October 4 - “There they were!”

Remember what I have said in past days concerning early mornings? Never mind. We went to bed around 10 or 10:30. Nothing unusual there. Besides, I was getting regular updates on Caleb’s football game, so I had to be up anyway. 

However, the alarm was set for … drumroll here … 2 a.m. Our flight was set to depart at 6:03, so that made our arrival time at 4. That, my friends, is an early morning. 

Our seats were in business class. Still 3 to a row, but more leg room. Two rows behind first class. Way better than coach. They kept announcing that it was a full flight.  I walked back to the rear bathroom, though, and there were numerous empty seats. 

I did have a bit of an encounter during that excursion de toilet. As I was returning to my seat, suddenly a tiny little head popped out right in front of me. The baby couldn’t have been a year old yet. I stopped, admittedly a bit startled. But I managed a quick smile and a “Well, hello!” The little one responded immediately with a wide grin and began to chuckle. Mom seemed quite relieved. Chris told me later that it was probably that youngster who was crying when we first set out. Well, Little One, you certainly brought some joy to my heart.  

After a brief layover in Seattle to change planes, we jumped on our flight to Fairbanks. It took about the same length of time as the first one. Three and a half hours or so. Enough that I watched the rest of the Steven Spielberg movie I started earlier. 

Our approach view out the airplane window was pretty spectacular. A little different than the Mount Rainier we saw coming into Seattle. Here there were lots of mountains, and every one was covered in snow from top to bottom. We also passed over a river. No idea what the name of it was, but the contrast of the mountains and the river valley made the view unbelievable. 

Our hotel for the first night (and the last few as well) was not far from the airport. Pike’s Lodge. Interesting side note about the room. The air conditioner was covered up with a sign on it warning us not to turn it on after September 15. Well, it was 30 degrees outside, so we were ok with that. Anyway, there was a box fan in the room, so Chris’ need for nighttime noise was met. 

Our lunch/dinner (our bodies had no idea what time it was) was at the restaurant attached. Halibut fish and chips for me. Halibut chowder for Chris. Yum. 

Speaking of eating … after a rest period of watching Texas Tech football (there may or may not have been some dozing in between scores), we gathered in the lodge common room in front of a fireplace and ate some ice cream. We also listened in on a reunion of sorts that involved bagpipes and tartan kilts and lots of music. How’s that for an unexpected start to our Fairbanks experience?

Oh! And I guess I’ll have to include this paragraph as part of yesterday’s experience. We got a phone call from the front desk around 11:50 or so - just before midnight, so technically yesterday. The lights were making an appearance! We hastily got dressed and grabbed our coats. 

We saw pretty much nothing for a good while. But we persevered. We changed the part of the sky we were staring at. We pointed our phone cameras upwards (we read somewhere that the camera could see what we could not). But finally, after we walked around the entire perimeter of the hotel, Boom! There they were! At first there was a long line, almost like a rainbow. Then the line slowly changed shape and got wider. The cell phone trick appeared to work as well. The images were beautiful. We even agreed to have a lady take our picture with the lights in the background (she saw the freezing old couple and took pity on us, I guess). It turned out great. 

Cary came out after a while. Kay Lynn was really exhausted, so we didn’t see her. Cary had been taking some pics from their balcony. Not sure about Larry and Diane. Hope they saw it. 

Guess we can go home now. Well … on second thought … as Cary said, “I’m staying. I paid for the whole week.”  

‭‭Exodus‬ ‭20‬:‭8‬ says, Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy.

Father, help us get some sleep tonight so we can stay warm on these crazy cold excursions. Amen.