Summer Visitors

How is it mid-July already?! The last few weeks have been busy, busy.  Since the Roth's left at the end of May, three separate sets of visitors have come up to see us take in Alaska.  First up were Alex's high school friends Mark & Ellen who had already planned on celebrating their 10 year anniversary up here before they found out we lived up here so it worked out perfectly.  We were a home base for them as they came & went on their different excursions.  They had amazing weather and did everything imaginable - dog sledding, white water rafting, tour of Denali and some hiking!  We didn't get to spend a lot of time with them but still had a chance to catch up.

Mark on top of Flattop Mountain

In between visitors, Alex found time to go fishing on the Russian River with a couple of guys also in the army.  It was prime Sockeye salmon season so the river was really busy.  I guess it's typical for people to head down to the river after work, fish for a few hours and then come home.  It was a 2 hour drive so they got home late that night [at least it never got dark!]  They each caught their limit of three a piece.  They found the easiest way to catch salmon was by fly fishing.  Alex even saw a bear just across the river!

Then after a week's break, Alex college roommate Brett and girlfriend Lori came up to see us and Lori's friend was getting married in Anchorage so they managed to fit us both in!  The trip even resulted in an engagement!!! They went on the Kenai Fjords tour one day and he stopped on the way home to propose.  What a perfect place to get engaged :) We did some small things in the area with them but the major activity we had planned was a guided tour at Matanuska Glacier.  It was about a 90 minute drive north of Anchorage and is the most accessible glacier by vehicle up here.  It was HUGE! It's 27 miles long and 4 miles wide... We debated on paying for a guided tour but it was well worth it.  They provided crampons [metal spikes] to attach to the bottom of your shoes so we were able to climb all over the glacier as well as helmets.  Our guide was really fun and he did a great job of explaining different things and taking us to different points of the glacier.  I was surprised by how much it changes each day and while water is constantly flowing off of it during the day it basically stops at night.  It was quite humbling that if you go or fall in the wrong spots it's a point of no return.  The tour even ended with a dip in the water [although I opted out of that since someone had to guard the beer & takes pictures :) ]

The rest of the pictures can be found at http://therothsalexamy.shutterfly.com/