Travel Rabble: All By Myself

My first week here was full of adventure and sighseeting! Now that Jamie is gone, I've moved out of Jeremy's house and I'm more alone, things have really slowed down. I'm spending a lot of time studying or pretending to study and not so much time touring. Part of that is my lack of car and while they do have busses here, I've been petulant about taking them. For example, I wanted to go the library. It was going to take- from the time I wanted to leave- about 45 minutes for me to get there via bus (most of that in waiting for the bus, not the actual ride. The actual ride would only be about 15 minutes). If I walked it would be an hour and 15 minutes. So instead of waiting for the bus. I walked. My walk did take me through the woods, into the the Native Alaska Medical Center, past the University of Alaska, Anchorage and then finally onto a long strip of ugly road where I passed a RIDICULOUS real estate sign and ultimately stopped for lunch at the Turnagin Arm Pit BBQ Restaurant. (that's funny because the large body of water here is the "turnigan arm"). When I finally made it to the library where I was EXHAUSTED from my walking and probably more likely from by BBQ lunch, I napped for a while before I started "working". Got about a solid hour of research in (currently on women during the gold rush) and then set back out again to meet Jeremy back at the UAA bookstore for a talk on "Hikes in South Central Alaska".

The day before that epic walk (only 8 miles RT, really), I met with my "mentor" from my company. She came with all sorts of practical things about tour directing that I enjoyed looking at. Luggage tags, excursion paperwork, examples of all the tools she carries (blue tooth keyboard, file folders, best bag options) and, generally a lot of enthusiasm.

We had our meeting at the local coffee shop, Kaladi Brothers. People LOVE that place here. One of the women I met said that Kaladi Brothers made it onto her list of "pros" when thinking of moving to Anchorage. They do have Starbucks here. About 19, in fact. There's about 10 Kaladi Brothers and then a whole bunch of other local coffee shops and roasters that I have seen around. Infact, for as ugly Anchorage is - all strip malls- there's not too many cookie cutter stores. I mean, don't get me wrong, there's definitely a Walmart, REI, home depot, etc but the little stores all around are more likely to be local little shops and I enjoy and appreciate that. I'm still not sure what my schedule will look like. I was supposed to meet with her today and I was gonna have her give me the rundown on what her last June looked like for an example but she's sick today. If I figure anything out, I'll keep you posted.

After our meetings, Jeremy picked me up and we went to visit our friend Sage. Another Ice Person. She bought a house here (she's from here) and had a bunch of Alaska books for me to borrow. She's also going to be letting me stay in her house in the month of May. That'll be lovely. Her house is a little two bedroom with a big picture window out the the big front yard and a huge back yard. She's going to let me stay in exchange for painting the inside of her house. I'm down!

Yesterday was a total 'study' day. I went to the UAA library and studied in their gorgeous green atrium. Incidentally, they also have a Foucault pendulum - that thing that swings in the MoS in Boston. They, however, don't have the little clay bobbles that it knocks over every hour. that's a disappointment. I'll make that recommendation. After I lost motivation there, I moved over to the UAA bookstore and went to the café where I bought myself as much food as I could for as little money as I could and ended up making a bagel with salami and melted cheese. It was pretty awesome. After lunch, I was, of course, tired so I went and sat in the lovely, practically a greenhouse walkway, where I took a nap on a bench. I woke up to a whole bunch of dogs walking through and visiting people studying (technically to support students for finals but I got a little snuggle in too).

After my afternoon of hard work, Jeremy picked me up and we went to his house where he had a bike all set up and ready for me to borrow!! It was GREAT! I feel so liberated! I can go ANYWHERE!!! Also, he had made pork chops and green beans for dinner and we watched a few episodes of The Good Place. Perfect night!

I'm hoping to do some more adventuring this weekend. Jeremy is going to visit his brother in Portland and will let me borrow his car. I might drive down to Seward and Homer this weekend. Nothing definite but a high possibility.

Hope everyone on the other side of the world is doing well.

This was on my walk. I love anything that makes noise. It was a whole little park with noise makers. Incidentally, when i was looking for the name of this park, I stumbled upon a website talking about how Anchorage is leading the nation in accessible parks!