Siblings Unite! Day 7

All good things must come to an end - well, at least for Casey. Today was his last day in Alaska so we made our way back to Anchorage via a ferry. We were fortunate enough to see a moose on our way back, only this time parked on the side of the road. Tomorrow, Margaret will go to the doctor for some new brakes.

Siblings Unite! Day 6

A vacation to Valdez is not complete without fishing so I booked us a 3/4 day salmon charter where we hoped to win the big one ($15K for catching the largest salmon of the season). We ended up on a boat with a couple from Portland, Oregon and while we didn't catch the largest salmon of the season, I DID catch the largest salmon of the day (16.6lbs!)! Overall, we ended up catching 15 salmon amounting to 84 pounds of Silver Salmon to be shared between Casey and I. And as for the contest, I won a 2XL sweatshirt (something tells me I must be smaller than the average fisherman...), a large t-shirt, medium vest, and a few gift certificates. I know, it's not $15K but it was pretty cool. Next year I'm shooting for the big bucks...lol.

Siblings Unite! Day 5

Woo-hoo we made it to Valdez! Still don't have much to speak of for braking power but we made it alive! Stopping about every 10 minutes to take a picture we were both awe struck at the scenary. The drive to Valdez is a MUST for anyone visiting Alaska.

Oh, and this evening we got another flat tire, only this time we were able to remove the tire and change it. But since we no longer have a spare, I arranged a ferry to take us from Valdez to Whittier (which is only 60 miles from Anchorage vs. 280 something) on Casey's last day in Alaska.

Siblings Unite! Day 4

Me? Drive too fast on a dirt/gravel road?? Never... :) *evil grin* Ok, so maybe I drive a little too fast. I forgot to mention that on the way to Denali yesterday I accidentally left the E-brake partially engaged and we lost all of our back brakes, including the E-brake itself. The pedal now depresses all the way to the floor before the front brakes start to engage, taking about twice as long to stop. So, we're crusing down a gravel hill on the Denali highway, and just as I'm thinking "Damn, it would take a lot of effort to make this bus stop if something ran in front of us" a huge ass moose (it was seriously as tall, if not taller than the bus) ran right out in front of us. "Holy &*$#!!!!" I slammed on the brakes and to the left I could see another moose so I kept the wheels straight, hoping that the moose in front of us would run faster than I could brake and that the other moose would either hurry up and run across or stay on the side of the road. Just as I notice that we're going to total the bus unless I turn the wheel, I veered to the left and we miss the moose by about a 1/8 of an inch - Casey swears that the back hoof hit the front of the van. The moose was so terrified that it pissed its way across the van. Afterwards, Casey and I just stared at the road in front of us. "Dude" I think was about all I could get out and then we pounded fists. We survived! I vowed to take it a little easier down the downhills but that didn't stop my lead foot on the straightaways.

About a half an hour later it started to rain as we passed by a van stranded on the side of the road. A group of three wildlife photographers from Sweden had two flats on their rental, and while a motorcyclist had pulled over to help, I thought that after our moose incident that it would be good kharma to do a good deed and see if they needed any additional help. We ended up taking one of the guys and one of their flat tires with us to a lodge they had passed just up the road. We get no more than five minutes down the road when Casey pops his head out of the window, "Ahhh...we have a flat." Dude, seriously? I know Casey's sense of humor and at first I didn't believe him so I kept driving. "No really, you have a flat." Dangit! So much for good kharma. In fact, we had just the opposite. We got out the lug wrench to remove the tire. I tried first but my girly muscles weren't strong enough - the thing wouldn't budge. So then Casey tried. Nothing. We both pried on it and then...SNAP! The lug nuts were so tight that the entire wrench snapped in half. Damn kharma. So we ended up driving about 10 miles at 10mph to the lodge where (thankfully!) there was a guy repairing tires from the gravel road. Apparently it was tearing everyone's tires to shreads because there was a line of people waiting to have their tires fixed.

We enjoyed a warm lunch, paid for the tire service (they couldn't get the tire off either and had to just plug the leak), drove the rest of the Denali Highway and then made our way South to a river about an hour or so from the highway where we stopped for the night to camp. I rigged up the surround sound in the van to my laptop - we enjoyed a movie and beer (ok, more than one beer) and then hit the sack.

Siblings Unite! Day 3

Up until Casey got here we had over a month of consecutive rain so I was estatic to see blue sky this morning. We didn't have a full view of the mountain but it didn't matter - we saw enough wildlife to make up for it, including moose, caribou, grizzlies, marmots, and sheep. Oh! And the fall colors! Everything was turning red, orange and yellow - I definitely have to make it back this time next year and spend more time in the park. After riding in a bus for eight hours into the park we were excited to get back on the road. Instead of driving back towards Anchorage on a paved road, we decided to take the Denali Highway, a highly recommended scenic dirt/gravel road that travels 120 miles East from the park to the town of Paxson. We made it only about 10 miles down the road this evening before we spotted a sweet camping spot beside a pond.

Siblings Unite! Day 2

After a good nights sleep, we woke up, ran some errands and made our way to Denali National Park stopping along the way to cut some wood for a campfire that evening. Note to self - wood in Alaska does not burn. We had all of the necessities we needed - Margaret, beer, food and time (Margaret cruises on the flats and downhills but she needs a little love on the uphills).

Siblings unite! Day 1

My brother arrived in Anchorage around 3pm today! What better way to torture him on his first day in Alaska than to take him on one of my death marches. He and I, one of my coworkers and his friend all loaded up in Margaret and hiked up to Crow Pass in Girdwood, AK. On the way we saw a pod of Beluga whales (very rare!) - it was an awesome sight, definitely a good omen to the start of our vacation and roadtrip together, not to mention the sunshine he brought with him.

Camping rocks

Friday @ 1pm, some of my fellow coworkers and I loaded up in Margaret and a pickup truck and drove to Homer Alaska for a weekend of camping fun on the Spit. Words cannot express how grateful I am to have found such a great company and friends to work with. It was definitely an epic weekend with lots of beer drinking, high altitude kite flying, ATV chasing, halibut fishing, bonfires, giant-sized marshmallow smores, hula hooping, and great conversation.


We all agreed that the only thing that was missing from the trip was someone who played guitar to accompany us by the campfire so Jessica made it her mission to create a sign to recruit one.



As we're sitting by the campfire on Saturday night, Jessica and I see two guys riding on ATVs along the beach. We immediately both look at each other and our eyes light up, "Wait for us!" They couldn't hear us so we walked after them but they disappeared out of sight. We were in desperate need of a ride on the beach in a four-wheeler so we walked briskly in their direction trying to hunt them down. We found them alright, about a half an hour later - two boys, no more than 16 years old, being scolded by their dad for riding too fast on the beach. Lame. So we walked back on the boardwalk and came across a hippie looking dude walking by himself looking for food. "Hey, we have some hot dogs and beer down by a VW van on the beach if you can't find anything." He thanked us for our generosity and as we turned around, I had an epiphany. "Wait!" I yelled out. The hippie turned around with a confused look. "Do you play guitar?!?!" "I do!.." was his answer! Yes! But then he followed with, "Do you have a guitar?" No. Bummer. We should have bought that Hanna Montana guitar at Fred Meyers! He ended up joining us at the campfire - what an interesting character. He just about had an orgasm looking at the van - "Dude!" he said. "This van is awesome!!! We have the same seat covers and stereo! Look!" He begged me to look at his seat covers and stereo so I followed him. "Dude, check it out! They're like exactly the same!" They were completely different. The only thing the seat covers had in common was that they both had black in them and both of our stereos had a blue light. This guy was a nut job but it was fun getting to know a complete stranger.


We drove around, visited some wineries and the brewery on Saturday and on Sunday we woke up at the butt crack of dawn and went halibut fishing on a buddy's boat. We all loaded up on Dramamine before the ride but several of us were still feeling the effects of the rough water, especially in the enclosed part of the boat which I deemed the vomit chamber. We reached our quota of two fish per person (14 fish total) and headed back to Margaret for a much needed nap. It felt SO good to crawl into a warm sleeping bag after being wet and cold all day on the boat.

It was super cozy and fun having four people sleep in the van but man, I really need to stop talking in my sleep. Apparently I said something aloud to the affect of, "My pants are getting wet on the inside and I need to take them off."