July 28

Awoke to heavy cloud and wind, cooler temps. Arrived at Casa Dean’s for awake time. We get our walking shoes on and off we go to the Campbell Creek Trail starting at Taku Lake.  The sun is out with wind and cloud, at least no rain. We are about 1.5 miles from our old neighborhood.  We used to ride our bikes to this lake from our house.  The Creek runs parallel to the lake and has spawning salmon in the current.  We walk upstream for a while to see where the Little Campbell merges with the main creek.  We are on a yet different section of this important creek that runs from mountain top to the Inlet, through the whole cityscape.  Brenna and Zach’s old condo sat directly on the creek upstream.  Am always amazed by these green belt areas that run through the city, little gems that remind us of what Anchorage must have looked like it its wilder days.  You would never know there is industry and roads all around us.  The paths serve as alternative traffic arteries for the city.  Pleasure and commuter bikers are on the paths constantly, there is actually a rush hour on the trails.  A commuter can cross the whole of Anchorage and not have to deal with road traffic but there are bike lanes on the roads as well.  In winter, they use fat tire bikes and or cross country ski. The fish are very red now with snarly toothed snouts and decaying skin.  They are not pretty at the end of their lives as they toil to secure future generations of fish.  Even in this state they remain noble in their cause and are to be admired for the long trip of obstacles they must pass to get to this important place of their birth.  Clean-up and river bank restoration are taken seriously and made part of the education curriculum.  People can fish the creek depending on the areas the different types of salmon that are in.  We take a couple trail trajectories to see different views of the creek as it winds through to the Inlet eventually.  See signs of moose browse but no scat.  Bears follow the creek through the city to pursue the salmon, often invisible to humans, no sign today.  Dean sleeps through it all with his stuffed travel gnome by his side.  Our path takes us back to Gallo’s restaurant and we enjoy a great lunch buffet and Tecate on draft.  How neat to be on the trail that his mother used as a child, eat at the same restaurant and be in the ‘old’ neighborhood!   Dean sleeps through it all.  He chalks up restaurant #5 and is a perfect gentleman!  Return home after picking up Brenna’s car with its new trailer hitch.  The Highlander is able to pull their rubber dinghy for fishing.  Dean is in Dr. Charles Ryan’s ped practice, same doc as Brenna and Seth. Doc Ryan took care of Seth as a newborn too.  Sadly he is retiring end of September but not until he was able to at least lay hands on Dean and meet Brenna as a mother many years later.  We say a brief good-bye to Dean as they prepare to go fish in Seward tomorrow.  And we prepare to meet Minde at midnight on Saturday!  Night little travel gnome!