Tuesday August 20, 2019
The odor of pungent wood-smoke hung in the air. Thousands of acres of forest were burning north of Anchorage near the town of Talkeetna which had closed the road to Denali National Park and stranded hundreds of tourists in the park. It was a chilly 41 degrees this morning and it would have been a sunny day except for the thick smoky haze.
We rented a car for our few days in Anchorage so we drove out to the town of Wasilla to visit the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race Headquarters. It’s a charming place of several log cabins where we met Raymie Reddington, the son of one of the founders of the Iditarod Race. He had a team of dogs tied to a cart on wheels which he used to train the dogs during the summer.
When I was teaching, I taught a unit about the Iditarod Race. My classes and I followed the teams on the Internet as they raced approximately 1000 miles from Anchorage to Nome, Alaska. The Iditarod always starts during the first weekend in March and runs about eight to 15 days. The children learned about the mushers and their dogs. They studied the history of the race in the context of learning about our 50th state and people’s early dependence on their hearty Alaskan dogs. The Iditarod unit was exciting and a lot of fun for everyone!!
The museum in the headquarter’s building displayed many photographs and had memorabilia collected from past races. We saw an excellent video and heard an excellent first-hand account of background information. Here’s a picture of me and Raymie Reddington with his dogs resting in the background:
Jeff and I were able to pet two and a half week-old sled dog puppies, Mr. Bean and Lima Bean. They were soooo sweet:
Later, we left Wasilla and drove east on the Glenn Highway National Scenic Byway toward Matanuska Glacier. It’s the largest glacier in Alaska accessible by an automobile and an easy two-hour drive out of Anchorage. We arrived at the scenic outlook across from the glacier but could barely see it. Unfortunately the smoky haze masked the magnificent mountains which surrounded us.
On our return to Anchorage, we had dinner at The Bridge on Ship’s Creek. Of course we had delicious fresh fish! I had silver salmon and Jeff had halibut, which were the two kinds of fish which were being caught at this time.
Ship’s Creek was a popular local fishing area. The tide was coming in so we saw several salmon fishermen.
I wish my photos were better, but the smoky haze lingered and filled the air everywhere we went.