Anchorage

Alaska 2016/Day 4: June 22, 2016 (Denali to Anchorage)

This day started with a 7:10A wakeup, shower, and finishing up packing so we could have breakfast around 8:00A. With all that taken care of we made another quick trip to Miner's Market for more food - this time snacks for the train ride down to Anchorage. We also gassed up the car before returning to DDH where Ann loaded us back up and drove us first to the train depot. She first drove us to a baggage area at the end of the station where she dropped all our luggage into a container that would eventually be placed into the baggage car. We then picked up our tickets where, to our delight, we found that we'd been placed right back into the magical Car D, in the same section we'd enjoyed on the Fairbanks to Denali ride. Of course, this time we didn't have the luxury of 16 seats to ourselves. We had to share "our" car with eight others! <g>

We still had time to kill so Ann offered to make our final drop off at the Murie Science Center where we bid her goodbye. We spent about 45 minutes looking around before heading out on some local trails for another hour or so before ending our walk at the depot once again.

The Denali Star arriving from Fairbanks, ready to take us onboard at Denali for our trip down to Anchorage.

This section is definitely more scenic than the Fairbanks to Denali section...but still not scenic enough that I'd recommend GoldStar service. There were more green forests and rivers, plus more mountain ranges. At one point we met the Anchorage to Denali train and there was a swap of parts of each crew so various employees would end the day in their "home" station. We also took on two high school students were were recent graduates of the railroad's 10 week training course that turns out the on-board guides. Our seasoned employee guide made way for these two for the rest of the trip to keep us informed about all things historical, cultural, and scenic.

Sometime around 3PM C mentioned that she really wished we had something sweet to snack on. At that point M surprised us with one final offering from DDH. Apparently, when Ann dropped us off that morning she had quietly given M two bars of gourmet chocolate and told him to pull these out "when it seemed like people needed some extra energy". This was a TOTALLY unexpected surprise and a really nice touch by Ann and Terry. It brought quite a smile to all our faces.

About an hour outside of Talkeetna we were rewarded with views of Denali off in the distance. So we could finally count ourselves members of the "30% Club", representative of those who actually manage to see the mountain.

Denali peeks out at us just outside of Talkeetna.

Another view of Denali. We joined the "30% Club!"

Throughout the trip, as we moved in and out of cellular and/or satellite coverage, we were getting snippets of texts from N and H, both of whom were dealing with challenges with their Delta flights. N, H, and J were all slated to meet in Seattle before flying together to Anchorage to join up with us that evening. There was real concern that H, at least, was going to be delayed so much coming out of Portland (Oregon) that she'd arrive in Seattle too late for her connection. On the train we were discussing lots of contingency plans - thank you, Spreadsheet of Fun, for having so many options listed!

After pulling out of Talkeetna around 5:20PM we did have dinner onboard the train. The food, not surprisingly, was not very good. However, the novelty of having a meal on a train is fun. For just a moment you can imagine what it must have been like in the days of luxury Pullman cars. When we got back to our seats in Car D we received a great photo showing N, H, and J all on their flight to Anchorage, so we could relax knowing we'd be meeting up with them as per plan. (H ended up on the Delta flight she was originally scheduled to be on...but not before her luggage ended up on the Alaska Airlines flight that Delta had provisionally put her on in case they didn't get out as planned. Her bag followed her to Anchorage about an hour after she had landed.)

The dinner menu on board. Those who were traveling GoldStar had dinner included in their fare. Us "common folks" had to pay the prices shown here. Don't get your hopes up for gourmet fare!

The lobby guard at Comfort Inn Ship Creek.

We stayed at Comfort Inn Ship Creek, which was about 0.7 miles from the train depot, so we just walked over to it. We got ourselves into our rooms and then took a walk across the street to watch the folks fly fishing along the creek. We saw a couple of fish landed, which one of the guys near us estimated to be in the 17-20 pound range.