The flight into Anchorage was amazing! If you ever have anything resembling a choice, fly in during the daylight hours. (I’m told a lot of people fly in at night and miss the show.) Once we started our descent and got below the level of the clouds, you could see the mountains jutting out right into the ocean and real glaciers! None of those “Oh, I mistook it for this year’s snow that just hadn’t melted yet.” glaciers from Glacier National Park. These were honest-to-god GLACIERS. (I think I mentioned during the summer that my mental image of glaciers was always that of an iceberg on land.)

I’ve had a blast in Anchorage; I was picked up at the airport by the District Librarian and a few other new teachers that were in town getting their own shopping done and we headed to dinner at this cool restaurant called Moose Tooth, which has amazing pizza. (If you’re ever in Anchorage, make sure to eat there.) The next day was full of grocery shopping ($165 in meat that is one of my checked bags, $600 in non-perishables and $140 in postage at the post office), meeting Lynda, one of the returning teachers from Shaktoolik, and a couple of the former teachers who were in Anchorage. The welcome wagon that the district put together this year was really helpful, but, I’ll be leaving a few suggestions for them to try next year (this is the first year they’ve done this).

It’s probably needless for me to say, but… I’m in love with Alaska already. Anchorage is fantastic, it’s a gorgeous small city nestled between the mountains and the bay and I’m really excited to board my plane in an hour and see more of Alaska.

I spent last night with my friends Tim and Jess, (watching Hairspray) who live a couple miles away from the Detroit Metro airport (which I flew out of). Tim dropped me off at 5:30am, and I had checked my luggage, made it through security and had a cup of over-priced coffee by 6am. A search for the bathroom and finding a seat in the lounge left me with only a 5 minute wait to board the plane. We even pulled away from the gate 3 minutes early and the flight was surprisingly nice. I found out I don’t much care for takeoffs and banking, but that could have simply been my mostly empty stomach.

I’m sitting in Las Vegas, NV right now on a 3 hour layover… it’s awfully weird to take a 4 hour flight and land an hour after you took off. So, next stop, Anchorage, AK where I will hopefully hook up with a guide from my school district and pick up a rental car. (I’m less hopeful about the car rental than the guide – Anchorage is notorious for being difficult to find hotel rooms and rentals in the summer.

I’ll update again when I get settled for the night. I should have a bed at the university, and I’ll be crashing early since 8pm there is 12am by my body’s clock.