the pilot via radio and we were able to hear him tell us about himself and some of his experiences as an Alaskan bush pilot.

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As part of the tour we also stopped in front of a sled dog kennel. This was the home of former 4-time Iditarod winner Susan Butcher. The kennel is now run by her husband, David Monson.

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He gave a very informative explanation of how the dogs are raised and trained to become sled dogs.

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Further down the river we stopped at a recreated Athabascan Indian village. We were able to get off the boat to tour the village and hear about the native culture and way of life.

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One of the guides modeled a traditional, hand made parka.

 

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Dinner that night was at The Cookie Jar Restaurant. The menu was extensive and the food was very good. One of the men in our group had the meat loaf and said it was the best he has ever had.

Edited by cruiseguy1016
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Loving your review - anxiously waiting for the next excerpt!

 

Can you share what camera you are using? Pictures are very crisp & clear :)

 

I used three different cameras on this trip. The one I used most was a Cannon SLR. It is about 10 years old and has a resolution of 10 megapixels, small by today's standards. I have a couple of lenses for it, an 18-55 and a 75-300. I also used a small Cannon point and shoot that fit in my pocket and was great to have when the SLR was too big to lug around. My third camera was my cell phone.

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Day 3 – Fairbanks to Healy: We split up this morning for a few activities before we started our drive to Healy. A few chose to head to the Creamer’s Field Wildlife Center for a hike. Others took a drive out to see the Alaska Pipeline.

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They use "pigs" to help maintain the pipeline.

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We all met up later and started our caravan toward Healy. A very worthwhile purchase for our trip was the Mile Post. The Mile Post is a very comprehensive map/guide for the Alaska Highway system. It gives a mile by mile description of where you are and where you’re headed. By following along we knew when the next gorgeous view would be and how many miles it was until the next pullover or rest stop. This book turned out to be very helpful in guiding us through our travels.

 

Some of the views on the highway between Fairbanks and Healy.

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For this portion of our trip we chose to stay in Healy as opposed to the area near the entrance to Denali National Park. We had heard the area near the park referred to as “Glitter Gulch” and we thought we wanted to stay away from the hustle and bustle of that area. We thought Healy would give us a more remote, Alaska feel. The cost for lodging was also a little less in Healy than it would have been in “Glitter Gulch”. We booked our stay at the Motel Nord Haven. This is another place that came recommended on Cruise Critic. It was a great choice for us. We had six rooms. Some had one queen bed and some had two. The rooms averaged about $190 night including taxes and fees. The rooms were clean and comfy. The hotel also offered a free breakfast. We arrived in Healy before we were able to check in to our hotel so we headed for Glitter Gulch (is there an actual namefor this area?) so DW could do some shopping.

 

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After a little shopping we went back to the hotel, checked in and then walked to Rose’s Café for dinner. Rose’s is a quaint diner where all 12 of us managed to find something to satisfy our hunger.

While in the area we wanted to see some of the back country in Denali National Park so we decided to do an ATV tour. We booked the Denali Wilderness Adventure tour through Denali ATV Adventures. The adults rented side by side ATVs because the women weren’t too fond of driving an ATV alone. The kids all had their own to ride. We booked the tour for 7:00 PM. The office for Denali ATV Adventures is in Glitter Gulch so we drove there to check in. We learned that ATVs are not allowed in Denali National Park, however there is a section of land notched out of the park that used to be a coal mine. This area is surrounded by the park, but not a part of it, so ATVs are allowed in that section. The ATV tour was a lot of fun. We drove into the “back country” where we drove through river beds and to the tops of hills where we had some great views of the surrounding area. Our guides seemed to be very knowledgeable and gave us some historyof the area.

A few shots from our ATV ride.

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This is overlooking the town of Healy.

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For someone who doesn't write trip reports, you're doing an outstanding job!

Your photos and details are wonderful. Thank you!

I know you put a lot of time and effort into planning for this trip. And you had the added pressure of planning for a group. I hope it was everything you hoped it would be.

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For someone who doesn't write trip reports, you're doing an outstanding job!

Your photos and details are wonderful. Thank you!

I know you put a lot of time and effort into planning for this trip. And you had the added pressure of planning for a group. I hope it was everything you hoped it would be.

 

Thank you for the kind words. And thank you for helping us plan this trip. A lot of the information I had came from you. And yes, it was everything I hoped it would be and more!

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Thank you for the kind words. And thank you for helping us plan this trip. A lot of the information I had came from you. And yes, it was everything I hoped it would be and more!
And now you're helping the "next generation" of Alaska travelers. This is just terrific, and your pictures are wonderful. Thank you, cruiseguy1016
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Day 4 – Healy: This was a day spent in Denali National Park.In March we bought tickets for the park shuttle buses to take us to the Eielson Visitor Center. The cost of this trip was $34 per person plus a $10 park entrance permit. The permit is good for 7 days. If you choose to do this trip, I recommend that you purchase your tickets as soon as you know you want to do it. We bought the tickets for the shuttle on March 24th and could not get the bus we wanted. We wanted to all be on the same bus. I first tried for 12 seats on the 8:00 bus but there were only 8 left. I tried for the 7:30 bus and there were only 4 seats left. We ended up getting 12 seats on the 8:30 bus. The shuttle buses for the park all depart from the Wilderness Access Center (WAC) near the entrance to the park. We arrived there at 8:00. The trip to the Eielson Visitor Center is about 4 hours one way. There is no food available for purchase in the park so it is recommended that you bring a lunch with you. Another service offered by Motel Nord Haven is that they will prepare a box lunch for you. We all took advantage of this service. The lunch was $13 and included a sandwich, chips, beverage and dessert.

 

There are also tour buses that will give you a guided tour through the park and I think these tours include a lunch. They are, however, a lot more expensive than the shuttle buses. The park shuttle buses are not meant to be a guided tour, they are meant to be a shuttle to the various stops along the park road. You can get on and off any of the buses. You are only guaranteed a seat on your original bus. If you choose to get off and take another bus, seat availability may be limited. Our research told us that the drivers of these buses voluntarily narrate the trip and will also stop for photos when there is a wildlife sighting. Fortunately we were able to take advantage of this as we saw a lot of wildlife on our trip.

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Dall Sheep

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Caribou

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Caribou

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A sow with her two cubs.

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This one crossed the road right in front of our bus.

 

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Another sow walking along the side of the road.

 

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Not only did we see wildlife, Denali mountain was “out” (meaning you could see it)that day and we had some spectacular views of the mountain.

 

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This picture was taken at the Eielson Visitor Center. They have a couple of these antlers to frame your picture of Denali.

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The bus arrived at the Eielson Visitor Center at 12:30. We had a half hour there to see the sights and eat our lunch. At 1:00 we headed back to the WAC. After an hour or so the clouds rolled in and it rained most of the way back.

 

Dinner this night was at the 49th State Brewing Company in Healy. The food was excellent and I would recommend this place to anyone staying in or driving through the area.

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Day 5 – Healy toTalkeetna: The drive from Healy to Talkeetna offered more spectacular views of the mountains.

 

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We spotted some moose and because we were in our own vehicles, we were able to stop for some photos.

 

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We wanted to spend a night in Talkeetna for one major reason. I had read that this was THE place to do a flightseeing tour of Denali with a glacier landing. We arrived in Talkeetna around 12:30 and decided to have lunch before heading to the airstrip. We found The Denali Brewing Company on Main Street and enjoyed our lunch there. After lunch we headed for the airstrip. We had booked our flight through Talkeetna Air Taxi. 10 of the 12 of us wanted to do this tour. We wanted to make sure we didn’t miss out so in January we booked the Grand Denali Tour with Glacier landing. This flight was to circumnavigate Denali and land on one of the many glaciers that flow from it.The cost of this tour was $420 per person and, because we were going to land on a glacier inside the Park, there is also the $10 park entrance fee. Because we had our entrance permits from the day before, we didn’t have to pay the fee again. Earlier I had mentioned the Northern Lights coupon book. This is where buying the book really paid off. There was a coupon in the book worth 25% off a party of 4. If you do the math you’ll realize that that $55 book just save us $420! Since we had two books, we were able to get the discount on 8 of us. And, since we were such a large group, Talkeetna Air taxi gave the last two in our group a 20% discount. As I had mentioned earlier, we had been experiencing some great weather for our trip and today was no different. When we checked in for our flight however, they informed us that the north side of Denali was cloudy and it wouldn’t be worth it to venture to that side of the mountain. They told us that the south side was still very clear and that they would extend our flight to show us more of the south side.They also gave us a small refund for not being able to get us to the north side. We met our pilot Leighan and she told us what we could expect on our trip. We boarded the plane and headed north.

 

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There were very few clouds and the views of the mountains were breathtaking.

 

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Leighan decided that our glacier landing would be at base camp for climbers attempting to summit Denali.

 

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Edited by cruiseguy1016
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Base camp for Denali was at an elevation of 7,200 ft. We were surrounded by some of the most beautiful mountains in the world. Hunter Mountain was on one side of us, Mt. Foraker was on another side and Denali loomed 13,000 feet above us on another side. Words cannot describe the feeling I had while standing there looking at my surroundings. It was the most surreal experience I have ever had in my life.

 

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We stayed on the glacier for about a half an hour and then took off for the rest of our tour. We flew through several more glacial passes before making our way back to the Talkeetna airport.

 

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If you ever have an opportunity to take thistrip, I HIGHLY recommended it. It was worth every dollar we spent.

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wow. amazing photos. I am really enjoying your trip report and now considering Alaska sooner rather later

 

I've been telling everyone since we got home that they need to put Alaska on their bucket list and if it's already on there, they need to move it up.

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For lodging in Talkeetna we chose to stay at the Meandering Moose Lodge. We rented two cabins for the families of four and two rooms in the main cabin for the other two couples. The two cabins were small but they suited our needs. There was a queen bed, a bathroom and a small kitchen/eating area on the first floor and a loft/attic area with two beds that the kids slept in. The two rooms in the main cabin had a shared bathroom. The rooms in the main cabin were cozy but the water heater stopped working overnight so there was no hot water for showers there in the morning. The Meandering Moose is a bed and breakfast and a continental breakfast was included. The breakfast options were very disappointing however. There were a couple of cereals and English muffins. The only beverage choice was coffee. We ended up going into town and had breakfast at The Talkeetna Roadhouse.The portions were huge and delicious. The town of Talkeetna is a very quaint town. While not very big, DW was able to do some shopping before we headed to Anchorage.

 

 

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Day 6 - Talkeetna toAnchorage: The drive to Anchorage was relaxing. With Denali behind us we didn’t feel as though we had to keep looking for it. We arrived had in Fairbanks on Friday and we had been able to see the mountain every day of our journey so far. They say that Denali is “out” only 30% of the time. We had been able to see it for 5 days in a row! We didn’t know how lucky we had been. The three vans all left Talkeetna at different times so we could follow our own schedules.

 

I had to take a picture of this sign. I might be able to have some fun with it when I put a photo album together.

 

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We saw these two on the outskirts of Anchorage.

 

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We all met up at our hotel in Anchorage which was the Alex Hotel. The Alex Hotel is a very nice hotel on the west side of town near Lake Hood. It was clean, comfortable and they offered breakfast in the morning. We paid $125/night for our stay.

 

This was the view from our hotel room.

 

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Dinner that night was at Humpy’s Great Alaska Alehouse. The food and atmosphere were both very good.

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Day 7 – Anchorage to Seward: Our choice for something to do in Anchorage was the Lake Hood Segway tour through Segway Tours of Anchorage. 8 of us participated in this tour. The tour started at the Alaska Aviation Heritage Museum which is another option for something to do in Anchorage. Our Segway tour took us around Lake Hood which is the largest sea plane airport in the world.

 

The view from one of the plane slips. I'm a boat guy. Is it called a slip if it's for a plane?

 

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A plane getting ready for takeoff.

 

 

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After the Segway tour four of us toured the air museum and the other 8 decided to visit the Native Heritage Center. For lunch the four from the museum went to Gwennie’s Old Alaska Restaurant and the rest of us went to the Moose’s Tooth Pub and Pizzeria. The four that went to Gwennie’s said it was good. The Moose’s Tooth is supposedly the largest grossing pizzeria in the U.S.. Being from New York, I was a little skeptical about pizza in Alaska but the Moose’s Tooth did not disappoint. I will say it was as good as any pizza I have ever eaten. After lunch we headed for Seward. The drive along the Seward Highway was filled with spectacular views. We traveled through mountain passes lined with snow-capped peaks. There were three or four lakes with emerald colored water. This was another occasion where the Mile Post came in handy. By following along with the mile by mile “narration”, we knew where the scenic views and parking areas were going to be along our route.

 

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We arrived in Seward around 4:00 and checked into our hotel. Our choice for accommodations here was the Breeze Inn. The Breeze Inn is in the heart of downtown Seward and within walking distance of several bars, restaurants and attractions. It is a clean and comfortable hotel. We paid $243/night for our stay there. After getting settled in we headed for the Alaska SeaLife Center. This was a very educational time for us as we learned about the marine life in Alaska. DW got to do a little shopping on the way back to our hotel. We asked one of the receptionists at the SeaLife center for her recommendation for dinner. She recommended Thorn’s, so that’s where we went. All of our meals were good.

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Your review is exceptional...lots of good information and wonderful photos!

 

We returned from a 14-day cruise to Alaska the day before you left and I need to get started on a review and my blog posts. Too many things going on since we got home...

 

Seward was one of my favorite parts of our last Alaskan trip so looking forward to reading about what you did there!

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