6/21/09

Hey!

So today was exciting since we finally got settled in the wilderness. First we woke up at 6am, and I got ready for the day and went to breakfast. While we ate we made our sack lunches for the bus ride to our first campsite in the Eastern Alaska Range. Then we packed our packs and loaded up the bus.

We left Palmer around 9am, and roughly 5 hours later we arrived at the “Hub”, a gas station in the middle of nowhere, where I got my last taste of orange soda and ice cream. Driving through Alaska is so incredible, since there’s SO much space and the mountains and rivers are beautiful! After another two hour drive (mostly on an unpaved road) we arrived at our campsite near the Macklaren river, which flows from the Macklaren glacier. So we set up camp, made beans and rice, and took a walk.

Also I went to the bathroom outside a few times, which isn’t too bad. I haven’t pooped out here though… we’ll see how that goes!

We did some more group and tent bonding games, which was pretty fun. The group has grown close already, so I feel really comfortable. We also learned a lot about bear avoidance, but we haven’t seen any wildlife yet so I hope we see more. I’ll take a picture of our campsite. Even though it’s like right by the road we came off of, it’s gorgeous here! Well, I’ve gotta be up for breakfast at 7:15 am, so I should get to sleep. It’s raining right now, so I hope that quits by morning. I miss everyone, but we stay busy and I’m surrounded by friends, so there’s not a lot of time to think about that.

Anyway I’ll write more tomorrow. We’re supposed to walk 3 miles and then do a river crossing, so I may have some interesting stories. Night! (Even though the sun STILL won’t go down)

~Sophia

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