We are done!!!!!!!

Hey it's Will, and I'm doing one last blog. We me made it safely home and I had maybe four hours of sleep coming home. It didn't help that I had to get up at 5:30 this morning to go to Virginia and listen to a judge speak about the separation of church and state. it was LONG and BORING but a little fun all at once. Oh joy!!

I want to say thank you to everybody who donated money for this trip and those who prayed for it as well. It really worked!!! The weather worked out perfectly. And those who read this bloq, thank you!! Your comments were great. I had a great time and hope to return, but i;m happy to be home. :)


Will's keepsake... Whale baleen etched by a native!

What does the end of vacation look like?

This... Will catching some zzzz's at the Denver airport. He doesn't know we have free internet, or he might "come alive" but it is doubtful. We left Anchorage at 11:15p.m., arrived here at 6:20a.m. and we will be back to Knoxville at 3:30p.m.. Of course that doesn't figure in the "loosing of time" 4 hours... but I digress, you all really just checked in to see what antics we have been up to or some witty comments from Will.

So I would like to tell you that we had an awesome last day hike in Eagle River, but it wasn't in the plans, as duty called for our host Matt. Will was able to do homework, which he was most excited to finish. We did however enjoy a most mouth watering delicious meal at Simon and Seaforts Grille with Matt and Caroline and finish up some souvenir shopping. We dined on crab macadamia nut stuffed halibut... yes it was as awesome as it sounds. And after 2 weeks of togetherness Will still thinks I am the best Aunt Debbie, although he did contemplate driving me into the drink in Homer... and well this photo speaks of our typical time these past weeks!



I would like to introduce our gracious host Matt and Caroline. A groovy couple living the dream in Alaska! Oh and say congrats and prayers as they are expecting their first child. We must not have been too hard of guest they invited us back, but we had to commit to babysitting assistance :)



That's right.... oh sorry another attempt at humor! This is actually Ralph and Kodiak... Kodi, and well they are good host too... fully accepting of us just as we were, as long as we fully devoted them some attention.

This is really Matt and Caroline... at the picturesque sky walk downtown Anchorage!




Of course right now we are both tired, and yesterday we talked about how we just skimmed the surface of Alaska and although there are adventures we didn't get to take WOW what we did experience was incredible. As we talked with Matt and Caroline last night at dinner Matt commented that we must have had a lot of people praying for our trip, he said the fact that we saw Denali as much as we did, the northern lights with the beautiful dance and even some great whale and eagle spots; we had experienced more in 2 weeks then many others that visit. So just in case you weren't sure, God does answer prayers, oh and that staying safe in Alaska, yea he answered that one too. As we were driving to the airport last night, I was cutting over to the way I know to get to the Anchorage airport and what to my blurry eyes did I see? Yes big old moose ran in front of me... and into someone's front yard! Will and I were cracking up!

We do hope that you have enjoyed following our adventure. We want to thank you all for your prayers, support and encouraging words on the post! We hope to have a slide show post for you, once I get back to my groovy brother in law who can set it up... So don't forget to come back and visit... thanks again for all the comments and prayers!!

Warning signs...

Okay... we are back in Anchorage, really Eagle River at hacienda Kirby's our most gracious host who allowed us crazy strange travelers to crash at their home!

The above pic was a t-shirt that Will and I found much humor in, and in my line of work especially! I am proud to report that we did not in fact participate (up to this point) in any of the mentioned activities we did however find ourselves today staring down eagles on Homer Spit...



Allowing Will to "test drive" the other rental car on the spit! Surf with the "big fish"



Run with the bears... oh I mean run from the bears!



Top that off with snow shoeing around portage glacier... thanks again to our host for letting us borrow the "shoes!"











So we have been safe, blessed and had much fun! Soon we will be heading back to family and old friends leaving new ones, and well lets just end this post with... Thank God for Wal Mart! They know how to do them right in Alaska!




P.S. Uhhh, our host Matt a really in shape dude has promised us a "short hike" up baldy mountain tomorrow so this "safe post may become null and void! jk :)

Alright!! we are in Homer. It's a pretty cool little town on the coast of Alaska. Too bad Mr. Simpson couldn't make it. (If you saw the simpson's movie you would know they go to Alaska, and they just had to have visited Homer) But first, our adventure in Seward.

When we got to Seward, it was cloudy a little windy.



I had to do my thing and I took awhile. Now that would have been okay if we didn't have to be on the other end of town to get on a whale watching tour in five minutes. The lack of fresh veggies and fruit, is leaving the colon uncooperative. Thank God the town of Seward is about as big as my neighborhood! So we made it. Now the tour was amazing. after about two minutes on the water we saw two young Humpback Whales. We had some pics and one of them was of the fluke but my crazy Aunt Debbie had the wrong settings on the camera, so they didn't work out. But we got to see two different pods of Orca Whales (killer whales) and some of them even came right up to the boat.






One good thing was the fact that these Orcas were not the ones that eat other mammals, but the ones that eat fish. So if you fell in you wouldn't die from being eaten, but of hypothermia. Now that's something to look forward to. To reassure everyone, no one fell into the water. Although I almost put something else into the water.... Let's just say, the Bonine didn't work. But no worries, everything was okay and we even saw a couple eagles hanging out, a few mountain goats who appeared to be waiting for a ride, seals and a Sea Otter on the way back.



















On the way to Homer we saw this guy... or maybe girl?





In Homer, we had somewhat of a lazy day. We drove down from Seward, ate lunch in Homer, (I had some fresh Halibit) saw lots of Eagles and switched hotels all in one day. Man, were we busy!!














While we were on the beach, (yes there are beaches in Alaska, With SAND!!) we saw some kelp growing on a rock.










And this is what I thought of it








Keep the comments coming!! some portions of this post where edited due to lack of full info on the past 48hrs...

In, Around, Under and Above Anchorage and Soccer Field

We are now in Seward and Aunt debbie has forced me to do this blog post today cause she did it two days ago and it's time for me to do it. So here's what we did the past few days. We got into Anchorage around noon and needed to exchange our rental car for a cheaper one. So we went to the Avis downtown. Okay this is Aunt Debbie, and I have to take over. Will forgot that we checked out of the hotel saturday a.m., ate at snow city cafe were he consumed massive quantities of biscuits, gravy and a a breakfast burrito. Thank goodness though because it took over 2 hours to finally switch out vehicles, well maybe not quite that long, but we did have to go from downtown to the airport. The woman "Star" was her name, no kidding, couldn't get the computer to cooperate and therefore wanted to charge me a $160 drop fee!! Sorry, I still have to feed Will for a few more days. Anyway, we connected by phone with Caroline who was doing nursery duty at church so we headed to an Alaskan adventure at the Beartooth theatre. We ordered pizza, and joined all the other peoples in the theatre to watch National Treasure book of secrets while dining.

Will's back!! Go Will, go Will, GO WILL!!!!! That was the song you guys were supposed to be singing cause you were so happy that I was now doing the blog. Haha, I know you guys love me. Anywho, the rest of the story. We got to the Kirby's and just hung out the rest of the day, I know that seems boring, but I enjoy some downtime once and awhile. Especially after running around like a chicken with its head cut off these past few days. The next morning we went to church with the Kirbys. There church was HUGE!! The largest church in Alaska. Their attendance was about the same as our church in Tennessee, but the building was an old Factory and contained thousands of square feet. Each kids classroom was about as big as our Apex. Those of you who have been to my church know that is somewhat of a large room. They even had slides in the classrooms. One was about as big as the slide we rode on in Fairbanks. After church, I went and played a game of indoor soccer on their churches soccer team. And it was fun! I played goalie. Now I know you all are thinking how many did he let in. And some of your guesses are around twenty goals. But you are wrong, Wrong I tell you, WRONG!!!!!!!!! I only allowed two. And they were flukes. I had both of them. One I dove for and it glanced off my arm, hit the goal post and rolled in. The other I stopped. and when I reached out for it, the stupid ball rolled over my arm into the goal. But hey, at least I had fun. After that little escapade, we rented I am Legend, watched it and went to bed.

It's getting late so I better get off of this thing we call the "Evil One" ( the computer). Not to be confused with "Evil One Jr. (the TV), or Evil One Jr. Jr., (the Xbox), or the "Evil One Jr. Jr. Jr. (the PS2), Or "Evil One III J,. (the Wii or anything Nintendo, The Gamecube, Gameboy, Nintendo 64, Super Nintendo, etc.) And last but not least "Evil One III Jr. Jr. twice removed, (Atari.) I'll tell you about Sewerd and Homer tomorrow. Keep the comments coming. You guys were slacking the last few post. I just wanted to leave you guys with one las thought....................

Glacier flying... and driving

Well, we are in the big city of Anchorage again. Yesterday was a slow morning that developed into a beautiful flight over around and through part of the Alaska range. We landed on a glacier and Will took a nap (....).



It was an awesome day of beautiful weather and views that will be stuck in my head for a long time! Quite impressive! The rest of the day was spent driving back to Anchorage were we had an awesome meal at the Alaska Brewhouse! Of course I had salmon, Will ribs! I just saw the weather and it is supposed to snow this week here, although the temps are 30's today! We are now entering the "twilight zone" version of our vacation... I have not made a plan.... well anyone who really knows me is not surprised! So start praying!! Oh we are going to stay with some relatives of a friend! Maybe you all should pray for Caroline and Matt!!



See ya, keep the comments coming and hopefully Will will be inspired to write again soon!

Hanging in the Thriving Metropolis of Talkeetna

On the way to Talkeetna, we stopped by the local store known as Wal-Mike's. If you needed a tire, they had it. If you needed any thing, they had it. Just like Wal-Mart. They even had that little star in-between Wal and Mike's just like Wal-Mart. Can't get the pic to show up for you... you will have to imagine



Talketna, a small town in the middle of Alaska, who's size makes an acorn look huge. Taking advantage of this small town, I went for a little drive.



It was quite interesting. Especially after I parked and Aunt Debbie wanted me to get closer to the hotel. I was close enough. It was a fine place to park. But no we had to move those extra six inches closer. Aggh!! So I did. but I went about eight inches, and that wouldn't do for Aunt Debbie. So I had to back up those little two inches to make her happy. I backed up three. This went on for a few minutes until I just turned off the car and got out. Before our little driving adventure, we stopped into a little pizza place and watched some March Madness. I ate one huge Calzone. It was about 15 inches long and about 10 inches wide. I almost ate it all. About three fourths of it. But man! it was BIG!!!! The hotel we stayed at had the greatest french toast I have ever had (made fresh by the owner who is originally from Switzerland). One of the cool things about this hotel was the fact that they had a theme over every door and a few bible verses explaining that theme. Ours was Repentance. Thank God the local Catholic Church was having confessions that very day. i can breath much better now.

Heally, then to Talketna

We are ALIVE!!!!! The hit-man did not come last night. He must have been off duty. When we got there was nobody there. And on the main desk was an envelope with our name on it and the keys to our room in it. Talk about freaky! After we put our bags in the room, a lady who claimed to be cleaning the carpet, came into the Motel. My personal opinion is that she was cleaning up the mess left from the last victim. Then on the way to Talketna, we kept seeing the cleaning lady's car frequently pull over on the side the road along the Nenana River. I swear I saw her drag a body out of the car and dump it in the river. Seeing this made me feel extremely grateful for the "Killer at the Motel in the Middle of Nowhere" passing up our room last night. Another thing that happened last night, was we saw the Aurora Borealis. It was just glowing and getting brighter occasionally, but nothing extraordinary. So we decided to go back inside. And about halfway down the road to the Motel, I turned around because I thought I heard something behind me. And there it was dancing across the sky! Man it was awesome!

From the End to the Middle... Somewhere

Sorry for not keeping you guys posted. We've been stuck between a rock and a hard place. Something about being an hour from the nearest city, makes it somewhat difficult to make contact with the outer world. So what, it's vacation! Okay that was not our thoughts about The Chena Hot Springs. Being a teenager and one who likes, and rather prefers, being in contact with the outside world, this somewhat stunk. We had two working channels. CNN and ESPN. But they were as grainy as sand at Myrtle Beach. I couldn't even tell who had the ball or what the score was during March Madness. So I felt the need to go outlaw and protest with Management.



Now I know all you moms are shouting Hallelujah at the top of your lungs because I was separated from Technology. Not funny!! i would love to see you guys go without TV, the internet or even Email (mom.... echem). It's not fun. But oh well time for what we did get to do at Chena and a couple of stops before Chena.

We went to the north pole.





Then we saw Alaskan Pipeline.





and then on to Chena hot springs. The first thing we did was eat. The food was one of the best things Chena had to offer. Then we went to The Ice museum. Where WE drank out off Ice Martini Glasses,




I preached from the pulpit,


had a bad dream,




went to the Bathroom



and wrestled with the Coca-Cola bear for some of his Coke and lost.







Swimming in the hot springs was the best part of the whole visit. Although you had to be an adult to swim in the hot springs, I swam in it. I may not be an adult but at least i act like one. Okay not really, but hey how old are you when you become an adult as a Jew? 14. What about an Eskimo? 12. I'm really scraping the bottom of the barrel now. I better stop. The cool thing about the hot springs was the fact my hair froze. I spiked it up and in a few minutes it was frozen solid.





It may not look frozen but over my right ear you can see icicles hanging off of my hair. Pretty cool. literally. But the best ting that happened was we saw the Aurora Borealis. It was out briefly and wasn't that bright but is was still beautiful.

End of the Road... Chena Hot Springs

Sorry no pictures or post from yesterday. We left Fairbanks, saw Santa at the North Pole, Pipeline and on to Chena. We have no cell service, and the other phones weren't up yesterday, or the internet to well... now I know we are still in the U.S., but it has taken a half hour to connect here today!! So we are basically "unplugged" enjoying it, but no lights last night!! Pray for the dance to appear tonight! Hopefully we will be able to post tomorrow!! Love ya, Keep the comments coming!

Bite My Finger!!!!

At first I was going to ask the salmon to pull my finger but... I knew that my Aunt would not approve and the salmon would feel un-evolved cause he didn't have any hands or fingers. So I just asked him to bite my finger instead. The morning started off eating some fake breakfast at the hotel. But at least the waffles were good and somewhat real. Then we stepped out of our comfort zones and went to church....... We decided to go to the church of our Avis car rental clerk that God specifically placed in our path so that we could experience this interesting church. The choir was good and the lead singer dude payed the eukelali and the bass player was a girl. The sermon was pretty good and the Paster got really emotional. But who can blame him, Jesus did a lot for him and all of us. After church we continued our quest to master Fairbanks and figure out where in the world we were going. We familiarized our selves with Fairbanks by missing our turns, cause our map stunk. The highlight of my day, besides church, was the Ice park.


At the Ice park there were sculptures made out of Ice that were incredible.









Plus about every thirty feet there was an Ice slide for the little kids.




And of course I had to go down everyone about five times. The coolest one was one about forty feet long and about twenty feet high.






This one we went down about thirty times. Okay not that much, but it was a lot. The funny thing that happened was when Aunt Debbie got stuck in a ice bowl. I had no trouble getting out and knowing that she would have plenty of trouble getting out, so being the good kid I am I said "Hey Aunt Debbie, how about you get in that ice bowl." She did and she got stuck. And I got a kick out of it. I know it was mean, but we thought it was funny to so it was okay.



Although it was about nine degrees, I was having so much fun that it didn't seem cold. Aunt Debbie is still hindered by her cold and thought it was freezing. Please pray for her to heal up quickly so she can "keep up with me" as she always says. Now we are eating our dinner and looking forward to tomorrow. Keep the comments coming!! thanks to Will for todays post!

"Life's short stay awake"

And that my friends and family is what we are trying to do! 12 hours on the train from Anchorage to Fairbanks, and our shuttle was an hour late sooo... with my cold and all this will be short!! The highlights 6 moose sightings, 8 caribou, 4 dall sheep, 2 people snow shoeing in the middle of what appears nowhere and ... drum roll 1 BIG DENALI! Actually we were truly blown away with many views of the Alaska range, Chucagh, and Talkeetna! As most people will tell you up here, seeing the big one, Denali is never to be taken for granted as it basically has it's own weather system up there at 20+. It was an awesome day really, and so much more to tell... but alas my nose runs and Will is off to find food or snack... he is tiring of the stash of Clif bars and well considering the price of train food... oh yes Will ate reindeer today!! So sorry to tell you all that Dasher will not be flying next year :) Okay my cold medicine must be kicking in! Thanks to all of you for your prayers... they are working, we are really seeing and experiencing great things... keep the comments coming

and if you were wondering what Easter is about... it's about the one who created scenery like this! Happy Easter!