Wanna see pictures?!

Here are two different slideshows I've put together so far!

12 Hours in the Booming City of Fairbanks

Did I say booming city? I guess "booming" wouldn't be the correct term to describe it although Fairbanks is the second largest city in the state of Alaska. Second only to Anchorage. I looked up Fairbanks on Wikipedia and according to Wikipedia the population of the place is about 34,000 people (that's only 12,000 more that Selma). That sounds about right. Needless to say Fairbanks wasn't toooo exciting of a place, although that's not to say that I was ECSTATIC to be there.

Fairbanks had a grocery store.

Fairbanks is 120 miles away from Denali, where I've been staying the past month.

Fairbanks has the nearest grocery store to Denali.

So we left on Monday afternoon on the 4:00pm train to Fairbanks. It was a four hour gorgeous train ride (yes, 4 hours to travel 120 miles=crawling at about 30 miles an hour, so good thing it was gorgeous). We arrived around 8pm, and knew that we had to get back on the train the next morning at 8am to make it back to Denali the next day. So we had a grand total of 12 hours in Fairbanks and decided there was no point to getting a motel or hostel and instead decided we'd explore Fairbanks in that time.

And we did! We pretty much walked from one end to the other. Not much was open other than some grocery stores, we caught a late night movie, and found a Denny's open 24 hours. (Also known as "the Northernmost Denny's in the World") Other than that we just walked.

The weirdest part about walking around downtown Fairbanks in the wee hour of the morning was what a ghost town it felt like. Normally if I'm in California and out late at night, things are often deserted...but it's also usually dark so it makes sense why it's deserted. In Fairbanks it could easily have been early evening (judging by the sunlight) but there was absolutely nobody around town. It was like a horror movie waiting to happen. Except I wasn't afraid of gangs...or being mugged....instead I wouldn' have been surprised if at any moment zombies creeped out from the buildings and tried to eat the last four people left in the town of Fairbanks. Flashes of "I Am Legend" played in my head and I kinda wished I brought a dog.

Overall it was a fun trip and SOOO nice to get out of Denali for a day (as much as I'm loving it) and be able to go to a store and buy things like toothpaste and snacks and fresh fruit. I'm super impressed by people who live here throughout the year and have to travel 120 miles to go to a grocery store. It makes me think about how many of them are in southern california. When I was at Chapman we could choose between Albertson's, Ralphs, Fresh n Easy, Trader Joes, all within a couple miles. And just a few more miles you could be at a Whole Foods or Sprouts or Mothers. Seriously? That's just ridiculous.

Anyways, I'm hping to plan a biking trip through that park pretty soon. A coworker and I are trying to mke it happen so I'll keep you updated on that!

Happy fourth of July!! While you all are enjoying your fireworks I will not be... :( That's one dowside of working in a national park. No fireworks allowed. (can't really blame them) They don't seem to be as big of a deal up here anyways because let's face it....how cool can fireworks really be if it's not dark outside?? Not as cool.

So enjoy all of your fourth of July celebrations!!!! Have fun!

Something I'll Never Do Again

It snowed yesterday. It didn't quite get down as far as where we live and work, but the mountains around where we are (for example Mount Healy that I climbed about a week ago) have snow on top of them now. The weather changes every five minutes. It seems that the weather forecast every day is partly cloudy, chance of showers- always. And usually it's right. The sun comes out every once in a while, and when it does everyone wants to go outside. But it's constantly changing. And just because it's sunny where we are near the entrance of the park, it could be completely different further in the park.

Well, I knew coming to Alaska would be all about experiencing something new. A new place. New people. And new experiences. So I've been doing my best to take advantage of everything that's offered here to do. It's been great so far, and being an employee has helped a lot. I'm still learning about the perks of being an employee, and learned recently that one of them is that you can do a flight seeing tour for free. Free!! How could I turn down the chance to fly through Denali National Park in a little plane, and take in all the beautiful Alaska terrain?! I couldn't! So I didn't.

I was really excited about it. My roommate and I decided to go together. We were shuttled to Healy, a nearby town where there is a small airstrip, and loaded into a 9 passenger plane with seven other passengers. We took off, heading towards the park, and flew over where we live and work....that part was beautiful, however I have a hard time remembering the rest of the ride...

The tour was an hour and a half, and if you're wondering why I can't remember the remaining hour and twenty five minutes it's because....well...most of the time my head was hunched over a plastic bag..... All those trips as a kid driving to Yosemite, making my parents pull over because of the winding roads were flashing back to me all at once, except there was no possibility of pulling over.

Talk about being miserable. Who would have thought that flying over glaciers and amazing mountain ranges could be a bad experience. I sure wouldn't have thought so. And if I'd known beforehand that I would be sick, I'm sure I would have done it anyways- telling myself that I could still enjoy it nonetheless. Never again.

So a word to the wise for people looking to do a flight tour ever in their lives. Take motion sickness medicine. Even if you think you have a strong stomach, it couldn't hurt. I still recommend the tour though. I tried to snap pictures and video out the window during the flight, knowing that even though I could care less about the views at the moment hopefully looking back on it I would appreciate what I was looking at. And the pictures are beautiful!! Although we weren't able to see Mt McKinley because there were clouds covering it, the glaciers were amazing and the mountains are breathtaking.

So in conclusion, I realized that flying tours in small planes are not my thing. I've always thought I'm up for doing anything, but am no longer willing to put myself through being that miserable ever again. I guess that's what this summer's all about! I'm learning! I'll stick to traveling by means in which I can stop and get out at any time. (this does include skydiving...I can just jump out...so that's still on the list) :)

Late Night ATVing

So although I don't think I can ever get used to it, Alaskans have definitely learned to make the best of the fact that it never gets dark up here in the summer. On Sunday night I went on an ATV tour that started at 11pm and went until 2am. It was a blast and I would recomend it to anyone visiting this area.

We left around 11, and got on a shuttle that took us to the town of Healy where the ATV tours leave from. (We drove right by a golf course that prides themselves on their "midnight golfing.) The ATV tour was veeery entertaining to say the least. It seems that one thing after another went wrong, but everyone's attitudes on the tour were so great that it bonded the group more than anything.

We started riding as the sun was setting (it was closer to midnight at this point) so the sky was pink and beautiful. After a few technical difficulties and one person running her ATV off the trail and into some bushes we finally made it to our first break spot. It was a gorgeous view. Our guides gave us hot chocolate and snacks at this part so we hung out there for a while and soaked it all in. Once we'd been there about 10 minutes though, te mosquitoes started becoming very attracted to us so we stayed a few more minutes before hopping back on the ATVs and riding some more.

We had one more break spot at a pretty lookout area then we headed back. On our way back we passed some people riding their horses (why not take your horses out for a ride at 2am??) Then, before we got all the way back we also saw a moose! This was really cool, so we stopped and stared at it for a while.

Overall, ATVing was a blast. I know I'm a big supporter of biking and not driving cars if I don't have to....but man ATVing was fun. I'd do it again in a heartbeat.

Just an interesting fact about ATVing in Denali, ATVing is actually not allowed in any National Parks- makes sense since it messes up whatever is in its path and the parks are all about preserving as much as possible. So we didn't actually ride in the park. If you look at the map here of the park in the top right hand part of the park there's a panhandle and then an area underneath it that isn't the national park. This are is where we did the ATVing. This is also the same area where the guy died from the book/movie "Into the Wild." There is actually another ATV tour that takes you to the bus where he died- if I can I'd love to do that one too.

Anyways, that's all the fun stuff I have to report. I've been working a lot and today is actually "my friday"- as so many people say here. I've got the next two days off so hopefully I'll do some exciting things in those two days and have more to share with you (and if no one is reading this then that is directed to the hypothetical you...or the me in the future when I'm old and can't remember what I did this summer).


Here are some pictures to share:

This one is the view from the chalet area, right near the employee housing. (This was taken at about 11pm)




This one's a cool view looking back/down while hiking the Sugar Loaf mountain. That cluster of red roofs is the chalet area- where there are a bunch of hotels and shops (that's also where we started). Employee housing is in there too. The river just behind that is where the rafting is done.

This is a picture of me hiking down the sugar loaf trail. We had to get all the way back down to where the river is in the picture.

First Few Days

So today is my third day in Denali so far. Our shuttle arrived the first day around 1:30, so I guess technically it's been 2 and a half....whatever. It's been busy. I'm having a really hard time already keeping track of the days- both knowing what day it is, and what time of day it is. The weirdest part so far is the amount of time that the sun is in the sky. It never gets completely dark, and so far during the hours that I'm awake the sun has been up the entire time. So when I go to bed and it's still light outside and wake up with it still being light outside, I don't always register that it's the next day. It's like I've been stuck on it being Tuesday all week. (My own personal Groundhog Day...except not really).

I've been doing a lot though. Went to the dinner theater called Cabin Night the first night. Went rafting yesterday morning (which was amazing). I met a couple on the same raft who was from Newport Beach and used to live in Tustin. So that was really cool. We were able to do the rafting for free so I'm thinking I should just make it a daily thing...haha, I don't see why more of the employees aren't jumping on this. Rafting every morning seems amazing to me.

I also had my first day of work yesterday. I like my coworkers and the job seems like it will be simple enough. The store is just like any food mart you would go in at any gas station. So just picture that and you've got it. (Any B&Bers reading this are extremely familiar with gas station food marts...you guys know what's up) And ours is actually a really nice one too. We get a lot of people coming in because it's amidst a bunch of shops and gift shops and restaurants.

I went hiking this morning up a mountain near where we live called Sugar Loaf. (I need to look up how it got it's name...on the way down I was getting really hungry and even saying the name made me hungrier) I'll try to upload my pictures to my computer soon so I can post some of the views we saw today. They're amazing, and we actually were high enough so we could see Mount McKinley in the distance, so that was awesome.

So far so good! I'm still alive and after today I'll be working a lot more so won't have as much free time. Thanks for reading and hope you're all doing well!

New Summer. New adventure.

Hellooooo everyone. I don't even know if people will be reading this since let's face it- I'm not biking across the country anymore (as much as I wish I were again). But alas, I have embarked on a different adventure this summer and people have asked if I'll be blogging about it so they can hear what I'm up to. So here we go again...

I'm currently sitting in a hotel room in Anchorage, AK. I'm off to Denali National Park tomorrow to start a summer job working in the Lynx Creek Store (which as far as I know sells gasoline and groceries). I'm actually not supposed to be sitting here in Anchorage today but should be in Denali already, however due to my forgetfulness and distractions of the past week (which there have been a lot of...graduation, moving, wedding in IN) I managed to forget to pack my social security card so was unable to go to the park today. Instead I had to entertain myself in Anchorage after going to the Social Security office early in the morning to apply for a replacement card. And as overwhelmed I was earlier today after being told that I had to stay in Anchorage an extra day, I've actually managed to entertain myself pretty well.

I flew into Anchorage after spending the weekend in Indiana attending a Bike & Builder's wedding (which was great because it was a reunion of B&Bers and was so great to see them). I arrived at the airport in Anchorage early early this morning (1:30am AK time, which is an hour earlier than Pacific time...4 hours earlier than where I came from in Indiana). I just slept in the baggage claim area for a good five hours until around 6:00am -at which time the sun had already been up a while. So my body doesn't quite know what's going on. The company I'm working for in the park is called Aramark, so after being driven to the Aramark Anchorage office I was told I needed to stay to get a new card instead of getting on the shuttle into the park. So a very nice girl from the office drove me to the social security office, made sure I had a map, a place to stay, and some recommendations for some things to see while I was there. After going to the social security office I went to a museum in Anchorage, grabbed lunch, took a much needed shower (it'd been either 2 or 3 days...I'm honestly not sure which with the 4 hour time change). Then I relaxed a bit in my room before exploring Anchorage some more by walking through downtown and along a coastal trail. So far it's beautiful.

I've realized that since graduating college I'm no longer going to have to take classes in order to learn things. This will be nice to not have the papers and deadlines and overall stress. However, I've been thinking that I also don't want my mind to turn to mush. SO, I'm still going to try to learn new things as often as I can.

So I made a list of things that I learned today during my day in Anchorage, Alaska:

1) Alaska was the 49th state to become a part of the United States and they became a state in 1959- so this year they're celebrating their 50th anniversary! Happy 50th Alaska! You're almost as old as Disneyland!
2) In 1964 there was an earthquake in Anchorage that registered a 9.2 and lasted 5 minutes!!!! The museum showed pictures of the damage and it was incredible. I can't imagine a 5 minute long earthquake..
3) When you are the only person staying in a single hotel room, you still receive 2 keys.
4) Subways in Alaska have $6 footlongs. I'm curious if they have commercials for them as well. ("six dollar foot longs" doesn't have the same ring)
5) Halibut burgers are deeeeeelicious.
6) Alaska has no sales tax. (so when you buy a $6 footlong...you pay exactly $6)
7) I walked into a bookstore in downtown Anchorage and learned that there is an entire book about the story behind the youtube video about Christian the Lion. (If you haven't seen the video search it. And watch the one with Aerosmith singing in the background, it makes me cry. So type "Christian the lion Aerosmith")

I think those are the main things I learned today. Way better than sitting in a college class, yeah?

I'll be sure to write about things after I get to the park tomorrow. Until then I'm going to try to trick my body into thinking it's night time even though it's as bright as if it were afternoon time right now. We'll see how that goes.

Hope whoever may be reading this is doing well! Thanks for being interested enough to read about my summer. I'll try to not disappoint, and I'll do my best to keep this up as often as I can. :)

Here are pictures from the 1964 earthquake.

San Fran, the wheel dip, and life after Bike and Build...

This past Sunday we rode into San Francisco and it was the most amazing feeling I've ever experienced. We had planned out the day so that we'd have different meeting points throughout the day at which we would wait for the entire group so we wouldn't get too spread out and would cross the bridge together and get to the ocean together as well.

I was riding with Anne and Kristiann in the morning. Kristiann was riding in front, then Anne, then me. At one point I heard Kristiann scream and didn't know why, then I looked up and saw a foggy Golden Gate bridge and soon all three of us were screaming. We were so excited. We stopped at the Vista point right before the bridge to wait for the whole group and then all 32 of us crossed together. It was SO awesome. I couldn't help but get a bit teary-eyed because I was so happy. We'd been thinking about this moment for SO long.

When we crossed the bridge we took a route around some famous parts of the city before we all met again just before the beach. We rode to Ocean Beach together where we were met by our friends and family with signs and cameras and really really really proud faces. Once we reached the sand we all picked up our bikes and carried them across the sand to the water. At the water we all ceremoniously lined up (Just like we did back in Jacksonville, but this time facing the water), and we dipped our front tires in the water.

After this we all had the urge to jump in the ocean, so after a final huddle we all ran in the water. It was cold, but our adrenaline was pumping and nothing at this point was going to keep us from running (and yes, frolicking) in the water. It was definitely a moment I will never forget.

Post Bike and Build

It's really weird writing this because I'm doing it from my bedroom at home, sitting on my bed with sheets and a pillow and I'm not surrounded by 30 other people. I can't remember the last time that life has been like this. Having no privacy and living out of a bag wearing the same 3 t-shirts over and over had become so normal.

There are a lot of things I'm going to miss. One is the carefreeness that I felt this summer. We woke up every morning...and we got to ride bikes. Every day! Who gets to do that? And once we got to our host site...we'd have to find a way to entertain ourselves...so we'd play. Play! It sounds like such a childlike pasttime. And I know I'm not that old, but I still think it'd been a while since I was able to just play without feeling like I should be doing something that will somehow get me further in life. We'd play ultimate frisbee inside of a carpeted gym while wearing roller skates and music was blasting from a sound system. (who does that?) Or we'd play card game after card game because there was nothing else that we had to do.

I'm leaving for school tomorrow and I can't help but feel that I'm not ready. The thought of getting a syllabus on the first day and buying books and all of a sudden having assignments and expectations and deadlines seems like a really scary thought. On top of that the thought of sitting in a classroom all day gets more and more unappealing.

I've driven around a bit since I've been home running various errands. My bike is currently in the bike shop getting maintenance repairs (it was good to me on the road...but after 3600 miles I thought I'd treat it to a check-up). And every time I've driven, I can't help but let my eyes drift over to the shoulder of the road and wish I were on my bike riding on it. I think of distance so differently now. Everything's bikable! Even when I was saying goodbye to one of my Bike and Build friends, Sara, who's from Florida, we were very comforted by the fact that even though we live on opposite sides of the country- at least we know it's bikable!

That brings me to another- and the main- thing that I'm going to miss. I'm going to miss my 31 other fellow Bike and Builders who were my family for these last 9 weeks of craziness! Once we all met each other, we no longer knew life without each other. Really. We didn't. Because we were around each other 24-7. And I have to say that I couldn't have asked for a better group of people to share this summer with. It was a trip of a lifetime for all of us, and we all knew it. We really kept each other going. And although we know that we were helping other people along the way (doing our best working for the affordable housing cause) we couldn't help but be affected too.

Overall, I think I'm still processing everything that happened. And honestly I don't know if I will ever completely process it all. If you were to ask me if I felt like I biked across the entire country I'd probably say no. It really only feels like I got up and rode my bike every day for the past 2 months. The distance doesn't quite sink in.

But nonetheless, it was an amazing summer. An experience I will keep with me the rest of my life. I met people I will know the rest of my life, and I think I discovered a passion for biking that will stay with me. I want the way I felt this summer to carry over and not stop here. I want the carefree feeling and the positive relationships that I have surrounding me not to end. Ever. I think I can work on that. :)

I also feel that in order to repay the hospitality that we were shown on the trip I have a lot of catching up to do. Even though I know we were the ones building houses and raising money and doing this for a cause, I was so humbled by every single person we encountered who provided us a meal or a place to sleep or a shower. Honestly, they have no idea how much that made such a difference. It's a beautiful circle, really. When we were in Yuba City, CA we were working with Habitat on a house for a woman named Barbara whose house has been in progress for over 2 years. Last years' B&B group that came through there also worked on her very same house. She built alongside us that day and was so positive and inspiring and grateful. Very grateful. She gave every single one of us a hug before we left, and said once her house is built we'll always be welcome in her home. That's how I feel about everyone who gave us a meal...if they're ever in my neck of the woods they should come by for dinner. And if they hadn't helped us, Barbara wouldn't be making progress on her house. It's a great domino effect that starts from one spark of giving I guess. Awesome to see.

I could probably go on talking about Bike and Build all day, but I don't want this to get too long. I'd just be repeating over and over how I loved it and it was awesome. If anyone would like to talk to me about it or ask any final questions, please feel free to email me (mhighbaugh@gmail.com). Thanks for reading about my trip and supporting and praying for me along the way. I'm so grateful to all of you that donated. Our route alone (just 32 of us) ended up donating over $70,000 to affordable housing groups in the gulf coast that are dealing with disaster relief in New Orleans and Mississippi. So thank you so much!! $70,000 from 32 people is absolutely amazing. Here's that domino effect again. If it hadn't been for you who helped donate, this trip wouldn't have been possible.

I'd like to leave you with two of my favorite quotes from the summer. Every morning we'd have some sort of inspirational quote on our cue sheets (directions for the day), and these were my favorite.

"Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us or we find it not." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

"When I see an adult on a bicycle, I do not despair for the future of the human race." -HG Wells

And one more thing! One quirky thing about our group that I don't think I've mentioned yet is our BIKE & BUILD CHOIR! No other group in the history of Bike and Build has had a choir...and ours came into being one day and has been growing in numbers every since. Here's a (quite shaky...in the sense of at times you might think an earthquake is occuring) video of our Bike and Build choir performing at our celebration dinner in San Fran after our wheel dip. The song is called "Happy Ending" by Mika, and it was a favorite among our group. One morning it was playing on a church sound system while we were packing up doing our morning chores- and pretty soon a spontaneous dance party erupted. So go to the link below to see us perform. I hope you enjoy. Peace.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EONkk_dgj3w