Wednesday - July 27

We checked out of the Hilton at 7 AM and walked down E Street to the train station.    Bought some coffees and chatted with a nice couple from Cleveland.    Boarded the train at 7:45 and at 8:20 were off on our Alaska Railroad adventure to Fairbanks (357 miles).    What a treat to see the sun today and pretty blue sky along with puffy clouds.  The train is really nice with reclining seats and plenty of leg room.   Our car is close to the upper deck with bigger windows where we can observe for 20 minutes or so as there are only 20 seats.    Stops along the way were in Wasilla (Sarah Palin’s home), Talkeetna, Denali and finally Fairbanks.
We ate lunch with 2 guys from Tempe, AZ..    Lunch was a real treat…..my spinach salmon salad was excellent as was Mark’s pot roast sliders.    We spent the day reading, playing solitaire on the I-pad, writing this blog and occasionally little cat naps.   But big majority of the time we were soaking up all the beauty.   At every twist and turn, WOW!!!!   Trees, trees, so many trees along with rivers, streams and clear, clear bubbling brooks.   We saw 4 black bears swimming and several moose.    The mountains were magnificent as our train just chugged along (later this afternoon we were between 2 mountain ranges - the Alaskan Range to our left and the Talkeetna Range on our right.
We had a delicious dinner (salmon chowder for me; Mark had Alaskan cod.)   We really enjoyed the food and service.
Our train pulled into Fairbanks at 8:00 – it was beautiful when we stepped outdoors – bright and sunny and 75 degrees   Yeah…   Took a shuttle/taxi to the Pioneer Village Inn and we are ready to hunker down!    This was a really fun, relaxing day filled with sooo much incredible scenery!
We took lots of pictures but slow internet here, so.....the beauty of Alaska coming soon!
Nighty night!
 
 

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