Hey! Hey! The Gangs All Here!

The next couple days Katie and I didn't really do all that much besides hang out around Anchorage anticipating Russ' arrival. We busied our days with souvenir shopping as well as hitting up restaurants and breweries suggested again by Meg Steele. On Sunday we visited the prestigious Glacier Brewhouse for lunch after a quick oil change in the morning. CJ had been giving us some trouble with the check engine light, so we were hoping that if anything was really wrong they would find it during the oil change. They found nothing and eventually the light went off as it always does. Whew! Anyway, back to the Brewhouse... it was amazing! Since we had the whole day at our leisure and since we had just planned on walking around all day, Katie and I made sure to make the most of sampling the local fare. We shared a pizza and

had about 3 beers a piece, experimenting with Katie's beer taste which is slowly expanding. After a stop off back at the car, we

went to every souvenir shop we could find until Katie was satisfied (or she didn't have any money left) then went for a walk down Anchorage's coastal shore via the Tony Knowles Costal Trail. We walked about 3 miles of this amazing 11 mile trail and then watched the sunset before heading back to the van. We had talked to Russ that day and he told the name of the hotel which we would be staying with him in Anchorage once he arrived. We thought it would be a great place to park the van for the night and that is exactly what it turned out to be.

Monday morning again found us in Anchorage with kind of a limbo state of mind. We again didn't want to do much in the city since we figured Russ would want to experience it all as well, so we decided to run some errands. First on our list was to stop at Walmart to get cleaning supplies for the van as well as the cooler. We didn't want Russ thinking poorly of us do to the lack of cleanliness in the van... well at least Katie didn't. That and our cooler also had a horrible smell since we neglected to keep it stocked with ice 24/7 and some of our meat went south. Another reason we went to Walmart was to get some bear mace! Russ insisted on having some since we would be directly seeking them out in the days to come. Next we went to Moose's Tooth for some lunch. This place is a pizzeria that serves as a front for a brewery; again another Meg recommendation which was spectacular. We sat down at about 11a.m. just before the afternoon rush. Our waiter was awesome and super interested in telling us about the beer and pizza and giving us samples to make sure we got exactly what we wanted. We ended up

getting some Diablo sticks and each a small pizza of our own. The beauty of this place is that you can split your pizza's in half, essentially getting 2 pizza's in one. Both Katie and I did this meaning we got to sample 4 different pizza's not to mention the beer. We both left the place having eaten way too much, so we headed to the Tony Knowles trail again to walk some if it off. This time we went to Earthquake Park which is a commemorative park for the 1964 Good Friday Earthquake. We ended up not walking too much, due to our full bellies, so we headed to trusty Barnes and Noble to use the internet and read for a while to burn some time before we had to be at the airport to meet Russ. Obviously we got to the airport early and finally met up with Russ at about 6 p.m. After we got everything checked in at the hotel we went out to explore the city. Since all of our tales of Anchorage thus far involved either breweries or the coastal trail, Russ decided that we should do both. We walked along the trail for a bit, this time enjoying the high tide. When Katie and I went the day before it was low tide and the differences in scenery were amazing. We stopped off at a lake just about a mile in to the trail. The day before Katie and I had seen 4 big fish swimming up the river as well as a loon type bird underneath the water doing some fishing of his own. This, along with tales of me throwing stones at beavers, was enough for Russ to want to check it out. Although there was no beavers this time, we did see

the fish again. We walked to the edge of the lake, just where the trail turned off the lake, and were about to turn around when an immature bald eagle headed straight for us and flew about 10 ft. over our heads! It happened so fast and we were in awe the entire time, both wondering what was going on and hoping that it wouldn't swoop on us. We decided to turn around after that

and head for some dinner at Snow Goose Restaurant before the sun set. We chose this restaurant not only because it was another infamous Meg recommendation (and brewery front), but also because it had a deck that faced the Cook Inlet, offering a spectacular view of the sunset. After some amazing food, beer, and sunset, we headed back to our hotel to get some rest for our first full day of excitement in Alaska as a trio!