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24
May 14

Seward, Alaska wildlife cruise

Seward is a town of about 3,000 people. It was once a vital shipping town, as the port sent a variety of goods into interior Alaska. A massive earthquake and subsequent fires and a tsunami in 1964 all but wiped the place out. As we were told today, the industry has never completely recovered. Now, alongside fisheries, tourism is one of the big industries. You’re about to see why in the photographs and video below.

We got right up to the seagulls, thousands of whom lived in this one rock protruding from the bay. Later in the season, we learned, bigger waves will come through and clean the rock. This is probably important, but tourists wonder why they’re learning about it.

And now, three shots of harbor seals:

These next six will need no introduction. Our cruise captain says he’s been doing this for 15 years. Even he was oohing and aahing about some of the things we saw today, including two separate pods swimming right to us.

Mountains over the water are also impressive, just so you know:

We saw a glacier.

Up close.

We got right next to it. The cracking ice sounded like a rifle’s report. And, from far away, you could hear the glacier-quake, a rumbling thunder, heavy industry sound.

And the Aialik Glacier is the subject of today’s video. Watch until the end:

You want to see the orcas again? Fine. We went back for another quick visit to watch them eat and play.

Another mountain shot.

Our captain steered us — hey, what’s that?

That is a humpback whale.

I said a humpback whale.

We only got to see him for a few minutes because some people on our cruise had to catch a train. Some people have misplaced priorities. Here are a few more mountain shots as we cruised back into port at Seward:

We got off the boat, looked up into the sky and saw this:

The sun stays up — or, rather, it doesn’t get dark — here until midnight or later this time of year. But at dinnertime, that’s what you see.

We stopped by one of the few promising restaurants we could find in the mid-century, blue collar downtown. I had a pork sandwich at the Seward Brewing Company. Walked away with a recipe, too.

We got back to our lodge and walked across the street to the mountain stream. Jessica, Adam, Lauren and I tossed stones into it for an hour or so. It seemed like it would be twilight for forever.

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23
May 14

Seward, Alaska — Day One

Adam and Jessica drove us down the peninsula from Anchorage to Seward today. There are a ton of pictures here — because I remain enamored with the snow-capped mountains — so keep scrolling. Forty-five shots in all, broken into sections. Enjoy. There are mountains, birds, fish and more.

Here are some shots from inside the car.

This next section features shots from the Seward SeaLife Center.

Watching the fish, one woman said to her daughter “It is hard to imagine nature could make something as beautiful as that.”

You understand her point, but wish she had the opportunity to get outside just a bit more.

Like the birds? Here is a video:

A few shots from around Seward:

If you walk outside of our hotel room, stand in the middle of the road and turn to your right, you see this:

This one is directly across from our front door:

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22
May 14

Around Eagle River

Most of the pictures today, I confess, are of the mountains. Because the mountains have deep, rich colors standing in contrast to the remnants of what was apparently a mild winter. I like mountain pictures. And since I grew up at the edge of the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains (which don’t look like these) and live on the coastal plain, you’re going to get more than your share of them on this trip, I suspect.

But, first, a plane. As far as I know this is the first time I’ve seen a Boeing C-17 Globemaster III. It is 174 feet long with a wingspan of about 170 feet and is powered by four Pratt & Whitney turbofan engines each capable of 40,400 pound force of thrust. Hauling cargo is the Globemaster’s purpose in life. It can support a 69-ton M1 Abrams main battle tank, other armored vehicles, trucks, and trailers and palletized cargo. The cargo compartment is 88 feet long by 18 feet wide and can carry 170,900 pounds. It can also airdrop 102 paratroopers and their equipment. This one has an un-refueled range of about 2,800 nautical miles and can cruise at Mach 0.74.

I also saw my first F-22 in person today, but I didn’t get a picture.

And, now, a series of photos featuring some of the mountains of the Eagle River Valley.

The Yankee, Jessica and I enjoyed the Eagle River Nature Center, where we saw most of this scenery today:

This is our roommate, Zach. He likes to cuddle:

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21
May 14

Travel day

We had breakfast with my father-in-law this morning. He took us to the airport in mid-morning. We sat in the airport holding pen for far too long, which meant enjoying the ever-challenging CNN dayparts. Why airports feel the need to turn it on CNN and break off the knobs we may never understand.

We they must almost always be turned to the highest possible volume first just seems like a crime against humanity.

Anyway, we flew to Salt Lake City, where we had our first experience in one of the secured “travelers clubs.” You pay a bit more and you get snacks, quieter rooms, better chairs and less crowds.

Worth every penny.

It turns out that my step-father was in Salt Lake City at the same time. He was over in one terminal waiting on his turnaround and we were waiting elsewhere for ours. We did not have time to meet, but it was kind of funny.

I got War Eagled on the plane to Salt Lake and then again inside that special club room. There’s just no end to the family reunions.

Here are some photos from the rest of the trip. We headed northwest, over the corner of Canada and landed, finally, in Anchorage.

On the one hand we traveled something like 16 hours on the day, after you figured in the time zones. On the other, we went across the entire country. Aeronautics are amazing, despite the cattle-car-in-the-sky mentality.

When we arrived it was about 11 p.m. local time. And it was still daylight. Our friends Adam and Jessica picked us up and took us to their place, and we enjoyed the mountains in twilight all the way there. Tomorrow we’ll start seeing the sights.

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17
May 14

A race, a game and a cookout :: A fine, full day

This morning we ran the Ft. Benning Reverse Sprint Triathlon. It is a short course, featuring a 5K run, a 20K ride and a 450-meter swim, in that order. Here we are after the finish:

This is the first triathlon we did last year, making this the first time we can compare times to previous efforts on the same course. I have a few things to be pleased with here.

The run is almost perfectly flat, and there are a lot of soldiers in the race, so they dominate the run, of course. You see them at the start and somewhere on the bike course or in the pool, if at all. So I’m not running with those guys, but I pulled away from a few people in the run. In fact, I didn’t get passed at all. My time was still slow, but I shaved a great deal off of last year’s run.

The bike is a super-fast ride with only two real rollers to think about. I was pleased with the ride last year, and I did it in three-and-a-half minutes less time this year. When you look at the average speed I was on the upper-end of average riders and almost break into the fast rider speeds. Only one guy dropped me here, and I’m not sure how. I looked down at my gears on that first roller, looked up and he was gone. I didn’t see him again until I passed him in the last 100 meters of the pool.

The pool was an improvement for me as well, if only because I was barely swimming last year. Remember, I was still dealing with shoulder problems and couldn’t even pretend to freestyle. I was disappointed in my swim today. The lanes were crowded for the first half of the short swim. Meanwhile, it takes me almost that entire distance to get warm anyway. I also had some energy excuses. (I even came up with a phrase for the latter, the red line of regret. I could have redlined the thing. I should have. Then I wouldn’t have regretted what I left in the pool because I was a little tired and winded. I could have been faster, but I didn’t overcome the red line of regret.)

Overall, my time was 17 minutes faster than last year’s race, which was very slow. This year’s was merely slow. But that’s a fair amount of improvement, with plenty of areas in which to continue to grow.

I’m bummed that I won’t get to do that race again for another year now. I want to measure these performances against another effort.

Today was senior day for Auburn baseball. Here the mother of one player and the grandmother of another shared a big hug and a kiss on the cheek of celebration. They’ve been coming to these games for four years. They’re going to miss each other.

They are sweet ladies.

Here’s another one. This is Morgan Jackson, Bo Jackson’s daughter. We’re buds:

This was the last time we’d see the team on the field this season:

My new Aubie gimmick — no one steal it! — is the Aubie selfie:

Another of Aubie, relaxing with the ladies.

Auburn lost the game, 8-1, bringing their season to a close with a 28-28 record (10-20 SEC). But the friendships are the thing: parents of five different players came to say goodbye to us today and then we had a cookout tonight with the nice group of people with whom we sit. That’s not a bad season at all, captured in one sentence.

After the cookout we picked up the traditional post-triathlon celebratory ice cream: