This is a view looking west over Cook Inlet from a playground in downtown Anchorage. The blurry dot in the center is a small plane from the very busy airport just past the distant bluffs of Earthquake Park (where I would end up later in the day). *

Anchorage was mostly cold, wet, and gray that drizzly morning, but I found a splash of color at the visitors center. That seemed to be the only place downtown that was open. I had set out on my city exploration early, since I needed to catch a van to Seward at 3pm.

The visitors center was smaller than I expected, but unique. The roof holds actual sod with live grass growing in it. Alabama wasn't on their signpost, but I could tell I was a long way from home.

I walked and rode around downtown for a bit, learning all about the Anchorage Peoplemover bus system. My new Garmen eTrex GPS receiver proved to be incredibly helpful navigating around the city; I don't know how I ever traveled without it. It certainly improved my confidence that I was on the right bus. I decided to spend the bulk of my day in Earthquake Park. This is the view from along the costal trail looking northeast back towards Anchorage.

The tall buildings of downtown Anchorage. It was a little hike to get here. A gruff driver only took me as far as Northern Lights & Aero, on the outskirts of town about a mile away from this vantage point. Public transportation does have its limitations. I guess I can't expect everything for only $2.50 a day.

Earthquake Park commemorates the 1964 Good Friday quake, reportedly the most powerful ever in North America. Here, 75 homes once rested on a sand & clay formation that liquefied during the 9.2 magnitude tremor. Much of previously-developed western Anchorage fell into Cook Inlet, and now exists as mudflats.

The Tony Knowles Coastal Trail led right under the takeoff path for Stevens Airport. Some of these jumbo cargo jets took to the air very slowly, and the sound they made was impressive.

As close as the date was to the September 11th anniversary, I kept expecting airport security guards to pay me a visit as I took these pictures. Thankfully, that didn't happen.

I hiked too far, and spent too long watching planes that morning. As a result, I missed the scheduled bus pickup back at Northern Lights & Aero. I had to walk many more blocks back toward town before I found another, more heavily traveled, route.

I felt like I could reach up and grab the landing gear.

These steep cliffs used to extend much farther out into the Inlet than they do now.

Back near my hotel, I walked down to the Lake Hood / Lake Spenard seaplane base. This is billed as the largest collection of floatplanes in the country, which I could believe. Every foot of shoreline had a dock and/or free-floating plane crammed into it.

The base was active, with planes taking off and landing every few minutes.

Some floatplanes were less fancy than others.

GPS tracks around Anchorage. My eTrex was still configured for airplane use, so the track points were obtained less frequently than normal. The buses didn't really plow diagonally through the city. :-)