Day 11: Delta Junction to Delani, AK

233 miles
8:15-2:15

Thank you, Lord, list:
beautiful place to stay
early morning light on mountains
Mom safely arrived
meeting Smiths
spectacular view from hotel
fun night of music and laughter

As we pulled away this morning, Steve said, "This is probably the nicest place we have ever stayed." (The snow-covered mountains in the background sort of faded out in the picture.) Lovely cottage, garden, views, nice breakfast, interesting people. He fantasized opening a B&B in Alaska the whole way to Fairbanks. Trouble is neither of us has the fix it skills.

I spotted a moose but it was behind a fence with a pile of road construction gravel so I'm not entirely sure it was really free-roaming, but why would road construction people keep a moose?

The Alaska pipeline passes close to the road just north of there.

Fairbanks was a blah Midwestern town, but we did pick up Mom no problem. Here she is stuck waiting for road construction. Sounds like Minnesota, doesn't it? But given the condition of un-repaired parts of the road, we didn't complain about road work.

We stopped for a bathroom and bought a hamburger to pay for the use of facilities. Just as we were buckling up to leave someone stopped by the car, drawn by the Minnesota license plate. Larry Smith and his wife Beth who joined us when her husband failed to come into the restaurant turned out to be former residents of Blaine, Minnesota. They are headed to Kenya with Bruce Dahlman's program to set up medical training there. Very small world. Beth gave me her can of bear spray to carry with me tomorrow hiking.

And here is where we will be tonight, outside Denali National Park. Breath-taking!

Steve got picked to be the "bad guy" with the evil laugh in tonight's skit at our dinner theater event. Here's the video:

 Afghan update: