Our 2001 Trip Report

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On June 12 we left for a long vacation, a long overdue visit to Alaska for Kelley's 20th high school reunion, and to visit her family and friends there. We live in North Carolina, which for the geographically impaired is quite a ways from Alaska. To get there, we left RDU on June 12 at around 4:00, flying to Atlanta. From there, we flew direct to Anchorage, AK where Kelley's parents live. We left Atlanta at about 8:00 EDT, and arrived in Anchorage at 11:40 ADT. Now stop staring at those times. Add 4 hours time difference between Alaska Time and NC time, and you get the real time of nearly 7 hours. It’s definitely a long flight by any measure. (Alaska is 4 hours behind NC)

So, as you might expect, we went straight to bed, and didn't get up until the "next morning, when we had another Thanksgiving dinner that couldn't be beat." (Not really) (Bonus points to anyone who can identify that quote from a famous folk song.)

So, Wednesday was actually taken up with computer stuff. Kelley's father had purchased a new computer, (so he could play his new computer game, Myst 3: Exile) and left it in the garage until we got there to help him set it up. Additionally, we managed to get them off the evil AOL system. He got a new Dell machine, which is extremely fast, and was a breeze to set up. It was up and running by around noon, so we played around with that most of the afternoon, loading software and stuff, and doing a bit of troubleshooting with some of the hardware they wanted to hook up.

On Wednesday night, we went to have dinner with John (a college friend of Kelley’s) and Lisa (his lovely wife), their 2 kids, and Evleen (another college friend of Kelley’s) and her two kids. Anyway, they were all happy to see us, and we had a great time chatting and eating. We stayed there until about 10:00, but then we started to fade out, since we were still recovering from the flights.

On Thursday we did more computer stuff. We found a conflict between the $50 scanner that someone had given Kelley's dad and the Epson 400 color printer. Every time they tried to print with both the scanner and printer online, they got a red X error box (not a good thing). The easy and inexpensive solution was an A/B switch, but when presented with our solution, Kelley's father disclosed that "he's never been totally happy with that printer," so we went shopping! We bought a USB hub, and a new HP 960C color printer that connects via the USB port. So, no more conflicts. After Terry decided to buy a new printer instead of a $10 A/B switch, David felt very close to him. ;)

Friday we got ready to fly to Fairbanks for Kelley's 20th high school reunion. The flight is about 40 minutes, and goes right by Mt. McKinley. However, the mountain was on the other side of the plane, of course. We got to Fairbanks around 4:00 or so, and checked into our hotel, the Aspen Inn. The hotel is fairly new, and the rooms were quite large. The major drawback to this place was that it is directly in the flight path for the Fairbanks airport, and anytime between 6:00 AM and 10:00 PM all manner of planes are buzzing the hotel. At some points we thought that perhaps we could see wingtips out the window they sounded so close.

Friday night was the casual mixer for Kelley's class. This was interesting for Kelley, not so much for David. Kelley was somewhat surprised to see that the cliques from high school hadn’t changed much in 20 years, but was also pleasantly surprised when a classmate that she didn’t remember said that he remembered her as “one of the popular people”.

On Saturday we had breakfast, and decided to drive around Fairbanks a bit to see what had changed since the last time we visited. In most cases, there wasn't a thing different. We've decided that the new Fairbanks motto should be "Frozen in Time" because everything pretty much was the same.

The weather was fabulous. It was sunny and warm in Fairbanks the entire time we were there.

Kelley went to the tour of her high school on Saturday. That was very interesting because the school, which had about 1000 students when she was there, now has about 1800, and they have expanded significantly to accommodate that larger number.

On Saturday night, we met with some more college friends of Kelley's. We went up to Carl Heidel’s house where he lives with his lovely wife, Margret and their daughter and their dog. Sandy and Bruce Dunkel were there, with their 3 kids, Janine and Steve Vorderbruggen and their 2 kids, and Debi-Lee Wilkinson. It was quite a party! It was lots of fun. Everyone seems to be doing well, and again we had another sort of late night. By the time we were back at the hotel, the air traffic had subsided.

Sunday we went to breakfast at a restaurant called the Bakery, and had reindeer omelets, which were very tasty. We checked out of the Aspen hotel, (do not stay there if visiting Fairbanks) and went off to the final event of the reunion, the picnic at Alaskaland.

After the picnic, we went back to Sonja and Robert Holden's house and chatted with them for a bit while waiting for our flight back to Anchorage. It was nice to spend some time with them without all the high school gang. They have a very nice house too! We sat out on the lawn in the sun, and some of us got a little sunburned. It was a beautiful day.

The flight back to Anchorage was very cool. For once, Mt. McKinley was on our side of the plane, and Kelley got some awesome pictures of the mountain poking through the clouds. Kelley's parents met us at the airport, and we went to one of their favorite hangouts for snacks and stuff.

On Monday, Kelley's sister Sarah had scheduled everyone for a "family portrait" at a professional photographer. This seemed like a fine idea to everyone, since the last family picture was taken in 1987. We went to the photographer's place and everyone was there, and it was very nice. David got to ride to the studio in Terry's green 1963 Corvette, and that is one very cool ride. Cooper rode in the back, and looked out the window cruising for chicks. He did not find any.

Many pictures were taken, and the proofs should be ready soon. After pictures, we all went to a Mexican/Italian place for lunch, and had a very nice time chatting and catching up and stuff.

We then went to the movies with Kelley's parents, and saw "Shrek." It was actually very funny, and we decided that anyone over 8 or 9 would enjoy it, and there's plenty for the adults too. Double-dating with your parents is very strange, but we had a good time.

Tuesday, Kelley and Sarah had lunch together, and the grandparents and David got to watch Bonnie and Genevieve. They both are very cute, but wouldn't talk to David at all, though they liked Cooper well enough. Later Tuesday night Sarah’s husband Kenny came over after work and we all had flank steak and Caesar salad, something that Kelley's father fixes on special occasions. It's very tasty, and we definitely ate too much. But it was so good.

On Wednesday we just hung around for the most part. Somewhere in there David and Terry set up the rear speakers for Terry's computer, so now he has surround sound. (David is jealous) Kelley and her mom went to a day spa and got a massage and steam, and then we did a little souvenir shopping. We also had leftover flank steak sandwiches with cheese on sourdough bread. Yum!

Thursday was packing and all that stuff. We took Kelley's parents out to Sourdough Mining Company for lunch, and then went across the street to see a big chocolate waterfall, or should that be a “chocolatefall”. We made a few more purchases, and then went home to pack. Last, Penny fixed a very good spicy bean dip and chips for a dinner snack, and then off to the airport we went.

The long flight home was uneventful, just long.

It's great to be back home after 10 days, but we had a wonderful vacation!

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