Trek America – Day Seven

MP3 track of the day – More Hillbilly music

Weather: Mixed again with a little rain and bright sun shine

Waking up a decent time (and getting breakfast) we put down our tents and were ready for the off quite early. However, before we headed back to Anchorage, there was still one more thing to see. We went back into the Denali National Park and went to see a dog sledding demonstration put on by the park rangers. Before the demonstration we had a chance to go close to the dogs, and stroke them (I didn't), and have a look at the sled, before the rangers strapped together a dog sled team to the sled. The dogs were massively excited to pull the sled and each dog wanted to be apart of the team; the speed in which the sled moved was quite amazing, considering there was only a team of five dogs pulling it.

After this we got in the van and took the long trip back to Anchorage; we said goodbye to Lauren, Gwendolyn and Bradford in Anchorage as they were heading straight to the airport, but Chuck was going to come out with us tonight for something to eat.

The rest of us stopping for the second week of the tour went to the hostel I stayed in previously and checked in; this time around I showed my 'Hosteling International' card to the reception guy and I got a 10% discount (should have done that last time … could have saved $5). I'm sharing a room with George, Jonathan and Constantine. George's face was a picture; it's the first time he's been in a hostel and the shared bathroom, bunk beds etc wasn't quite what he had expected.

We headed out into town pretty quickly and those of us that were left (George, Constantine, Jonathan, Sandra, Alex, Anjtia, Chuck, Linda Eddie and I) went out for a meal. We went to Humpies and I had a Three Cheese Alaskan Burger which was very nice indeed. After this I went to a pub to say fare-well to Chuck; he lives in LA so I plan to meet him in September (he said he might be able to get me free tickets to an American Football game which would be amazing).

We all headed back to the hostel for a good nights rest … until Jonathan started snoring that is. To be fair to Jonathan, he's been really good on this trip and he has acknowledged that he snores and so, without complaint, he has set-up his tent each night away from the rest of us … however here he had no choice and so he had to share a room. Normal hostel etiquette is to put up with someone snoring and try to make the best of it (ear plugs etc) before waking them up in the morning with a rendition of 'Land of Hope and Glory' … but George hadn't been hosteling before had he. In the middle of the night George got up, put the light on and shook Jonathan a wake and asked him to be quite so at least the rest of us could get to sleep before he started snoring again. Bless Jonathan, being quite startled from been shook awake at 1am in the morning he said okay … but after 10 seconds he was back asleep snoring.

Well at least tomorrow I'll be back in the tent with hopefully no snoring.

Toodle Pip!