Last year, I discovered a flightseeing company out of Delta Junction (about 1/2-2 hours south of Fairbanks) that did flights around the Alaska Range, including Black Rapids Glacier..I'd been wanting to fly over that glacier for years, and I said that on my birthday this year that's one thing I would do. My birthday week was cloudy, so I made a reservation for today, because the heat wave brought clearer weather. Unfortunately, the wind chose today to bring over smoke from fires burning in Canada..that's not nice!! Haha. Me and mom and her friend Sarah (they sew/craft a lot together) drove down anyway and met the pilot at the "airport" (literally a path of gravel through a field haha). He said the smoke might get better in the mountains, so we hopped on and took off. This was Sarah's first time in a small plane! The pilot was glad I had a specific location in mind, apparently other people are like "just take us anywhere" haha. It look a little time getting to the mountains (the smoke was somewhat better there), but once we did..wooow. There is SO much beauty and awesomeness you can't see from the road!! I loved how smooth the snow/ice looked on the mountains, like ice cream! It was VERY hard trying to take pictures though, so bright! Mom actually got a better view of Black Rapids from her side, but she thought she left her phone in the car, so she couldn't take any pictures! Ouch! (She saw it was in her purse when we landed!) That was kind of disappointing, but I still enjoyed the view of the tributary glaciers (I think the pilot said they're just considered the Black Rapids complex or something like that), the pretty meltponds, moraines, etc. We also saw the beginning of the Susitna Glacier. I wished we could have spent more time there, but that would have been insanely expensive, and those little planes only hold not a huge amount of fuel (it's never long enough for me when I'm around glaciers haha). When we were flying back, the pilot pointed to where he worked at his "real" job, and said he was on his lunch break..well that's pretty much the best lunch break ever haha. Unfortunately, not all of my pictures came out (especially with the wing strut thing in the way), but I still got some cool ones

After that we had buffalo burgers at a restaurant that I think is only open in the summer, went to a fabric store, and went to this grocery store that sells food from different countries, like Russia (their donuts looked good, but I was way too full from lunch to eat one lol). We have our road trip "musts": glaciers, food, fabric..works for me!! Haha. The smoke was a little better on the drive back, yay! Sarah thanked us for inviting her and said she had a good time..fun was had by all :D

( pics from the flight!! )

Yesterday the flightseeing tour took us up close and personal to Mt. Iliamna..it was so cool seeing all the volcanoes I've heard about (Redoubt, Augustine, etc). It was so clear you could see Kodiak Island, 100 miles away!! Wow. Iliamna is a dormant volcano, but you could still see steam coming out of different places..cool! It was definitely heavily glaciated..I wanted to go all the way around the volcano and see the glaciers on that side, but we didn't. After getting an eyeful of Iliamna lol we descended to a river delta and saw lots of bears! They were probably eating lots of fish lol. What a beautiful day for flightseeing! After that we looked in shops and had dinner and looked in even more shops lol. It's always nice to relax after a busy day :P

Today we drove to Seward..it was still a nice day, but I could tell the weather was changing cause clouds were coming in. I'm so glad we had a few days of nice weather though. After shopping (my debit card feels tired. :P lol) and dinner we had fun watching the sea otters in the harbor! They're so cute lol. There were also some really red jellyfish..so cool. I want to post my pics, but the Internet is kinda slow where we're staying. Tomorrow we drive to Valdez..that's gonna be a loooong drive..it's 423 miles from here. D: Good thing I keep buying books :P

Today mom and I went on a biplane ride! We kept passing the place and I wanted to try it. We opted for the 20 minute ride to Pigeon Key and back (I think it was $199 for two people..we split it, so it was very reasonable). I had never been in a biplane before! Omg it was SUPER AWESOME!! The water was sooo blue and clear and gorgeous! We saw some manatees, lots of manta rays and some sharks! I love seeing how places look from the air! That was definitely one of the best parts of the trip so far :D

Tomorrow we're leaving the Keys and going to Vero Beach, where grandpa used to live and where more of his friends live. I hope it's less hot there, the Keys are way too hot for me haha

( more pics! )

I'm back from Talkeetna! On Friday mom went to Laurie's house to load up the car with her stuff, Laurie came to mom's house to have breakfast, then we left. It was an uneventful drive down. Besides McKinley (which was cloudy then), I find the Parks Highway rather boring. I've driven the Richardson too many times haha..it's way more exciting. :P We got to Laurie's house, unpacked the car, hung out a little, then had dinner. We met up with another air traffic controller, his wife, a girl who played basketball with the controller, and another lady that I'm not sure what the connection was. I was rather annoyed..I was tired, hungry and it was really loud. Once I had some wine and food I was better though haha. There were cool mountaineering mementos on the walls (Talkeetna is the jump off for mountaineers flying to McKinley. I'd love to go in the summer when all the mountaineers are there!). Talkeetna is rather quaint. After dinner, we went back to Laurie's house, had more wine (we bought a bottle..Red Rock Merlot) and played Trivial Pursuit haha. Funn. After the game we went to bed

Yesterday I got up and when it was light enough started checking the webcams to see what the weather was at McKinley. It was clear over Talkeetna but I could see a thin layer of fog/clouds (depending on where the camera was) at McKinley. I was confident it would break up though. I checked later and..I was right! The clouds were breaking up and I could see the top of McKinley! I have good weather skillz I swear haha. ;) After breakfast we went over to K2 Aviation and they said once the pilot got the plane ready we could go flightseeing! Yaaay haha. While he was doing that we went over and checked out the flight service station where Laurie's gonna work (the guy from the night before was working then too). After talking with him we went back to K2 and went flightseeing! We opted for the Denali Grand Tour. :D (Don't worry, I saved up for this haha) One of the best feelings everr is taking off in a plane and seeing everything around you. THE FLIGHT WAS SO AMAZING!! Denali, Foraker, Hunter, etc were so clear and pretty!! Even the pilots were amazed. I could see in the distance it was cloudy over Anchorage and I heard it was snowing in Fairbanks. WOW haha. A good weather hole, just for me. ;) We got SUPER close to Foraker and other mountains..so amazing to see the detail!! Seeing all sides of McKinley was pretty awesome too. All the glaciers were awesome too..so cool seeing icefalls, crevasses, moraines. *drools* The mountains looked like ice cream haha. I took over 100 pics up there!! It was just amazing. <3 Laurie met up with us after we landed and had lunch and dessert at two different places haha. Ouch..I ate horribly yesterday. :P That just happens when you travel though. We also checked out the Talkeetna River (which had an AMAZING view of McKinley and co.), went to a gift shop, went back to Laurie's house and showed her our pics, then left to go back home. It was like 4:15 when we left! Oops haha. There was a nice mountain sunset though. The WORST part of the drive is after Nenana you just wind and wind through hills and you're so close to home BUT THE HILLS NEVER ENDDD haha. But we made it back to mom's house, unpacked the car and went to bed haha. Pics tomorrow or whenever I get them all uploaded :P

( 72. Mischief Managed )

Today we ate breakfast then went to a bookstore/touristy place. The bookstore was AWESOME. There was a nice selection..I bought so many haha. I think I'm literally addicted. :P Then we went to the visitor center type place and asked about flightseeing tours and stuff. The guy said there was a couple and gave me their numbers. I called one and they were like "nooo the weather's horrible the wind is supposed to be blowing and we don't have any spots available." Kayy then. We drove to the other one and they were like "sure we'll get a pilot out here the weather's getting better by the second!" HAHA..niceee. It actually was getting better. While waiting for the pilot we talked to the guy's wife. She said the Northwestern from Deadliest Catch was in Cordova yesterday and they flew Sig and Edgar out! JEALOUS!! I lovee Sig and Edgar! The pilot arrived in his floatplane and we got in and took off..my first time in a floatplane! Coool haha. We told him we were interested in the glaciers and that's where he took us. OMG there were SOO many glaciers!! It was seriously epic. Many in the valleys and even more small hanging glaciers. WOW. *swoons* And every single one was different..amazing. The weather even was nice..we're harbingers of nice weather I swear. ;) We flew over Sheridan Glacier, which someone said we could walk on..ummm it ended in a lake. Yeahh..maybe you used to be able to though. And..HE FLEW US OVER CHILDS AND MILES GLACIERS!!! Take that washed out bridge! He flew us low over the face..it was sooooo awesome (if only they had calved for us :P). It seemed the biggest glacier we saw was Miles. Of course as we were flying over it my camera said my card was full (it only holds 172 pics?! Whaaat). :P I deleted some that weren't that great so I could take more. We also saw some goats and moose! Totally an epic flight. My pics are INCREDIBLE..the detail and everything is just amazing. I can't wait to show them. When we went inside the house to pay there was a kitty! I pet him and picked him up and he was just content and purring. The lady said she was surprised cause he's not normally friendly. Awww he knew I was a kitty lover hehe. After that we drove to Sheridan Glacier and hiked up to the face. You definitely wouldn't want to try and walk on it..it's all melty and unstable. It was cool though. I liked hearing the rocks fall off the glacier into the water. Plus the weather was sunny and was beautiful on the mountains and glacier. After than we went back to town. EPIC beyond words day. :D I put my pics on the computer so I can take more. Hopefully I'll get all updated so I can post them tomorrow :P

( Day 57- A picture of you and your favorite color )

Flightseeing was awesomeee. I actually went with Ryan cause mom has done it with me before and we wanted to give Ryan a chance too. I think he enjoyed it. We got to the building and they wrote down our weights and we paid and stuff. They were fine with taking us to the glaciers haha. We waited for the pilot to get ready and then we left. We flew over the fire by the Tanana River that's STILL burning! I thought it would have burned itself out cause of how cold it's been. Wow. It was interesting listening to the pilot chatter on the headphones too. It got cloudy going into the mountains. In the distance I saw Mt. McKinley! It looked awesomee. When we got into the Hayes, Hess and Deborah area it cleared up! That area is REALLY heavily glaciated. There were a bunch of glaciers there..and the mountains looked seriously awesome in the sun. The glaciers looked unique too..I'd never seen the surface look like it did on those before. You'll see in the pics..it was just amazing. I wasn't on the right side to get any good ones of Deborah and Hess..too bad cause they looked awesome up close. We saw Wood River Glacier, Yanert Glacier, West Fork Glacier and maybe the edge of Susitna glacier before it clouded up again (it seems like there was more than that though haha). When we flew back we flew under the clouds to see if we could spot any wildlife (it started snowing! Haha wow). We saw a bunch of Dall sheep on a mountain and two moose! The pilot spotted a third but I didn't see that one. Awesomeness :D

( pics! )

Would you rather always have to sleep with one eye open or always breathe using only one lung? Sleep with one eye open..I sleep with my eyes open anyway

Today's trivia: Fish yawn

Yesterday I went to Warbelow's Air cause mom told me they did flightseeing around Mt. Deborah and stuff (I've been really wanting to fly around those 3 mountains and see the glaciers over there). I talked to a guy in there (he may have been the manager?) and he talked about a wildlife tour for two people. He brought one of the pilots out and I told him I wanted to see the glaciers more than anything. He said the glaciers were close enough he could go out of his way to fly there. Sweeeet. Mom said we could even go one day after work if the weather's nice since we don't have to drive like 200 miles haha. Now I just gotta wait for my PFD (October 7th!) and the weather to clear up haha

( Day 2 – A photo of something you ate today. )

Today we drove to Denali. We went to the winter visitor's center and asked the person there if we could drive into the park..she said only 3 miles cause it had snowed. I got a map and was asking about the glaciers arount Mt. McKinley and if there were any we could see by car. She said no but she said there was a guy who did flightseeing tours in Cantwell (not far from Denali). She gave me his number and I called him and he said he could do one that afternoon!! I let mom talk to him and then it was off to Cantwell! I was ecstatic! Driving through the Alaska Range to Denali was cloudy but in Cantwell it was sunny! There was a GREAT view of McKinley. We so got lucky haha. We found the guy's house (I guess it's his own business) and soon we were flying over the mountains...OMG it was AMAZING. It was GORGEOUS. Mom and the pilot saw sheep but I didn't see them (I actually found out about it after we landed :P). OMG we got really close to McKinley!! I saw the wind blowing snow off the top of it! There are like a billion glaciers coming off McKinley too haha. When we were coming back the pilot flew low so we could look for wildlife. We saw a group of moose! I think it may have been a bull moose with his harem of cows lmao. The pilot flipped the plane to the side so we could go back around and I looked outside and it made me dizzy haha. Then we landed and the pilot showed us a map and the route we followed. Then we drove home and I saw one of the most awesome sunsets I've ever seen (plus I could still see McKinley). Wowww! Haha. I'll post my pics too

Last night mom and I looked out the window and there was an inch of snow on the ground! We went out at like midnight and threw snow at each other ;)

( pics!! )

Today's stupidest quote: When she fainted, her eyes rolled around the room (actual comment written by a doctor on a patient's chart)