YUKON TERRITORY Part 1 - Ferry to Skagway.

Went to Whitehorse with some friends a week or so ago. took the car on the Ferry to Skagway, crossed into Canada, thru Carcross and into Whitehorse, which is only about 150 miles or so from Skagway.  The weather was great.    Of course we saw Orcas on the way there - the dorsal fin of a male can be 6 ft tall!

My new camera is proving to have been a worthwhile investment, eh?
Skagway is a cute little old gold mining town.  That thing is the front of a Snow digging train!

I love this fountain!

The HATCHERY

I just found this unfinished post I started late last summer when the mass salmon orgy and death frenzy was at it's peak!   This is one of the most amazing things I've seen in my life.  To read about it in books and see it on nature documentaries on TV is one thing - but seeing it in real time is phenomenal.  First the salmon are fighting and literally dying to get up every freshwater stream in town.  They flop so frantically they'll flop themselves onto shore and not be able to get back in the water.  The sea is a swarming mass of salmon.  Then, after they do their spawn thing... they die, and carcasses are everywhere.  The entire Juneau smells like dead fish and the eagles and bears are everywhere gorging themselves.   I stood in a stream that was about 12 inches deep at the deepest and the salmon were moving past my legs, and crashing into my legs to get upstream.  It was cool!  This whole thing drives home so intensely the urge that these animals have to mate and reproduce. 

Kasaan

I went to the Village of Kasaan on Prince of Wales Island last week for work.  Kasaan is a Haida (Indigenous Alaskan people) village.  We had a meeting there and after the meeting they took us to see the last original standing Haida clan house in Alaska.  It was Chief Son-I-Hat's house.  We also saw his burial site. The house was near the shore and the totems would be visible from boats on the ocean. 

The setting was just beautiful - very isolated and peaceful.  I wish I had taken a pic looking out at the ocean - an incredible view of mountains and islands, with absolutely no visible sign of human activity. It must look close to the same as it did 200 years ago.

We were told not to hold on to the railings on this bridge (that they give a false sense of security because they're about to fall off).  The village of Kasaan is desperately trying to raise funds to maintain this place.  If you're feeling generous, go to their website - you can buy a tee-shirt to help with the fund-raising (I bought 2 while I was there). 



 This bridge was in Kasaan, but in a different place - our meeting had to walk to look at the site of a proposed Magnetite mine. (Our souvenir magnetite rocks did not go over very well at the security in the airport).  And this was the most beautiful rainbow ever we saw from the Inter-island Ferry, which goes from Ketchikan to Hollis, on Prince of Wales.

Winter to Spring... and a Glacier Wedding!

Well it's been a while since my last post.  The winter here was pretty boring compared to the spring,summer and fall.  I just could not get into doing too many outdoor things for some reason - I bought snowshoes but never used them.  Didn't see the light of day much - and it snowed or rained almost constantly.  But here it is spring now and today was beautiful and clear sunny!  The buds are starting to leaf out, the magpies are gone back north and the varied thrushes are buzzing again in the woods.  I did go on a few winter hikes - the trails were icy so it was hard walking.  They sell these things here that you clip onto your boots to make it easier.  Here's some pics I took of a nice walk out to a beautiful desolate beach.  The tide was going out so got some nice pics of the tide channels in the salt marsh.

 Also went to David & Shelly's wedding at Herbert Glacier!  About 10 of us hiked out there (5 miles ea way!) with champagne, salmon spread, cameras, and Shelly had her wedding dress in her backpack.  It was a long arduous hike, through ice and packed snow, and boulders, but a beautiful spot to get married - then a long hike back.   I had the worst blister on one toe - almost the size of my toe! 

  I think Sadie will remember this day the rest of her life!

which is why we spent thanksgiving holiday in sunny southern California!!

Winter is upon us...

I HATE THE RAIN

OK, the weather was beautiful from April to early august but then it started raining and hasnt stopped.  I don't look at my favorite website NOAA weather forecast anymore because all it says now is rain, 100% for monday, rain; 100% for Tuesday rain; 100% for Wednesday rain, 90% for Thursday rain, 100% for Friday, RAIN!!!  Oh my god, thursday looks like a nice day.  Wait a minute, no it doesn't!  What am I thinking??  I just spent all this money getting a nice bike from a pawn shop in Anchorage, flying it here on the airplane, getting a new shifter put on it, and all it does is rain!  I'm even getting sick of seeing the rainbows every other day.  Not like NY where a rainbow means the rain is ending, here the rainbow comes out while it's still raining, just to let you know the sun is not dead, just hibernating.  Will it ever change?  I swear, the next sunny day I am not going to go to work, i am going to worship it all effin day.  I've had a cold for a week and I'm always freezing and wet!  I don't even take Rosey for a pee walk anymore.  I just open the door, she looks out at the rain, runs out to pee and runs back in again.  I see all these locals boating in the rain, walking in the rain, riding their bikes in the rain, wearing flip flops, and I'm wearing long sleeve shirts & fleece under a helly hanson raincoat i got at a thrift store for $2, wool socks, and sweat pants.  I'm gonna get out my gloves and hat soon.  Yuk Yuk.  The first thought in my brain when I wake in the morn - before my eyes are even open, is "is it still raining?  do i hear rain?"  Inevitably the answer is "o fuck" and i go back to sleep.  And it's not a light rain, and then a heavy rain, and then cloudy, it's a constant rain, just rain rain rain.  No wonder they don't have basements here.  And you don't need to drink water, it just imbibes through your pores.  Cheryl, you'd hate it!  My tomato plants grew 2 rotten tomatoes.  Moss and lichens are growing on my ears.  Maybe when I rid myself of this cold & fever I've had I'll feel better about this shit weather.   But until then.... IT SUCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

hey, wait a minute, what's that sound I hear??? silence ? no rain?  really, i think it just stopped ...  too bad it's midnite.. don't worry, it'll be raining again within 10 mintues.  maybe it's not a cold at all i have, maybe it's vitamin d deficiency. where's my vitamins. i'm craving seal livers due to lack of vitamin d.  would i actually club a baby seal to get some? 

our x gov

 

Ha Ha!

THE JOB arghhhhhhhhhhh!!

I decided to run a post of WORK. Those of you who know what I do for a living will get it....



Aww, we had to say goodbye to Shelly, our summer college student hire. We presented her with a gold, gold pan.







Go away for a few days and this is what happens to your office, right Matthew?

<------------Fill, Fill everywhere

      Drain that Muskeg! --------->

  <---------- Bulldoze that Muskeg!

THE BOAT!

I bought a boat!! A 15-foot 1977 Starcraft. It is real hard to live here and see all the boaters and fishers and not be one! With some help from experienced boaters, we scoured Craigslist every day and finally found the "Deep Valley", but since the last two letters are missing: The "Deep Vall".

Q:What is wrong with this picture?

A: The boat is supposed to cost more than the car.

I plan on changing its name to "Tardigrade" (my favorite zooplankton - common name ="water bear"- very appropo for AK. But I've been told by my pirate neighbors (they have a pirate flag and their dog has a pirate collar) that it's bad luck to rename a boat without an official renaming ceremony, so it's officially the "Deep Vall" for now.

Sadie's growing to love it and calls herself a "Boatrist". There's a lot for landlubbers like us to learn - so as not to die at sea, and we are learning fast!

The most miserable thing at first was how to back it up to the launch. We launch from Amalga Harbor because that's a relatively remote launch place and you have to buy a launch permit from CBJ (=the City & Borough of Juneau) before you can launch at a public launch. I am so broke that I cant afford the 80$ and I was told that the Harbor folks start downtown and ticket everyone and quit for the day before they reach Amalga so your chances of getting caught there are less. So far we've launched maybe 6 times and (knock knock) no ticket yet.

Anyway, back to the backing up of the trailer, the first time I did it I held up 10 other boaters trying to launch out or bring in (most of whom were being very patient giving me all kinds of hints and tips on how to do it). I think I had to start over at least 20 times and was almost crying and ready to drive the whole thing into the water - car and all - and go back to NY- but I did it. And it hasn't gotten much easier. Sometimes I get it quicker, but I think it's just luck. I really think a pickup has more visibility in back than an SUV - but I'll find anything to blame other than meself!

Anyway, I stocked up on everything for safety and my housemates David & Shelly & I got everything we needed for fishing (halibut) and away we went! It was a pisser - after the disastrous backing up, we stalled out the boat (hand pull starter), took at least an hour to actually pull away from the dock- it was ridiculous! [By the way, I got some boating 101 lessons from the guy I bought it from - he was actually nice enough to take me out and teach me a bunch of stuff. I knew absolutely nothing and there was a lot to learn - most critical: have PDFs, make sure the plug's in, make sure you have gas, make sure you lift the engine up before you drag the boat out of the water. ]
The very first time David caught (what we thought were) two halibut. When he pulled the first one out of the water, Shelly screamed and almost fell out and I was shocked at the sharp toothed JAWS. When he was cleaning them at the stainless steel fish-cleaning table set up at the dock, the bigger one (about 20 inches long) accidentally slid through the tunnel for the guts disposal! And I wanted the JAWS to hang in my house! Long story short - they turned out to be arrowtooth flounder - not the best eatin. I have yet to catch anything - in fact lost my whole halibut contraption (I think I had caught a 50 -100 lb halibut (at least that's what it felt like - but coulda been a rock I was fighting) but since i didn't tie the freakkin thing on right, the whole thing came loose so now there's some miserable halibut swimming around with a 6-lb lead ball in his belly). Everything takes time to learn.

But the boat rides are fun! Seen seals & whales, and we only go out when it's calm waters. And as usual - absolutely breathtaking beauty out there! Check out the video clip at the bottom (turn the volume up).

Later Maties,
Captn H

A LITTLE BIT MORE OF THE FAIR

I came across some more pics from the fair ...

And the black wolf-dog that I love...

And me on the bike with Rosie in the backback!

Here's the road we biked back to the ferry - nice scenery along the ride!