It's not all about the scenery!

Sure, the place is beautiful, but so are we! Not really, we are both getting as craggy as the mountains and moving as slow as the glaciers.

We just finished tent camping in Denali for3 days. The first night it rained all night, the 2nd night the wind blew all night,the third night it rained AND the wind blew all night! We are now in Fairbanks dryingout and actually saw the sun.Thought you'd enjoy the attached. I got to see wolf pups in the wild and a rare glimpse of the mountain.

Bears, Volcanoes and Glaciers

Katmai National Wildlife Refuge continued - You could tell that we flew to Hallo Bay for bear viewing from Erv’s photos of the icy volcano lake and the panorama of cliffs and mountains. For me, the flight was almost as great a thrill as the bears. We flew in a 6-seat bush plane with a taciturn pilot who skillfully landed on a sandy beach near where a group of bear were grazing on rich sedge grasses. En route we were treated to another impression of Alaska’s vastness and rugged diversity. We flew over rugged, snow topped mountains, glaciers and a complex system of rivers, wetlands and bays. I spent some flight time contemplating escape routes and wondering how we would survive if forced down and left on our own in this remote wilderness - no problems with imagination here! We also flew close to the St. Augustine volcano which erupted last in the 1990's dropping inches of ash on Homer (local volcanoes generally expel steam and volcanic ash vs magma) and is currently steaming. In my camera lens I was able to line Augustine up with another quietly active volcano, Mt. Ileamna - love this photo.

The Alaska Peninsula and Aleutian Islands stretch southwest from the Anchorage area and are a part of the Ring of Fire which also includes islands of Hawaii and Japan. The local geologic activity stems from proximity to where the pacific plate slips under the continental shelf. In 1964, a 9.9 quake and related tsunami destroyed several towns in Alaska and significantly impacted Homer, claiming about 6-9 feet of the Homer spit. Even this month we felt a small earthquake (4.5) and there continue to be ash eruptions from two Aleutian volcanoes near Dutch Harbor. All this has made me more aware and respectful of the strategic Tsunami warning system which is part of the scenery along the bay in Homer.

I echo Erv when I relate the time with the huge brown bears as being a special experience. For me, it was Zen-like as I never felt more fully present than in that beautiful, remote meadow among these amazing creatures. Even when a large male, pursuing females at the end of the mating season, unexpectedly came within 8-10 feet of me ( it is truly amazing how fast these huge animals can move!) and I could see him salivating and hear him huffing, I felt awe rather than fear. One of our party of 4 got a photo of this encounter which I’ll post as soon as he forwards it to me. We’ve learned a lot about normal bear behavior and appropriate human behavior around bears and will have even more training as we prepare to live in the cabin in Coldfoot where being bear aware is essential. People and bears are more likely to get into trouble when they surprise one another.

Volcanos and now glaciers... lots of geology! So much of Alaska remains primal and that is a huge part of its value to our nation both experientially for those who come here, and for the insight it provides about our planet and interdependent interrelationships on this earth. Let me move on lest I get on a soapbox myself. Today 7/21 we took a guided hike on the Matsanuga glacier with Rob, a friend of Erv’s from Big Bear, CA and his party of 5. It was quite a new experience for me - I mean hard hats, crampons (I unfortunately - shades of Star trek - called them “clingons”) poles and all. The play of sun on ice, the dynamics of melt and movement, the steep climbs and descents were exhilarating. I’ll let photos do the talking!

From Erv's soapbox

It just gets better and better...
A short while ago we flew to a very remote area of Katmai National Park and, with only 2 others and a very environmentally minded guide (meaning no firearms), we experienced the world as it may have been if man had not been part of it. Of course thanks to technology we were able to reach back in time by arriving in an hour on a small plane and I was able to record it with the latest in digital cameras and I am able to send it out to the world through the internet, but other than THAT, we were in Brown Bear Jurrasic Park. Surrounded by active, steaming volcanoes, ancient glaciers miles thick and creatures that struck fear and respect in our ancestors as they told stories around their fires in the distant past, you couldn’t help but feel small and insignificant but part of something bigger. I could write for days about the wonderful time we had, but something more important is gnawing at me since that day.
This wonderful, remote world of Alaska is so accessible today it makes it even more important to save areas like the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge from man’s imprint.
Protecting it from the proposed drilling and limiting it to scientific study to learn how nature or God if you want, intended the earth to evolve without us. This is one of the last places on earth that we haven’t scarred or altered significantly. Can’t we just keep this for the plants and animals that live there and see what there is to learn from it? Sure, Senator Stevens would have you believe it’s a “barren wasteland” with his blank white poster board displays and photos of snow covered tundra, but under the white blanket is a tremendous variety of life forces waiting to explode in the short seasons given them. And there’s a vast number of birds and animals that call it home as it is. My friend Alan Bartels reminded me, only man can make a barren wasteland. We are learning (or should) every day, all of life is woven together. You can’t tug on one string without another reacting to it.
Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, or ANWR, as the oil industry would like you to call it to depersonalize it, has maybe 200 days worth of oil. It would take at least 5 years to even tap that. It would not be “American” oil. Oil companies are international. The product would not be exclusively for our SUV’s.
Alaska is known by its license plates as the “last frontier”. As I look around, more and more I see it treated the same as all of America’s frontiers of the past.
This is the last chance we have to have a last frontier. We must try something different. Soon Sandra and I will be leaving to work for the Visitor Center that serves Gates of the Arctic National Park, Arctic National Wildlife Refuge and Kanuti NWR above the Arctic Circle. I’m sure it will be the experience of a lifetime for us. We will be in a log cabin with no indoor plumbing, running water or electricity leaving lots of time to blog and photograph and explore the “wasteland”. Keep you posted!

Cabin in the Woods

I must admit to feeling weary of late. We work four 8-hr. days plus additional time for program development in the evenings since planning time is difficult to come by at the Visitors’ Center. (Program presentation is both fun and a personal commitment for Erv and I; our current efforts focus on eagles and sea otters.) Then, on our 3 days off we feel compelled to take full advantage of being in Alaska by exploring as much of this unique and beautiful state as we can. And, like everyone else, we must fit in laundry, shopping, cleaning, business, etc. So, we’ve just returned to work after 3 days hiking/camping in the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge, about 11/2 hrs north of our home base in Homer, and we’re ready for some down time which isn’t an option.

The trip to Kenai and Engineer Lake was a joy although it made us feel our age. We back-packed everything in to our remote site on a boggy, root-encumbered one mile trail around part of the lake’s shoreline then (rowboat came with the primitive cabin) rowed back to the parking area for the rest of our gear - another 1 mile round trip. We set up camp in the relatively new cabin (fine outhouse way back in the woods with a Dutch door to facilitate contemplation of the beautiful surroundings) and sat back on the porch to relax. The quiet evening was interrupted only by the lovely calls of red necked grebes and loons nesting around the lake. Entertainment was provided by a group of snowshoe hares nibbling grasses and chasing one another around the small clearing between cabin and lake. The quiet was deafening!

Alaska’s “summer” sunlight lasts 19+ hours and one becomes confused about time’s passage and the normal cues for waking and sleeping (dawn is around 4AM and dark- a relative term- about 11:30PM) - another cause of our weariness I think. And, although it is now considered summer, we sun-worshiping New Mexicans sorely miss intense sunshine and bone-permeating warmth - our longest stretch without a gray and overcast sky for at least half the day, has been 3 days. Nights continue in the 30's (days now reach the low 50's). At the cabin we enjoyed being able to make a fire in the wood burning stove to ease the chill before turning in.

Next day was cloudy and blustery along the lake but good for a 4-hr hike further inland to an even more remote lake. We saw lots of bear and moose scat but only birds and small critters. Returning, we found the boat swamped from large waves and had to bail and drag it to higher ground. Still plenty of time for rest and reading. The final morning dawned clear and calm and, after breakfast, we loaded everything into the rowboat and headed for the far shore. About half way there a stiff wind came up, as we had been warned it could, and we added a lot of stationary and “blown off course” rowing to the round trip. At one point we rowed in place for so long that we had a lengthy conversation with the Youth Conservation Corps trail crew! Still it was better than packing everything out on our backs. All in all - great outing and one in which we developed an even greater admiration for Alaska homesteaders!