Construction Season in Alaska

It’s been said that there are two seasons in Alaska . . .  winter and construction, and now we enter the latter.  Would you believe this image is a church about a mile from my condo, so I’ve watch it go up slowly all winter.  It’s just corrugated metal, and some Asian religion I guess.  There’s another huge office building on the SE corner of Northern Lights and C streets, and this is the first building that cleverly put a huge garage on the lower floors.  Perhaps the architect finally figured out that we all drive cars to these places, and since you can’t park on the street in Spenard (the real name of mid-town) you simply need a place for clients to park.  They haven’t figured this out yet for downtown, and the last parking block now has a rather uninteresting looking Convention Hall going up with a name I’ll never remember — it’s Delana or something like that. 

Springtime also brings lots of action in the arts and sports.  Anchorage Opera is revving up for their season with several fund raisers, and the museum is expanding and you will laugh at the rather costly sculpture they are setting outside.  Our football team enters it’s second season.  Alaska Wild is their name, and they are.  We had a meet-and-greet at the Petroleum Club last week, and were treated to a cheer/dance by the cut

Alaska Wedding on Ice

Following up my recent blog on the Ice “Museum” which is a hotel at Chena Hot Springs, I felt I just had to post this neat picture in the morning paper of a couple getting married there. Here’s part of the article:

What would happen if Barbie came to life and got married? Oh, and she lived in Alaska and wanted a unique wedding. And she liked the idea of being a princess.
Her big day would look just like Anchorage residents Mechelle Sharp and Shawn Boquist’s wedding April 26 at Chena Hot Springs Resort.
“I’m the girl playing with Barbie all her life,” said Mechelle, who still has 300 of them tucked away in a trunk.
“I’m just really grateful that there is an ice castle in Alaska.”
Outside of all that, this was a weekend to focus on the ‘kids’. My piano students played some neat music for the residents of the Pioneer Home on Saturday for the Strawberry Festival, an annual event sponsored by the Pioneers of Alaska. . . Women’s Igloo #4 . . . and the Children’s School of Dance gave a great performance of the “Wizard of Oz” at West High school, with over a hundred kiddies on stage together, and no one ran into each other. I am amazed over the number of 4 – 7 yr olds. who participated, wearing great costumes, and of course, there are always a few who don’t ‘join the group’ and wander off, but they were ably grabbed by some teen age girls who herded them back to the ‘chorus line’. It was such fun to watch, and brought a tear to my eye as I was laughing at the same time. Kudos to the teachers/director.

Outside activities of the weekend included a women’s triathalon that drew a number of the younger set of ably fit gals, and the newspaper gave good coverage of this event. This is really a running city, and in the winter, a cross-country skiing draw for national and international competitors. Until next time, keep planning your trip to big A! You’ll love it here.

Dena’ina Hits Anchorage!

South view from 3rd floor

Unless you’re an Alaskan, you might think this is some sort of hurricane. Nope. This is a great image of ‘my’ church, which is the spire with the cross on it, located just 2 blocks south of the spacious, new $111 million Dena’ina Civic and Convention Center. Although the building was finished in September. . . the city waited until a bone-cold morning in mid-October to stage its grand opening festivities — outdoors. The name Dena’ina (pronounced De-nine’-a) comes from a small surviving native group in Alaska. The many banquet and meeting rooms in the building have equally difficult native names to remember. My first visit was before the grand opening, as the Anchorage Convention and Visitors Bureau had a ‘meeting planners’ luncheon that was first-class! The vice-president entered riding a bicycle, wearing a bowler and waving a cane as he circled the large room. He made it to the podium safely, and gave a speech using a powerpoint demonstration on a huge screen. We were all impressed. So Anchorage continues to grow. Personally, I miss the old “Alaskan” town, but I guess that’s progress.

The Foucault Pendulum at the University of Alaska

\"Over the Rainbow – Michael Close\"The Foucault Pendulum is named for the French physicist Jean Foucault (pronounced “Foo-koh”), who first used it in 1851 to demonstrate the rotation of the earth. It was the first satisfactory demonstration of the earth’s rotation using laboratory apparatus rather than astronomical observations. The direction along which the pendulum swings rotates with time because of Earth’s daily rotation.

The beautiful new library at UAA (University of Alaska Anchorage) houses the pendulum in a large setting on the first floor, extending thru the second floor. The dedication ceremony was last night, and all of us who bought ‘a degree’ were there to toast this piece of art. This should be a real tourist attraction, but unfortunately, even most locals are unfamiliar with it.
The University continues to grow into a major force in our city, with continual building, and spreading out which now requires shuttles to operate for the students to reach classes. The Arts Building is at the East end, and almost butts into the smaller school, Alaska Pacific University. These centers of higher education are a source of pride for Anchorage.