Happy Birthday Alaska!

This weekend marks the celebration of Alaska's 50th anniversary of statehood. Several events are going on, among them, a concert given by the Judds, the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds air show, and many more events steeped in Alaskan history. Saturday we went to the air show; you'll see photos below. 

On our way, on bikes, to the air show, we were politely told by a young Army recruit, "you're going to have to cross here, there's a bear on this side of the road." We agreed this is the best Alaskan one-liner we've heard as of yet. We took his advice.

A shot of the Thunderbirds heading North across Elmendorf AFB. Typically four planes flew together and the other two were rogue wanderers, performing impressive aerial stunts.

Here the set of four are flying over the runway, and the rest of the planes on display at Arctic Thunder. Unfortunately, our shutter speed just won't catch F-16's too well.

Here are the planes looking like flies lost in the stratosphere. The overcast sky makes it hard to see white jets, but the contrails are visible here.

On our way home Carrie decided to commemorate the bear's location by framing a nice shot of the mountains outside Elmendorf.