Dinner With A View

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After our breakfast at the Mile High, I returned to the lodge to work on these blogs and the rest of the crew headed back into town. Since today was relatively relaxing after the 3 hour flight and tomorrow would be a long day doing an 8 hour bus tour of Denali Natl Park, tonight we were going to dinner with Howard and Darlene at the Talkeetna Alaskan Lodge, a high end lodge with a great restaurant. It's about a half mile away and located up on a large hill.

It has a wonderful view of the Alaska Mountain range and Mt. McKinley. I went there 3 years ago before my previous glacier flight and that's where I dropped and broke my camera from the raised outside deck. (martinis WERE involved!)

Howard surprised us by telling us that we were going to drive there in his classy Lincoln stretch limo. I didn't even know he had one. The limo service just happens to be one of his other businesses that complement the lodging. It was really fun to de driven to the Alaskan lodge in the back of this beautiful car.

We dined on the second floor outside deck of the lodge. It was another beautiful evening. It was in the upper 60's and sunny again. What luck. Marilyn selected an excellent wine and we toasted to old and new friendships. We all got to know one another much better and it was a wonderful finish to a great day. The people are always the best part of travel.

After dinner, Howard took us on a drive around Talkeetna in the limo. What a hoot! We waved out the windows to all the people walking around and Dan said they probably thought Sarah Palin was in for a visit.

After we got back to the lodge, we decided we needed to go into town for a nightcap. Jan and Marilyn nixed our idea to stop in the Fairview. It was crowded and a live band was playing. So we found one other bar still open, the Latitude 62. There were a couple very friendly women at the bar and we had some fun talking with them. One of them took a picture of us outside the place at midnight. We wanted people to see how light it was at midnight. After last call here, we went back and started a fire outside our cabin and relaxed into the wee hours.

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Photos

Going In Style
Howard's limo. He IS quite the entrepreneur.

Posing With The View
Howard, Darlene, Dan, Marilyn, Jan and me.

Mt. McKinley from Talkeetna Alaskan Lodge
Notice how much larger it is behind the mountains in the foreground.

Ta-Da!
Chocolate Mousse Cake with a moose on top.

Nightcap Time
Taken at Midnight. Just to prove that it was still light out.