Skagway, Juneau

Kluane Lake – Destruction Bay, Yukon Territory, Skagway and Juneau, Alaska

August 18, 2013

Day 36 of our adventure brought more trying travel and participation in the “Rough Road Rodeo”. Poor Mike had his fill of the difficult driving yesterday, and we had even MORE today. Over 200 miles were taken up with loose gravel, potholes, washboard surfaces and LOTS OF FROST HEAVES! The landscape was again pretty, but we tended to be a bit preoccupied with the road and how to avoid the worst of the obstacles. Mike once again did an amazing job of keeping us safe and sound. The 4 of us were very glad to make it into camp and be done with the roller coaster action of the day. The night’s camp was a bit primitive, small space and only limited hook-ups and not enough for all of us, but we made do and everyone seemed just glad to be done driving the “hell road”.  Wild life count for the day – cute caribou and moose planters at an interpretive center we visited.

just can't wait to get........

on the road again......

Miles for the day: 227   Total miles for the AK Adventure: 3269.2

August 19-22, 2013

Days 37-40 we had crossed out of AK and back into the YT, Canada for one night, interesting geography with international boarders changing along the way.  Most of the day’s drive was in Canada.  We were up and on our way early (unusual for us, as we are often one of the last rigs to leave – no rushing me some mornings J) made us feel like we could more easily handle the day’s challenges.  Fortunately he road conditions were much better, thank goodness – the last 2 days had been a trying and worrisome, could the old coach “hang together” over more rough roads?  The vistas and views were very pleasing again. Kluane Lake, as we left was beautiful, as was Emerald Lake that we passed later in the day.  Scenic rivers, waterfalls and mountains with their first snowfall of the season were at every turn.  We drove through an area called Carcross Desert – complete with a few miles of sand dunes.  Summit Lake Valley was very unique – a rocky surface with low clouds that made these several miles of the drive look “other world-like”.  We ended the drive today by crossing back into the USA and on into Skagway. Mike had to thrill us by announcing, as we are driving out of the boarder crossing that “we have no BRAKES!” YIKES! – we had been driving down an 8% incline for 12+ miles and guess we had over heated the stopping power. Fortunately we quickly regained them and all was well.  Very few dull moments with us.

U.S.Customs

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Miles for the day: 272   Total miles for the AK Adventure: 3541.2

While in Skagway we took the White Pass Railroad for a ride on the narrow gauge rail. We saw breathtaking panorama of mountains, glaciers, gorges, waterfalls, tunnels, trestles and historic sights. We rode in vintage parlor cars and excellent views from the large windows.  Mike spent most of his time out of the deck between cars shooting lots of pictures.  Skagway’s main reason for existence seems to be to sell the passengers on the cruise ships DIAMONDS.  There must be 3 jewelry stores for every other tourist trap in the 7-8 blocks of shops that lead from the port.  There were 4 ships docked and the streets were quite crowded.  We enjoyed a drink at the Red Onion Saloon, Mike and our waitress were quite taken with each other – wild old guy!!!

Skagway

Tipping!

Skagway

We took a daylong trip to Juneau. At 7:45 am we boarded the 63-foot fast-hulled catamaran the MV Fjordland. This was a comfortable boat with indoor seating and a 360-degree view of the breathtaking scenery. We cruised through the Lynn Canal the longest and deepest glacial fjord.  On our trip we saw several bald eagles, some sea lions and a couple of hump-backed whales playing a few hundred yards off our deck.  We arrived in Juneau mid day and took a short bus ride to downtown.  We had a couple of hours to eat lunch and see the sights of Alaska’s state capital.  It also is another “cruise ship” town – lots of other “tourists” besides our group of motor homers.  Juneau is an interesting place – one can only get to it by air, sea or being born there.  There are no roads to Juneau.  The state has put initiatives on the ballot to propose changing the location of the capital, but it would be so costly that it does not make sense to the voters.  The same thing goes with proposals to build a highway to Juneau – TOO COSTLY.  After lunch and a short walking tour we went to visit Mendenhall Glacier.  This was another breathtaking location.  The glacier is about 12 miles long from the Juneau Ice field down to Mendehall Lake.  The face the glacier is about ½ mile wide and about 100 feet tall above the water.  Beautiful blue highlights with many icebergs  floating at her base.  We took a short walk around seeing many spawning salmon but no bears made their presence know.  The boat trip back Skagway was great – we spent the better part of a ½ hour watching 6-8 whales all around our boat.  We knew we had a good chance of spotting some when we saw a dozen or so whale-watching boats nearby.  The cruise brought us back to Skagway about 8:00pm.  The BOYS were quite glad to see us, way past their dinner time and it had been a long day with out any “potty breaks”. 

Mendenhall Glacier, Juneau

view from the boat

another Humpback

Palmer, Valdez, Tok

Palmer, Valdez and Tok, Alaska

August 13, 2013

Day number 31 of our Alaskan Tour was another wonderful drive to another interesting city (I know that I tend to get repetitive, but it is hard to continue to come with new descriptors).  Leaving the Kenai Peninsula we drove back through Anchorage – stopped at one of their Fred Meyers for groceries and fuel. The roadside was covered with the majestic mountains that we have seeing almost everyday.  The peaks were separated with more waterfalls.  Google told me that Alaska has over 3 million lakes and 3,000+ rivers – I think we have seen 90% of these during our travels.  We have enjoyed these routes and continue to be amazed at the post card perfect landscapes that our travels take us through.

Glacier and Karen with the boys

roadside scenery

We arrived in Palmer mid-afternoon, a small interesting town.  In 1933 the FDR administration gave 203 families 40 acres of land each to clear and assisted them in building their homes and barns in Palmer. This was an attempt to help a few of the poor families and help the economy in Alaska. This valley is very fertile and they were optimistic that these families could become self-sufficient.  The plan was not a success, but many of the families stayed and many generations still reside in this area.  There are several barns that are still around that are referred to as colony barns.  There was one at the Musk Ox farm we visited. I bought 2 oz. of qiviut (qeevioot), that is the soft and very warm under fur of the oxen.  It is combed out from their hair every spring (not a job I am thinking I would wantJ).  Palmer is also home to the Alaska State Fair – drove by their fairgrounds they were busy getting set up for their events in the next couple of weeks.

Glacial Valley

Musk Ox

Miles for the day: 173   Total miles for the AK Adventure: 2527.2

Aug 14-16, 2013

Days 32, 33, & 34 of the A.A – Onto Valdez, Alaska.  Long drive to our night’s stop, BUT possibly the most beautiful of all. Hard to pick one over another, but the views here seemed better than before, each turn in the road brought us another picture perfect view.  The highway was a bit challenging for Mike today, miles and miles of frost heaves: undulating road surfaces, that one cannot always tell is going to rumble and tumble you. We could see the towed Prius taking flight a few times as we crossed the crazy road surface. There were also quite a few miles of construction that added time to an already long day.  All was ok though because we were quite mesmerized by the gorgeous Wrangell-St. Elias Mountain Range and her accompanying glaciers.  Alaska is home to over 100,000 of these frozen wonders. Unfortunately most all of them are receding.  The first jaw dropping view was of Matanuska Glacier and the Matanuska River --- how can one describe the incredible beauty?  I am almost at a loss for the right descriptive words, even the thesaurus fails me.  Mid-way on our travels today we stopped at the Wrangell St. Elias National Park – it is the largest national Park in the US, larger than 6 Yellowstone N.P. – BIG!  The vantage point in the park where we could see Blackburn, Sanford, Drum and Wrangell Peaks was incredible.  We took a nice hike with the Boys and enjoyed the forests around the interpretive center.  The 9 hours of driving were well worth the landscape we saw, waterfalls that came right out of the mountains were a wonderful surprise as we were tiring of our travels.

Bridalveil Falls

Glacier

Miles for the day: 260   Total miles for the AK Adventure: 2787.2

We took a Glacier and Wildlife Cruise on Prince Edward Sound, a great experience allowing us to see more of the amazing sights of our 49^th state. We floated past the huge Alyeska Pipeline and terminus of the oil project.  It is slowly declining in the ability to produce enough oil; there is genuine concern that it maybe become cost prohibitive in the next few years – that will definitely affect Alaska and her economy.  The bay was huge and very smooth, great day to cruise.  We watched a fishing boat transfer their catch to a tender that will take it to the processing plant, allowing them to stay out and fish longer.  Not quite the “Deadliest Catch” but interesting, nonetheless.  Mid-day we came upon Meares Glacier an amazing sight.  A tidewater glacier on the Unaiwik Inlet, one of the few glaciers that is actually advancing. BREATH TAKING!  This glacier is at least 6 miles long (from ice field to water’s edge), ½ mile across and 250’ tall. The captain kept the boat about ¼ of a mile away and allowed us time to watch her, listen to her creak and groan and see a bit of calving activity – happened so quickly it was often just a splash in the water that we saw.  The water surface was littered with icebergs, chucks of ice that have broken off of the mother ship.  The wildlife spotting was good on this trip we saw many birds: puffins, eagles, kittywakes (gulls), and cormorants.  We also saw a big group of Stellar Sea Lions, quite of few Dall Porpoises, sea otters and best of all a Humpback Whale -exciting!

fishing Prince William Sound

Mears Glacier

Hundreds of year Glacial Ice

Whale Tail

Bears were on our list of “want to see” The salmon were spawning in this area so there was a good chance that we might see some. We went out two different evenings to try and catch a glimpse; watching the gulls peck at the dying fish, swatting at mosquitoes, and putting up with the stinky rotting fish smell – we were finally rewarded.  We saw a medium black bear come out of the brush and take a nibble of a couple of the fish.  He obviously wasn’t very hungry, or they were not to his liking, cuz he really didn’t eat much, but we saw him fairly up close and personal.  EXCITING EXPERIENCE!

Black Bear feast

August 17, 2013

Day # 35 – Gray and gloomy weather today and Roads with an attitude today! Mike earned his PHD. – Pot Hole Driver today!  The roads were mostly paved, which is the case for most roads in Alaska, but the surfaces left a lot to be desired. We were doing the “Heavey Jeavey “today – this is where the permafrost warms and cools and really messes with the road levels.  There are often little florescent flags along the roadside to warn of the up coming bumps, but not always and it is quite an intense “rock and roll”. Watching the towed take all 4 wheels up and off the road was quite an interesting event.  Amazingly we got to camp and everything appeared to be in one piece, not sure what the long term effects are, but we seem to keep rolling. Mike had to duct tape one fender on the dolly where the welds had broken.  Our campsite was in Tok, AK – a return visit to this location.

Alaska roads, mostly good

Miles for the day: 258   Total miles for the AK Adventure: 3045.2

Seward

Kenai Peninsula Part II – Seward, Alaska

August 10-12,2013

Days 28-30 of our Alaska Adventure, still moving along! Leaving Homer we saw more of the same beautiful roadside scenery today; the mountains were cloaked in what looks like beautiful green velvet, they are accompanied in their splendor with more picturesque waterways; the Kenai River was full of fisherman. The views were postcard perfect for many miles of our travel today. Arrived in the town of Seward mid-afternoon. Our campground was right on Resurrection Bay, looking across at some rugged mountains topped with clouds. It is fishing derby week, so there are a lot of fishermen out on the bay trying their hand to win the big prize. Little boats are constantly zigging and zigging across the water to go to their fishing sites. Our afternoon activities included visiting the Alaska Sea Life Center – a nice aquarium and rehabilitation center for sea life, built after the oil spill in the 1980’s.  We completed our downtown visit with a sample of suds from the Seward Brewery and a couple blocks stroll to check out the local tourism shops and stops.

Kenai River

Kenai Lake

The weather changed from gray and a bit dreary to WET and gray and dreary.  That did not stop us from taking a short hike up to see the Exit Glacier in the Kenai Fjords National Park.  About a mile up the trail we stood within a few feet of this beautiful blue ice flow.  You could feel the cold blowing off of her as we stood staring at her.  This is a spectacular view, even though she continues to recede several hundred feet a year on warm years.  As we stood at the view point we wished that there were a way just to “freeze” time so that all who travel this way will be able to take the majesty of this sight.  Exit is a relatively small glacier off of the Harding Ice Field above, but it is the only one that has a road that you can drive up on to get close to on a hiking trail.  We returned to camp to dry out and warm up.  The tour arranged a boat trip out on Resurrection Bay to Fox Island for dinner and some wildlife viewing.  Dinner was good and we enjoyed a presentation about the area by a local park ranger.  The wild life viewing was negligible because of the weather conditions – Mike did his best to take pictures of few sea otters, sea lions and birds in the distance, but the rain was really not very cooperative, he got soaked trying to snap some pics off the deck of the boat.

Exit Glacier

Seward has a deep harbor and as such is a docking location for some cruise ships.  There were two in town while we were here.  It not the glamorous sort of town that you picture ships coming into, but there still is a lot of fun to be had.  We drove down to the Mile 0 of the historic Iditarod Dog Race – it traveled over 2000 miles from Seward to Nome in the early 20^th century.  The race now starts In Anchorage and goes to Nome – shorter safer run for the dogs and mushers.

Seward River and Port

another broken down cruise ship

We will be leaving the Kenai Peninsula and heading east to our last 4 Alaskan stops: Palmer, Valdez, back to Tok, and eventually to Skagway, (after traveling through a part of the Yukon Territory again). This continues to be a fantastic trip!

Miles for the day: 175   Total miles for the AK Adventure: 2354.2

Homer

The Kenai Peninsula: Beluga Point, in Kenai and Homer Alaska

August 6-9, 2013

Day 24 saw us in yet another incredibly beautiful area of our 49^th state.  This Alaska Adventure continues to thrill us, we know we really are “living the dream” on this trip.  We now are on the Kenai Peninsula it is 150 miles long by 70 miles wide and yes with more incredible landscapes to be seen.  Our first stop was Beluga Point in the town of Kenai. On the route to our night’s stop we visited the Alaskan Wildlife Conservation Center – we were able to drive through (yes w/ the MoHo and dolly and Prius) There were nice pullovers where you could get out and view the rescued critters up close. We got to see several moose, caribou, elk, bison, musk ox, black bears, bald eagles, and barn owls up close and pretty personal. The only residents we missed were the 3 brown bears (grizzlies) that are there, they were being quite shy during our visit.  Just a few miles down the road we stopped at the Portage Glacier Interpretive Center. It was rainy, windy and pretty darn miserable so we skipped the boat ride that would have taken us out to the glacier (it has receded so much that you can no longer see it from the center on Portage Lake). We did see a good movie about the area and got a sense of how it was.  Into camp at Beluga Point we watched for whales off the point, saw some otters and seals, but no whales. Across the Cook inlet we had a good view of the 4 Sleeping Giants: Mt. Redoubt Volcano (last erupted 3-23-09), Mt Spurr the tallest volcano in the Aleutian Arc, Mt. Ilamna, and St. Augustine an island formed by Augustine Volcano, last erupted in 1986. The sun was just shining on the tops of these mountains through the clouds and giving us a gorgeous view.

Black Bear - "What are you looking at?"

Sunset on the Kenai Peninsula

Mt. Redoubt, Kenai

Miles for the day: 173   Total miles for the AK Adventure: 2084.2

Days 25-27 – Homer - a place we have anxiously waited to visit. Our daughter Kristin has been here twice and has always told us how much we would enjoy it. SHE WAS RIGHT!  Today’s route was a relatively short drive with only a couple of construction hold-ups, and a few bumps along the way, but again there was such amazing scenery to distract one from any road concern. We made camp early in the afternoon and were overjoyed at our accommodations. All 23 rigs are parked on the spit of Homer, sitting less than 30 ft. from the water at high tide on Kachemak Bay. This place is simply WONDERFUL, many of us think we are done with the trip - we will just stay here!  Guinness and Corona are in 7^th Heaven. They got to run on the beach, smell the smells, run through the water and enjoy a bit of rough and tumble play that they miss most days while on this trip. After enjoying our beautiful campsite we went down on the “SPIT” and walked along the shops, restaurants and waterfront. We had happy hour at the famous Salty Dawg Saloon. kind of a fun & funky place – dollar bills, bras, hats, panties decorate the walls, ceiling etc.  Dinner was great; we ate at the Fresh Catch, recommended to us by a couple of locals at the bar. We ordered king crab legs (market price – nope didn’t ask what the $$ was – YIKES $70. A pound) they were GREAT as were the much more reasonable mussels we also shared. PB&J tomorrow J!

Homer Spit

Salty Dawg, we are regulars!

Mike went on a half-day fishing excursion for halibut and brought home his limit!! He caught two 15-20 lb. fish that gave us over 10 pounds of cut and flash frozen fillets. Phew the little freezer is stuffed with the CATCH. Mike said it was hard work, glad he did it, but it was pretty chilly, the water was rough, and the labor of pulling up the fish was pretty intense. So glad he caught some for all of his effort.

Halibut, Mike's two are third from the right

Eagle spotting was good – we had one right outside our MoHo on a light post and saw a nest with a couple of birds in a tree downtown. Breakfast was at the Spit Sisters Café’. What fun: we walked in and Mike said “we know Melissa Keevel” and we were supposed to say “HI”.  They all knew Melissa and said she had been in Homer to visit but was working up north.  We then told them we were friends of Melissa and her family and our daughter had been there a couple of summer’s ago to visit Melissa. When we mentioned Kris—they all immediately knew our girl.  “Funny Kris?”  They asked, “from Oregon?”  Yes that’s the one. 2 more women walked in and the shop owner said, “Kris’ parent’s are over there”—pointing a finger towards us, well my gosh one might think we were celebs.  Laughing hugging and chatting took place as we all agreed what a great person Kristin is.

Spit Sisters Cafe, Homer

Bald Eagle outside our motor home

Took a drive to see the spit and beautiful surrounding mountains from a good vantage point above the city. Nice to get a general lay of the land, enjoyed seeing some of Homer proper too. Definitely is much more of a tourist influence here than is some of the other towns we have visited. Guess it won’t be long before the visitors and support network are gone and all that will be left are the “sourdoughs” that call Alaska home all year long.

Glacier on the bay near Homer

Miles for the day: 95   Total miles for the AK Adventure: 2179.2

Anchorage

Anchorage, Alaska:

August 3-5, 2013

Days 21-23 were spent in Alaska’s largest city, Anchorage; home to 44% of the state’s population nearly 300,000 people. Interesting bit of trivia is that there are more espresso stands per capita here than anywhere else in the world (more than Seattle?) It is a huge city geographically 1961 square miles are within the city limits. On a clear day one can see 6 mountain ranges (No, not Russia, Sarah) and Anchorage is as far north latitude as Helsinki Finland, and as far west as Honolulu.  Who knew?

Anchorage

The group had a city tour and drove through the down town area and into Earthquake Park where you could see some of the consequences of the 1964 massive earthquake that hit this area. It was 9.2 on the Richter scale, it lasted nearly 3 minutes, some of the land near the water’s edge dropped nearly 12 feet.  The route then took us on a drive around Lake Hope; there we saw an amazing array of seaplanes tethered to shore. Most of them moored there had small garages for tools, and spare parts-looked a lot like a boat harbor, but for planes. Most of these planes had their pontoons on for summer, but switch to all-terrain tires in spring and fall and skies for winter.  Over 90% of Alaska is not served by roads; so approximately 1 in 11 of Alaska’s population have a pilot’s license, and there are 16 times more planes per capita than anywhere else in the U.S. From a nice viewpoint up on a ridge we looked across the Cook Inlet and Turnagain Arm.  In 1778 Captain Cook, was looking for the infamous Northwest Passage, thought he had found it, until he sailed into this narrow waterway, realized he had not and told his ships that they would have to “turn again”.   From this vantage point we also had a pretty good view of Mt. Susitna at 4,396 feet. The mountain is also referred to as the Sleeping Lady: the story goes that many years ago on the shores of the Cook Inlet lived a local people (giants) that were peace loving. There were being bothered by another band of natives who did not share this life style. To try and solve their differences a band of men led by Nekatia approached the marauders. Unfortunately Nekatia died in his attempt. Susitna waited and waited for her lover to return, and finally fell asleep. Supposedly her tears and those of the other villagers brought the first snow fall to the area – when the mountain is snow covered she is snuggled under a fluffy white blanket, and as the weather warms up her blanket is beautiful green with flowers. Susitna is still waiting for her lover to return and the story says that she will only wake up when peace returns to our land. The afternoon was enjoyed with a lunch and a bit of souveniring: went to the ulu knife factory and the Wildberry Sweet shop with the world’s tallest chocolate fountain.  An Alaska video showing the beauty and uniqueness of Alaska finished the tour.

Karen meets Merry the Reindeer

Visitors center in Anchorage

Anchorage is home to the Alaska Native Heritage Center – Changing lives, living values: They had an excellent interpretive center explaining the differences and similarities of the 11 distinct cultures. We walked through the 6 native villages and got a little better understanding of the native peoples of the state of Alaska. We enjoyed watching a display of Alaska Native Games – 2 young women demonstrated a kicking game: they kicked a ball that was suspended on a rope about 7feet off the ground. The kicking was amazing, but the way they hopped up in the air both feet off the ground whacked the ball with their foot and then landed on the foot that they had kicked with. We just stood watching for several minutes couldn’t believe what we were seeing. Amazing athletes.

Alaskan Native Heritage Center

the summer door

Our Anchorage visit was topped off with a wonderful salmon barbeque hosted by our wagon masters. John and Arleen are quite the “Alaskans” and do a lot fishing and hunting.  The group consumed almost 30 pounds of tasty Coho salmon.  Yummo, we really enjoyed it.  Mike tried his hand at salmon fishing, but they were just not biting his lures and fishing hole he selected was crazy with other fisherman.

Salmon fishing

Miles for the day: 239  Total miles for the AK Adventure: 1911.2

Denali

Denali, Alaska

July 31- August 2, 2013

Days # 18-20 of our Alaska Adventure. Well here is a very important question. Can people have too much fun, too many beautiful views, too many fun activities, too much good food??  We are attempting to answer those questions.  At this point one would have to say NO!!  This trip just continues to get better and better!  Our travel to Denali from Fairbanks was quick and uneventful. The views were a bit hazy, but one could still appreciate the mountains in the Alaska Range and the gorgeously green valleys.  After arriving at camp we set out for a helicopter flight to see Mt. McKinley or Denali as she is now called.  The weather Gods were not so cooperative, we had some pretty good thunderstorms over the mountains, so they flew us to the eastern potion of the Alaska Range (away from Denali) but we saw some amazing mountains, vistas, valleys and GLACIERS! Wow who knew that they would be so numerous and incredible.  We have seen a few glaciers on other mountains on our trip but NOTHING the size, variety and number we saw on this flight.  We did see the blue color that is visible because water is very good at absorbing light; only the strongest light with the most energy is able to escape.  The color blue has the most energy, so it can escape without being absorbed. The thicker the glacier the bluer is appears (I think I got that explanation right?).  The 50 minutes we flew vanished before we knew it.  Another fantastic experience on the “trip of a lifetime”.

Glacier view from Helicopter

Outer Range of the Alaska Range

We took a daylong bus ride into the Denali National Park. The driver was extremely knowledgeable and entertaining.  It didn’t hurt that the weather was close to perfect. We were so fortunate to be able to see Denali (Athabascan Indian word for “The High One”), the 20,322 feet tall mountain from 4 different viewpoints. We are in the 30% club; only about 30% of the visitors get to see the mountain, clouds often shroud it. The views were nothing short of spectacular: the creeks, rivers, lakes, valleys, rock formations and beautiful sky. The trip was also a good wild life-spotting event. We saw several moose, caribou and one very shy golden grizzly bear (he was hiding behind some bushes and never really did make himself very visible). The bus was outfitted with a camera that the driver could focus in on the scenes and project them onto small video screens through out the bus, this gave everyone a good view of things.

Caribou

Denali

Denali River Valley

“Ya Hoo – Ye Haw and Oh My God!!!”  We took a 2-hour whitewater raft trip on the Nenana River. What a rush it was. Because the water comes right off the Nenana Glacier less than 24 hours earlier it was COLD – about 38 degrees ----- brrrrrrrr.  We all wore dry suits that did a pretty good job of keeping us dry and warm, but the splash was still quite exhilarating. 3 other couples & Mike and I banded together for the trip. We had some discussion on the type of trip we would take: a simple float trip or a Canyon Run Excursion – the Canyon Run, it was. The girls rode on one raft and the guys on the other. Think the girls had the most fun! The views were grand, beautiful canyon to rip and roll through, splashed through 7 level III rapids—what a blast!  After returning to camp and putting on dry clothes we went up to the Grande Denali View Hotel and enjoyed a little lunch and a stunning view of the river we had just rafted and the surrounding area.

white water on the Nenana River in Danali

We enjoyed an evening’s entertainment – Nite Cabin a dinner theater – the serving staff are all singers and quite the characters.  After a good family style dinner, we enjoyed a show of skits, singing and dancing, a great ending to our Denali Experience.

Miles for the day: 124  Total miles for the AK Adventure: 1722.3