RCI EV Issue 8 Spring Summer 2013
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<strong>RCI</strong> HOLIDAY STORIES<br />
Your <strong>RCI</strong> Holiday Story<br />
WIN an iPad© *Mini Competition<br />
Thank you to all the <strong>RCI</strong> Members that have shared their holiday stories and photos for our<br />
recent competition. It was fun reading about your adventures and creative holiday experiences!<br />
We look forward to sharing many more of your stories with your fellow <strong>RCI</strong> Members over the<br />
coming months.<br />
However, there can only be one winner, and it wasn’t easy to choose as you all submitted such<br />
amazing stories. As an added bonus, we have decided to provide two $50 <strong>RCI</strong> Member Rewards<br />
to two Runner Up <strong>RCI</strong> Member stories.<br />
We have landed.<br />
And the winner is....<br />
It is so cold.<br />
This is what life is about.<br />
On a <strong>RCI</strong> arranged tour of<br />
Alaska we went to Girdwood. At<br />
the local airstrip and after a safety<br />
briefing and dressing up like the<br />
Michelin Man we board a helicopterwhich<br />
is so small I am looking for a<br />
remote control-for a short flight up to<br />
Punchbowl Glacier (so called because<br />
it is shaped like one). We alight into a<br />
world of pure white-ice, snow and low<br />
cloud. It is breathtaking and bitterly<br />
cold. It is the scene we all think of<br />
when we think of Alaska. And thenthe<br />
dogs start up- a cacophony of<br />
howls and barks from about 60 sled<br />
dogs. We are going sledding with an<br />
Iditarod Race musher. The dogs are<br />
begging to be chosen for harnessing.<br />
They go crazy and it is obvious they<br />
love their job. So the scene is this: a<br />
surround of majestic peaks, low thick<br />
white cloud, a team of dogs and then<br />
it snows, not much but enough to<br />
make this a special highlight of our<br />
trip. Soon we are off on a 45 minute<br />
ride of a lifetime. We fly across the<br />
snow pulled by 16 dog power with my<br />
partner Robert taking the reins and<br />
me holding on for dear life and loving<br />
every second of it. When we return<br />
we swap the chance of unharnessing<br />
the dogs for the guest tent, which is<br />
blissfully, warm. And then the icing<br />
on the cake, Mike the musher brings<br />
in the cutest puppy for us to cuddle.<br />
Not long after we board the mosquito<br />
sized helicopter for the trip back<br />
to Girdwood and a memory for<br />
a lifetime.<br />
ROBERT BAKER & RONITA WHEELER<br />
<strong>RCI</strong> MEMBER<br />
48 SPRING/SUMMER <strong>2013</strong><br />
*Endless Vacation® magazine is an independent publication and has not been authorized, sponsored<br />
or otherwise approved by Apple Inc. iPad and iTunes are registered trademarks of Apple Inc.
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