Ship Creek in Anchorage, Alaska

It's been a habit for Andrew and I to occasionally reward our children with special individual activity nights. It happens once about every six or seven months and part of the fun is that the child gets to decide what we'll do during our few hours together.

We've gone to movies (I think that was how Andrew was trapped into seeing The Princess Diaries), to dinner, bowling, swimming, Discovery Zone and Tastee Freeze. Have I ever mentioned our theme song for Tastee Freeze? We made up this song that's just brilliant and one of these days the Tastee Freeze people are going to get wind of it and we'll be famous, the next spokesperson or spokes-family or something like that. But where was I?

Oh yes, Date Nights. So with four children it can be a month-long affair, with one child every Friday night but it's fun to spend some one-on-one time with each of them. Whenever we get one of our kids alone they're always well-behaved. Always. What is it about having siblings or other adults around that brings out the worst? Not that I'm saying we should have stopped with one, I'm just saying that Date Nights are a great time to focus on each other and not let distractions interfere.

Last month David requested that we go out to dinner at the famous Arctic Roadrunner. Think of the best burger place you've ever been to, then give it the best onion rings and blackberry shakes on the planet, put a creek running out back with aquariums and stuffed animals inside and then put in a burger-bar spot inside with all the extras you can pile on your burger in case it didn't have enough calories to begin with. I get to stand there and eat my weight in pickles while I wait for my order to come up.

I ordered a smoked turkey sandwich, thinking I'd be a little healthier, right? What arrived was the King Kong of turkey sandwiches. Four inches high, it had everything anyone had ever devised for a turkey sandwich, including several onion rings, and had then been grilled in glorious transfats to perfection. Fabulous.

It was a beautiful night and we sat outside at the tables by Campbell Creek, watching people tube down the creek. David's only regret was that he hadn't brought his swim suit. Just pretend you're an eight year-old boy. Is there anything you'd like better than simultaneously eating the world's best hamburger and swimming in a creek on a summer day?

When we were done the weather was so nice, and guaranteed to still be sunny for hours to come, so we took David downtown to Ship Creek which runs through the port area and is home to several species of salmon. I think it must be the only place in the world where one can leave the 10th-floor office and be fishing for King Salmon within ten minutes. Top that New York City.

That day was the start of the annual Ship Creek Salmon Derby which meant Combat Fishing and wall-to-wall men in hip waders. We stood on the bridge, watching them cast, feeling full and contented and at peace. It's something I take for granted--to live in a place where in the middle of the city you can get away from it all and relax and see salmon swimming upstream (that's some of the salmon in the photo above).

And if the high-rises of downtown Anchorage above the salmon stream weren't enough of a contrast, on the other side of the bridge beyond the fish ladder was a beaver building a dam. We stood quietly for ten minutes, watching him paddle back and forth with his load of sticks, admiring his glistening pelt and the slap of his tail on the water as he dove. While we were staring over the side, a flock of Japanese tourists came out of nowhere riding through on Segways on a "Segway Tour of Anchorage." They stopped long enough to see the beaver who quickly disappeared with the noise of so many guests. Segways and beavers--where else are you going to see that?

Technorati tags: Anchorage, Alaska, fishing, Ship Creek, salmon