Friendship, Beauty, and Something Divine

This is an original picture by my dental hygienist taken from her home by Denali National Park. She is quite a spectacular woman, and she has both blessed and inspired me tremendously.  So far she has adopted and housed over 30 native girls who she found living on the streets. Unfortunately most of them were prostituting themselves for money. Seeing this, this kind hearted woman decided to do something about it and has helped rehabilitate many of these girls, most of which have graduated from college and some have even gotten PhD's!  Anyway, she took this picture after a morning of heart felt prayer regarding her "daughters". Can you see the face in the clouds? It still gives me goose bumps! God is watching!

 We welcomed our good friends, Aaron and Ashley Montero to Alaska. They made the long trip (via trains, planes, and automobiles) from Michigan to stay with us for 1 week. We really enjoyed having them visit us; so much so that we all shared 1 bedroom for most of the trip! Who says good friends cannot bunk together? I guess here is where I should clarify that we did have 2 separate beds. Regardless, we are very happy that they came and they very much enhanced our trip. 

Aaron, Ian, and I did the Lost Lake Run, a 16 mile trail run in Seward, Alaska. One could sum up the race as "breath taking" for both scenery and difficulty. Lets first comment on the trail. The first 8 miles were all up hill covering an elevation of 1800 ft. This was a challenge, but we finished. Aaron did beat us in record time (Yeah Aaron!) and Ian only beat me by a few minutes because I stopped to help an injured runner....really, Ian, that is the truth!

But, the scenery as I said earlier, absolutely did not disappoint. It was just unbelievable. Once you got to mile 9 you were in a high valley in-between mountains and the Lost Lake.  After all the pains I still think I want to do this again, especially because I can binge on pizza afterward. 

Here is the trail head of the Lost Lake Run. 

 Ian showing off those runner legs

Me, Ian, Ashley, and Aaron on the cruise ship. We took a 9 hour wildlife / glacier cruise starting in Seward, AK into the Northwestern Fjords. The 9 hours went by really fast and we saw a ton of wildlife and scenery. I think that this may have been the highlight of our time together. Although if you ask Aaron, it may have been his moose hunt. 

Yes, that is my now bald husband. We decided to shave off off his hair prior to our race. We thought it might make him run faster? Anyway, I actually like it very much and Ian is super happy that he now only has to shower once a week, its the wake up and go look. 

We saw tons of sea otters on our trip. I didn't take a lot of wildlife pictures because I didn't want to experience this though a camera lens. I like to say that my memories are stored in my mind. These little guys were so cute. They really enjoyed the waves from the boat and holding their paws in a praying type pose they twirled around and around. Very sweet. 

Behind Ashley and I is the Northwestern Glacier. Although it is receding at record rates, it is still a magnificent sight. At one point this glacier came out into the Fjord 10 miles! I do have to admit, though, that my "save the trees" mentality was kicking in big time as I watched big chunks of the glacier breaking off. Some may find the sounds and sight beautiful, I just couldn't stomach it personally. Mostly impart because I know that in a few short years, this glacier may not even be here. Such a tragedy! So......go recycle your plastics people and turn off your lights! 

Closer look at the Glacier

Views coming upon the Northwestern Glacier.

A Harbor Seal enjoying his iceberg. As we turned the corner into the Northwestern Fjord, this is the sight that we saw. It was just amazing....hundreds of little sea lions resting on floating icebergs welcomed us. 

On the cruise ship

Parts of the cruise took us by high waterfalls. You cannot make out the height of this one, but it was all the way up the mountain and dumped into the ocean beneath us. Again, just beautiful!

My attempt to capture a humpback whale. We saw several of these in the cove. It was hard to capture their fins because they were so fast, so all you get is this. 

The famous Puffins. We saw hundreds of these little birds on the cruise. At one point there was a hole flock of them along side the rocky mountain walls. So my pictures may not end up on National Geographic, but you can imagine a whole wall of these little guys. 

Found on an adjacent cove there was a large group of sea lions. These guys were funny. All you could hear was their grunting. I really liked watching them defend their territory, they are quite clumsy looking. 

This was by far my favorite part of the cruise. At one point we found a super pod of orca (killer whales). Apparently this is very uncommon. A super pod consists of 40+ whales. Our captain said that he had never seen anything like this and we spent  a lot of time just taking it in. Everywhere you looked, and I mean everywhere you saw these beautiful creatures.  They even came up beside the boat to show off. I definitely felt my heart stir while being with these whales and at one point thought about just jumping in to swim with them knowing I would die very very happy. Ian on the other hand discouraged this so I thought better stay on the ship for him.

I guess I should say that Ian and Aaron caught this large fish....but, in all truth it was plastic. This picture was taken in Homer, Alaska. After our cruise we took a drive down to Homer to visit this beautiful seaside town. The drive along the Seward Highway into Seward and then into Homer was amazing. There really isn't anything quite like it with all the cliffs, mountains, valleys, etc. I am really glad that we did the drive, and Homer didn't disappoint. We enjoyed walking along the spit and looking at all the art shops. We even visited ABI (Alaskan Bible Institute) where my parents come often. 

Just a friendly game of horseshoe. I think Ian won this one?

This is at one of our many stops. I am not sure where, but it was a great view. At one point, we found a small lake that Aaron decided to go swimming in.....he just HAD to do it despite our cautions about hypothermia. But, if you ask him, he would say that it was invigorating and well worth it. He made several memories like this, and very much added to our enjoyable time. Thanks, Aaron, for doing what all of us wanted to do, but didn't have the guts too!

Such a wonderful time with friends, nature, and God. Being in this kind of beauty you just cannot deny that something more divine exists. We are thankful to have an awesome creator, and wonderful friends to share it with.

Blessings and Love
Sarah

 ps. this adventure can be your adventure if you want! We have an open door policy to anyone who wishes to explore the great last frontier! 

Scotland Part 2

For those of you who have been anxiously awaiting the second addition, here it is! With later blogs I will further detail the long delay, many changes and events have kept me from the hours of picture uploading.  Remember, here in the bush, Internet is shotty at best therefore creating the magnificence of this blog (haha) can take hours, even days. 

So here it is Scotland part 2. We restart our journey with one of the highlights, the National Wallace Monument and Bannockburn, the place of the most spectacular battle of the Scottish Wars of Independence.  If Robert the Bruce or William Wallace need explanation, go watch Bravehart.

Proudly, though, somewhere in my ancestry (thanks to my Mom, Karen Wallace) we are related to William Wallace or his descendants. Here is my mom at the National Wallace Monument, proudly claiming her history.

Battle of Bannockburn

They believe this to be William's actual sword. 

The National Wallace Monument in Stirling, Scotland

Next up was a journey to St. Andrews Divinity School, not only work place to the great scholar NT Wright (one of Ian's favorites) but also the meeting location of Prince William and Duchess Catherine. Although I joke that we went there to find remnants of William and Kate, really, it was for Ian to meet some of the professors at the Divinity school. He has been thinking of getting his PhD and possibly attending there. 

Regardless, it did not disappoint. It's rich history and ruins were just beautiful. 

We continued our journey to Edinburgh castle, the Palace of Holyroodhouse (the official residence in Scotland of Her Majesty the Queen) and then to the famous Rosslyn Chapel, probably best known from the movie The Divinci Code and the secretive Knights Templar. 

Rosslyn Chapel. You cannot take pictures of the inside, but believe me when I say that it was impressively and extremely intricate in detail. The outside was under preservative reconstruction so these pictures do not do it justice. I really enjoyed just sitting in the pews and admiring inch for inch of the mason's handiwork. 

Holyroodhouse

Ferry ride over to the Holy Island known as Lindisfarne. The parish church was built in 1066. Here they have old ruins of the priory and nunnery. 

Lindsfarne ruins

Lindsifarn Castle. Built in 1550

Glasgow Cathedral

I thought that this was so cool. Every morning, in Berwick-upon-Tweed, England, our bed and breakfast, the couple would get fresh eggs and milk. There is a big push in Scotland to buy and support locally, something Ian and I are going to try harder at doing as well.

Two little dogs we saw on our way to Berwick-upon-Tweed. So cute!

Common scene along the hills of Scotland. We just loved the long haired sheep and cows!

Duart Castle

Yes, they do drive supernanny cars in Scotland! This is their cabby, just loved it!

And upon our arrival back home, the Braveheart express awaited us, compliments of Ian's dad, Jon.

All in all, it was a busy, exciting, and memory filled tour. One I will never forget. 

Blessings, 

Sarah