Our tale begins as our travel trips normally do… I got little to no sleep the night before, and was literally still packing up to the very last minute possible. The Girl Scout from my childhood was doing her best to plan for every possible scenario, which was complicated by the fact that Alaska weather is a just a wee bit colder and more unpredictable than Virginia in mid-September. I had to pack for the potential of chilly nights aboard the ship and cold winds blowing across glaciers, while ensuring I also had appropriate waterproof attire because this was not a game to be called on account of rain. Oh, and not to mention, this was to all fit within the confines of Delta Airlines’ size and weight limits for baggage… My inability to decide what to take definitely caused me to over pack, but thankfully, our bags barely skated under the weight limit.
As we were waiting to board our initial flight, I got exciting thinking about all the “firsts” we would get to experience over the next week and a half… especially flying first class for the first time… I may be indecisive when it comes to over packing luggage, but when I find a good deal, I do not hesitate to pounce, and that is exactly what happened when I book our First Class tickets for a fifth of their normal price. If anything could make the next sixteen hours of travel better, it was surely getting to do so with the added perks of First Class. We were most excited about the extra space, which I learned later isn’t that great when the person in front of you reclines his seat all the way back for the duration of the flight (yes, it even sucks in First Class)… but I digress.
First Class was definitely a neat experience for the most part, especially when we boarded our last leg of the day to discover that the plane was actually chartered by the Minnesota Vikings on the flight right before ours… we looked around our seats for an errant Super Bowl ring, but alas, we were not that lucky. This was also the longest segment of this travel day, so we got the chance to experience dinner on the flight, which was surprisingly enjoyable. Unable to move from the large meal (and the guy in front of me pinning me in), I settled in for a nap. If you have ever tried to sleep on a plane, you know that it isn’t the most restful thing, and I dozed in and out of consciousness for the most part.
Somewhere over Canada, I sleepily looked out the window and noticed a faint glow of green light. It seemed to be moving, so my first thought was that the haze of drowsiness was making me see things or that it may have been a reflection on the plane window. Intrigued, I stared for a few minutes more as the green hue grew brighter and brighter, and the colors ebbed in and out of my purview. Suddenly, I realized what I was seeing — it was the Northern Lights!!!
Given that our cruise was in middle of September, and this particular leg of the flight was at night, I knew this would be the best chance to see these glorious lights, so of course I booked our tickets on the right side of the plane just in case. While I honestly didn’t think we would get the chance to experience them, it was at that moment that I was so glad I thought to take those just in case measures several months earlier.
At that moment, nothing else mattered. It was as if these emerald waves of beauty were performing a show just for me, and I was fascinated. As I tuned back into reality, I heard the hum of the engines intermingled with soft snores of neighboring passengers. In one swift motion, I turned in my seat and reached out to get Chris’s attention, only to spill a freshly opened can of Coke Zero all over his lap…
As we began mopping up the carbonated mess around us, our flight attendant rushed swiftly to our aid with additional napkins. At that moment, I felt so embarrassed and out of place as if I was too clumsy and uncouth to be sitting in First Class. Between what I had just seen out the window and what I had just done to Chris, I was still in a bit of shock and could hardly mutter an apology. A few minutes later, my brain was finally able to piece together the words to tell him what I had seen, so he could see it, too. I was also fortunate enough to have a night photography mode on my phone that did a decent job in capturing the show.
A few hours later, we began our descent into Anchorage, and as we deplaned and walked toward baggage claim, we were greeted in true Alaska fashion by a moose. The airport in Anchorage also doubles as a museum with all kinds of native art, taxidermy, and various other artifacts. If it wasn’t so late at night when we arrived, I would have loved to explore it more. A brief shuttle ride later, we were checking into our hotel. The adrenaline of the constant go-go-go of the travel day quickly faded, and we fell asleep as soon as our heads hit the pillows. We were four hours behind Eastern Standard Time, and only had a few hours to sleep off the jet lag before spending the next day exploring all that Anchorage had to offer.
