Day 13, Anchorage, AK to Anchorage AK, 152 mi

10 July 2015

Since we are overnighting in the same location the post title is Anchorage to Anchorage.  While this implies that we didn't go anywhere, that assumption would be false.

In the morning I rode up to Team CC in Eagle River (about 20 miles north of Anchorage) to get the rear tire on the Spyder replaced.  I arrived shortly after they opened at 9:00 am and put myself in a corner and had myself a timeout while playing on the Internet.  Of course I also mentioned about the intermittent cruise control issue, even though it has been working perfectly all day.

Well after a couple of hours, the Spyder had a new paw on it.  Since the job took less than the estimated 3 hours the service manager gave me a sweet break on the price. The people at Team CC in Eagle River are good people.  So Team CC is RECOMMENDED (note that they also have a location in Wasilla)!

The AFTER picture

While I was off retreading the Spyder, the spousal unit was busy doing the laundary thing.  The dorm here a the University of Alaska has a washateria (that's a laundromat for those of you who haven't spent any time in Texas) that does a good job for just a little coin,

Now that the Spyder is again safe for human conveyance, we had a healthy lunch of convenience store bratwurst (2 for $3.00 - cheap!) and headed south down the Seward Highway to see the Portage Glacier.  There is a nifty tour boat that will take people on a glacial lake (fresh water) for a close-up and personal view of a glacier for less than $40.  The ride is about an hour long, and has running commentary from a knowledgeable parks person.

Here is what the glacier looks like.  Sorry I didn't get a picture of the boat itself, but if you really want to see what it looks like here is a link.  What you really want to see is the glacier, right?  Well, wait no more.

Portage Glacier

Now, up close and personal:

Future cocktail ice?

Now, I know what you are thinking.  What about the icebergs? Well the captain had to do her darndest to navigate around those floating bits of ice.  Really though, they were quite small.  Anyway, while we were close in we even heard a loud report, like thunder or a bomb and saw some iceberg calving action right before our eyes!  In real time even!  Overall, I would say that the Portage Glacier cruise is RECOMMENDED!

After the excitement of the glacier cruise, we took a little hike towards another nearby glacier.  We didn't feel like hiking all the way to it, so we let the telephoto camera lenses do the last bit of walking for us.

We don't have glaciers like this back home

So much blueness

After a glacial afternoon we did the usual Alaska thing of looking for salmon and moose, but they again proved to be too elusive for us.

Today's summation:
Number of recommendations 2
Number of wildlife seen none (other than birds) 0
Number of new tires installed 1