At last I am in Talkeetna Alaska, the quaint little town that will be home base for me until I leave for the lower 48 - hopefully after a succcessful solo Summit of Denali. I had an uneventful trip here with my small mountain of luggage, thank goodness everything arrived at the same time as I did.
The high temp today in Talkeetna was 18 degrees, sunrise was at 10:16 am, sunset was at 3:30 and days are still getting shorter - that trend will reverse soon. One nice thing about the very short days of winter here is that when they do start getting longer you can really tell a difference from one day to the next. I have been hoping to fly out to Denali to start my trip for real on Monday, but it doesn't look like the weather will cooperate: the forecasts are for freezing rain for Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday next week - not good weather to fly in. I'm not worried about it, the mountain will wait. There's nothing I can do about it, though it is emotionally difficult to be so close and not be able to just hit the slopes. I am glad to be stuck here instead of in a snow cave, the food at the Talkeetna Roadhouse is much better!
Meanwhile I still have work to do before I fly out. Of course I am keeping up my training regimen, the snow certainly won't keep me from exercising! That will help me acclimate to this time zone as well. Other than that I have some technical details to take care of with my satellite phone and some other pieces of gear, not my idea of fun but certainly important.