Saturday 29 June
Docked in Whittier around midnight Friday. Apparently, during WWII, the Japanese had occupied the Aleutian Islands, and this then brought Seward within bombing range of the Japanese. Seward was a naval port so the US needed a second option. Whittier was chosen, it was just over the hill but covered in cloud 320 days a year. The thought was that if the Japanese couldn’t see it, then they wouldn’t find it. Needless to say after the best weather in College Fjord the day before, Whittier was bright sunshine as well.
There is a rail tunnel into Whittier, the only way in or out. Trains have right of way at all times, and as the tunnel is only 1 train/car wide, there are control lights at each end. Cars can only enter the tunnel to come to Whittier on the half hour, and only enter the tunnel to leave Whittier on the hour. We were supposed to assemble for disembarkation at 7:40am, not sure what time we would be leaving so we just walked off early (around 7:15am) and found Larry waiting for us in the terminal building. So great to finally catch up face to face after 23 years.
After loading our gear we went sightseeing in Whittier which went something like “See the high rise building over there? …” (the only multi-story building in Whittier), “… that’s the grocery store, the post office, the Government Building, in fact, all of the shops and accommodation in town”. This ended the scenic tour of Whittier, and we made the queue for the 8am release to leave Whittier.
2.5 mi/4 km later, we exited the tunnel and commenced the drive to Anchorage. Quite a lot of haze in the air as apparently there are large out of control bushfires at Kenai that apparently are unlikely to be brought under control for another 4-6 weeks minimum.
Called into Value Village (op shop), a sports store (with lots of guns), and there we hit REI (where we did lots of damage 😊). Late lunch at Taco Bell, a few stops at some aviation stores and we were on our way north to Talkeetna. Arrived in town around 6 pm and got to meet Robin, Robbie and Fern for the first time. Such an awesome feeling to come back to our ‘Alaska home’. The girls had Fern’s room (she is now resident in Fairbanks), Josh had the spare room downstairs, and Chris and I had our own room/accommodation down at Larry’s hangar, again bringing back so many great memories, including where we were introduced to the internet for the first time.
Had ‘Sloppy Joes’ for dinner back at the Rivers, a great mince dish on burger buns. Still trying to get to grips with the fact that we’re getting tired, the sun is still up, and it’s 10:30 pm.