A more leisurely day planned, so after the usual late breakfast we head down to the "Mush School" which calls itself "Paws for Adventure". Here you can have a half day course of dog sledding. (See CNN news 3rd Mar on WWW). We just watched the dogs.
On our travels around we found a sledge, so being close to a hill we had a few gos at that - what fun.
Back to Chena via the runway to look at the observation site by day before going on the nature trail - Moose hunting.
Walked round the Nature Trail/Beginners Loop which was considerably further
than expected, still not having quite come to grips with the scale on the map.
Sadly, spotted no moose, but loads of Moose droppings which the locals paint
and sell as souvenirs - one of which was 3 or 4 stacked up and painted with
faces and called a "Turdum Pole".
[In the airport on our way back there was a Moose do packaged as a lipstick
with the caption "It won't protect your lips but it will certainly stop you
licking them"]
Back in the room it was time to wash a few shirts 'cos I've just run out of them.
Off for another soak in the hot springs followed by the slightly warmer outdoor jacuzzi followed by the nice and hot indoor jacuzzi. There was a list of "do nots" by the pool on of which was: "No bodily foreign matter [permitted in the pool] including, but not limited to, that from the nose, mouth, ears and eyes"
To keep feet a bit warmer tonight we hired some Arctic Boots which were refered to as Bunny Boots for reasons that were not at all obvious
We return to the room to relax and have a beer (Alaska Pale Ale), before dozing off for a couple of hours.
9.45pm - wake up, look out of window and see auroral arc. Mad dash to get kitted up then out for our last night of viewing.
Despite the early promise of things to come the aurora never really got going. There were lots of run-of- the-mill showers with occasional brightning and looking like it might develop but didn't - it just died away. The bunny boots performed reasonably well but feet still got cold eventually with just standing around. Again the temperature was -18.5C plus some wind chill.
We came in at 3.00am, had a drink, packed up some stuff and got to bed about 4.00am
Goto Day 8: Chena Hot Springs to Anchorage
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