Great Outdoors

We leave in 4 days for Alaska! For 8 days, we are going to be exploring the Interior and Kenai Peninsula in an RV. The planning for this trip started way back in late January, so just the fact that it is finally so close is incredibly exciting. After hours of online research and pouring through travel books, we are actually going to start our adventure soon. It feels unreal. I am eager to start packing my backpack tonight.

A few of the RV sites that we’re staying at later in the trip have wi-fi, so I will do my best to post some blog updates from the road. For the first several days, we will be in Denali National Park so I don’t expect to have any cell phone reception. After we get back, I’ll post extensively about our itinerary, adventures, wildlife sightings, how many baby animals I try to take home with me, how many times Kurt has to say “No you cannot have a pet fox”, and of course plenty of photos. For now, here’s our rough schedule:

Friday, July 20: arrive in Anchorage
Saturday, July 21: pick up the RV and head to Denali National Park
Sunday, July 22: hiking in the park
Monday, July 23: more exploring, maybe visit Talkeetna
Tuesday, July 24: drive to Seward
Wednesday, July 25: kayaking and boat tour in Resurrection Bay/Fox Island
Thursday, July 26: back to Anchorage area
Friday, July 27: Soldotna/Kenai area
Saturday, July 28: get in our last bit of exploring, drop off the RV, fly home overnight
Sunday, July 29: back in Chicago

It has become a new tradition to go camping the weekend before Thanksgiving to celebrate our friend Thomas’s birthday. We usually head to Kettle Moraine State Forest South in Wisconsin. As long as you bundle up enough, it’s a lot of fun to camp in cold weather. For one, you don’t have to worry about bugs AT ALL. Also, you don’t need to worry about filling your cooler with ice; your beer will stay nice and cold on its own.

The annual cold camping trip includes a huge birthday feast. Since daylight hours are limited, the cooking begins as soon as everyone wakes up on Saturday morning. As we drink Bloody Marys and New Glarus beer, we prepare food all day long using the campfire, a smoker, Coleman grills, and even a hibachi. This past trip’s menu included a bacon-wrapped turducken, sauerkraut with Nueske’s bacon, yams, vegetarian curry, cranberries, stuffing, potatoes, dinner rolls, and plenty of beer and Jameson to wash it all down.