Alaska Review

Destination: Alaska Skidoo Safari
Location: Anchorage, Alaska
Duration: 4 days
Rating / 10: 12!
Extreme factor: moderately high
Cost Factor: $1500k (after rentals / accommodation / flights)
In Attendance: 5
Group recommendation: Definitely a BOYS trip!
Description:

On Thursday, February 14th, Myself and Matt, along with two teammates of ours - Richard & Jason, decided to spend our Valentine's Day without the females...and visit the beautiful mountains of Anchorage Alaska!

...And what a GREAT move that was!

We left early Thursday morning to catch a flight to Seattle that would take us to Anchorage not long after that. After a couple of plans and some time spent in the Airport pub, we landed into Anchorage Alaska. As we got off the plane (to a winter wonderland I might add) it took no time to realize that it was a bit colder than our rainy Vancouver hometown.

We made our way to the hotel and got changed up to adventure out on the town. After finding a place to eat, visiting some fur shops, and the 'happening place' to enjoy some brews, we packed it in for the night. I must say that a night out in Anchorage might change you a bit!



We woke up early Friday morning, grabbed our gear, and drove out to our meeting point where the sleds were waiting for us. As we got suited up, we huddled around the heater and got ready for our first day of sledding. Friday, turned out to be a great day. We ventured out to get up close & personal with some enormous glaciers, not to mention, had some fun ripping it through the trees, on the lakes, and in the hills. By the mid-afternoon the sun was shining and by the end of the day the only thing was missing was some FOOD. Yep, we went all day with no food or fluids. You can only imagine what were like when we final got back to our departure site at 4pm...it was like a group of vicious Hyena's all over a fresh killed prey.



That night we were fortunate enough to stay in the nicest resorts in Anchorage. Very similar to some of the resorts in Whistler, we took our gear off and hit up the hot tub to relax our bodies from the long day on the hills. After freshening up, we went out and got another bite to eat at the Double Muskey. Here we would fill our bellies and eat more than our food requirements for the day in one sitting. I think Richard was thinking about crawling out of there...after he took some pics of course!



It was an early night on Friday and soon enough we were waking up to get going for our second day of riding. As we went down to the buffet in the morning, we walked past a stack of daily papers, however, the news for the day was not exactly motivating news to hear. Yesterday, 2 riders were killed from an avalanche in the same area that we were supposed to head towards that morning. Jason already being a bit nervous of the terrain...he now was turning a bit green eating breakfast. And I can assure you that things were running through my mind as well.



However, we signed up for ADVENTURE so we stuck to the plan (with safety in mind that is!). As we approached our departure site, we took the time to review all of the avalanche safety tips, our emergency plans, and covered all the bases just in case mother nature got the best of us. We were off for the day...and a day of sledding it was.

Flurries, hills, bridges, rivers, gusting winds, cold conditions, narrow slopes...and most importantly LOTS OF POWDER were some of the items & conditions we faced. It was adventure at it's finest. To a point that we actually decided to turn around because of our potential avalanche concerns. All good though... we made it back by the end of the day with a full day of sledding in.



As we packed it in for the day, we took the night out to enjoy a great celebration dinner and then visited a home town special place for a beer before we departed the town of Anchorage in the morning. Definitely a trip of a lifetime - great people, great places, great adventures.

Next stop: Sahara Desert 100km