Memory Card

I removed the 1 GB memory card from my broken camera, stuck it in the iMac and hoped for the best. Amazingly the images displayed onto the screen…images of the Alaskan trip. Looking at all the faces and places took me back…back in time…back to my college days. It was all the same faces, all the same friends; it was just as if time did not exist. Yet, there we were all on a once in a lifetime trip.

We laughed, we joked, and we enjoyed each others’ company. We did all the touristy stuff. At Fairbanks, we did the paddle wheel steamer, the abandoned gold dredge, and panned for gold. Then we rode the train to Denali, day tripped through the park and motor coached to Seward to board the ship for Vancouver.

We sailed across the Gulf of Alaska to Glacier Bay with its mountain of ice. We tied up at Haines and took the ferry to Skagway where we rode the train to the top of White Pass. I wondered how the Gold Rush Stampeders could have each hauled two thousand pounds of supplies up and over the pass in the dead of winter.

My best friend, my wife, and I rode up the tramway and viewed Juneau from the top of Mt. Roberts. We zip-lined down through The Tongass Forest and repelled down to an awaiting boat. At Ketchikan she again ventured out of her comfort zone and we kayaked to the island of Tatoosh where we observed bald eagles in great numbers and harbor seals (all within a stone’s throw). Only later back in our cabin aboard the ship did she admit how much she enjoyed it. Each night we all sat around the big table and shared a meal and stories of the day’s adventures.

After two days of meandering the city Vancouver, visiting Stanley Park and walking the Capilano Suspension Bridge we packed up and headed to the airport for our flight home.

Thank you, lord Jesus,
For good sights
For good times
For good friends
And the good sense to enjoy them.
Amen.