Tuesday, August 20, 2024

After an attempted 2 hours of sleep at the Princess Riverside Lodge, we awoke at midnight to prep for our  pre-scheduled 1am taxi.  We were told the last shuttle from the hotel to the airport was at 11:00 p.m. and we didn’t want to be so incredibly early for our 2:51am flight from a VERY TINY airport.  As we were waiting for our taxi, we were told that a hotel shuttle just arrived with guests from the airport and we could go back to the airport with that shuttle!  Once again we were the only two on the BIG coach.  We felt very blessed.  And BTW, the taxi driver called me and it was OK with him that we didn’t use his services. 

For some reason my TSA PreCheck number was not in the system so I had to go through security the regular way.  It didn’t really matter as there was hardly anyone at the airport.  But it did make me appreciate pre-check even more.

This night, or should I say this morning, was the last chance to see the Northern Lights in Alaska.  I pulled up my Aurora Borealis app and for the first time since downloading the app, we had a great chance of seeing them.   If only it hadn’t been cloudy. 

I looked out the windows at the hotel and airport a few times, but it was too cloudy and too much light from the buildings.   

Gratefully our flight to Seattle did leave on time.  At a 4am, I captured this ….

We had a 4 hour layover in Seattle, so we checked into THE BEST DEAL IN TOWN: the Alaska Lounge.  Only $30 for a day pass. 

Our Tucson flight was delayed because of a broken transponder, but we were so tired we almost didn’t care.  We got in about 45 minutes late.

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