Thursday, August 26, 2026

Yesterday evening, Pat and I returned from a two-week tour of Alaska.  All I can say is “WOW!”  It was everything that had been told to us to expect.  We booked this trip through Rupiper Travel in Yankton, SD, and that was a very good experience.  Our Tour Manager, Shay, was very personable and her expertise was of great benefit.  There were many farmers in this group of 44 travelers, and we made some new friends.  It was a very pleasant group to share this experience.

The first week of the tour was based on a cruise of the Inside Passage on the Celebrity ship Summit.  That was our first cruise experience, and it was wonderful.  We started our trip in Seattle, then the group went by bus to Vancouver, BC to board the ship.  We had stops in Ketchikan, Sitka, Juneau, Icy Strait, and Seward.  The land portion took us to Anchorage, Talkeetna, Denali Park, and Fairbanks.  Needless to say, the scenery was magnificent.   Among all the animals that amazed us, I saw a moose for the first time.

This trip was a celebration of our 48th anniversary. (July 28).  We have traveled to the other 49 states, and Alaska was our 50th.  We discussed whether we should wait to go to Alaska for our 50th anniversary, but we decided that we can’t know if we will be able to go then, so we went this year.

I will attach some pictures.   I can’t put them all on here, but I’ll include some highlights.

We met Larry and Dee from Nebraska, and they were great travel buddies.

We got pretty close to the Hubbard Glacier from the cruise ship Summit. It was pretty cold there, and the sound of the ice breaking off was thunderous and unique.

The Hubbard Glacier is massive!  It was much taller than the ship.

A little closer look

We had a visit to the farm of the Vandenweele family at Palmer. They hosted supper there and served us with products from their farm. Their hospitality was exceptional and sincere.

We had great luck in viewing the big mountain Denali… it is shrouded in clouds 70+% of the days, and we saw it 3 times in two days! This was a view of it from the train

Denali was impressive. It rises 20,310 feet!

Yes, I did see a moose… several times. Boy, oh, boy… are they big!

Here are all the Hoosiers on the trip.  Others were from Nebraska, Iowa, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Florida, and Texas and South Dakota.

We got right up to the base of Nugget Falls at Mendenhall Glacier.

We are now back home, getting back into the groove.