Today was big brother Brian’s last day in Alaska, and so we took him to Houston. We went north out of Anchorage to the little town of Palmer, where we had breakfast in the Noisy Goose café, with a view back over the Knik Arm inlet, and the surrounding mountains. What a backdrop for eggs benedict and hash browns, washed down with copious amounts of coffee!
We then toured Palmer, a tourist trap for the unwary, weary travelers from Fairbanks and Glennallen, both towns many miles away.
But we were not to be fooled, and we didn’t buy anything!
Brian said he wanted to explore one particular side road, down to a place called Goose Bay, a side trip of about 12 miles says he, so of we went, and after 20 miles of pretty much nothing we came to…….nothing. The road just stopped at a sign which said “End”, and there was a gravel path down to a wide gravel strip with a forlorn looking weather sock, and nothing else, no other signs or roads or buildings, nothing. This, we worked out was Goose Bay airport. But there was no Goose, no Bay, no anyone.
So, after suitably chastising Brian verbally we journeyed further north, through Wasilla, which is as bad as its name suggests, and ended up in Houston, Alaska.
This place had one cop car, one store and one RV park, and the tourist center was closed!
There were four huge coaches full of passengers from some cruise line or another, and they were all standing in line at the counter for ice cream. We three mooskerteers, not being on any sort of schedule, waited our turn patiently, for some delish ice cream. I had berry cheesecake, Brian had some mint thing and Marlipops had vanilla and peanut butter, which she could not finish, so I got seconds!
Apparently, there is an annual Duck Race in Houston, where rubber ducks are hurled into the local river, and the winner gets the keys to the city or something, which we may catch on August 18th.
We saw a car on the side of the road and were tempted to trade the yellow peril for it, but didn’t.
This evening we went to the Airport Grille, had a relaxing dinner watching the floatplanes take off and land, then put Brian on the big silver bird and waved farewell, until next time.
Wildlife watch today was a Mrs Moose with Mooselet.
