Alaska 6.0 - Day 4

 August 13:  Scenic Railway Trip - Denali to Anchorage

After two full days of activities in Denali Park today we were up and out the door at 7 am for our luggage pick-up and have some breakfast before boarding the McKinley Express domed train for the scenic ride to Anchorage.  So, there aren't many tales to tell today....but here's what you DO need to know.  First, the train ride.  One of the coolest things you can do is to ride the rails in Alaska to get from one spot to another, the scenery is truly something.  There are three routes you can ride the train.  (1) between Fairbanks and Denali - we were on the bus for this portion of our journey and honestly, of the three train routes, it's the least scenic.  (2) Denali to Anchorage - what we did today.  It's the longest, and I mean the L-O-N-G-E-S-T of the three as it covers about eight hours of riding on the train.  The scenery is "good," but there's NOT eight hours worth of WOW scenery.  A lot of it is just riding through the wild forest.  And that's ok - it's scenic, you're on a domed train, and you're in Alaska so who's complaining.  In addition on this leg you are served lunch which was delicious.  For some reason today was a busy day on the railroad and there is but a single set of tracks.  So twice we had to pull over and wait for a train coming northbound to arrive and pass us by, so it added about an hour to our day.  (3) Anchorage to Seward/Whittier where the ship awaits.  This is what we'll do tomorrow - it's about 3 hours, maybe a little longer.  And the one time we did it we both said it was THE BEST "excursion" we've ever been on in any of our previous five trips to Alaska.  The scenery for nearly the entire three hours is spectacular, so we have high hopes for tomorrow.  Some of the shots I captured today:

One final selfie in Denali

Showing off our souvenir mugs with our morning "beverage"

(Mine was hot cocoa spiked with kalua - yummy!)

Patti has friends from high school who have bought a place in Anchorage and will live here at least part of the year.  So she made arrangements for Kim and I to meet her friends Jackie & Tom Maxwell.  They were waiting for us in our hotel lobby once we arrived.  We made sure our luggage was in our rooms then all got into their car and drove the short distance to the restaurant Jackie had picked out.  We were so excited to discover we were eating in an "igloo!"  The dinner was fabulous, the company even better.  Finally after dessert Jackie & Tom drove us back to the hotel where Kim and I took a look out over our balcony onto the waterfront and headed to bed.  We've loved the land portion of our adventure but are so SO excited for the cruise to begin.