Skater's Cabin

This is skater's cabin on Mendenhall Lake. It is property of the US Forest Service. People have events and fires here quite a bit. The distance picture was from my camp site. I saw a wedding taking place there one afternoon. Another night I heard a native group having a ceremony. My School uses it once a year in the winter when we have classes go out to the Glacier. They have a fire and do some outdoors studies out here. It has a very big wood stove and a very big fire pit outside too.

Mendenhall Glacier, Ketchikan. blueberries

Pictures of Mendenhall Glacier. The last picture is of Ketchikan, AK. Between the buildings is a river which was loaded with salmon. People could rent poles and fish.

We are having a blueberry festival at our school next week - how great is that? Tlingit elders talked my principal into setting up the festival since blueberries are growing wild and blueberries are a traditional food of the Klingit people. Everyone is thinking of lessons involving blueberries, bears, seasons, and how the blueberry was infused into the lives of natives and the people of AK generally. Pretty great idea!

Bears

Here is the first bear I saw at Mendenhall Glacier. They close down sections when the bears are getting too close to people. Regularly, bears wander where there are hundreds of people near the glacier.

Petersburg, AK

Petersburg, AK. This was Petersburg and it was getting dark when we were there. It was a short stop so I did not get off. I have heard good things about Petersburg as a town. Like all small island towns, it has few paved roads.

Ketchican

We had a 3 hour layover in ketchikan and I checked out the town and took a few pictures. It is much like Juneau but Juneau is a bit bigger and I think Juneau has bigger mountains surrounding it. both places are surrounded by forests, sea and animals. do you see the salmon is the river which goes right through the town?

To Alaska: The inside passage.

The trip was relaxing and I read FDR, which helped me figure out the current mess which President Obama is facing. There are many similarities between FDR and President Obama.

During the voyage: We saw at least one hump back whale as well as a few Orca Whales.
We passed so many islands as we went through the inland passage and many of them were uninhabited.

Rain - yep. Southeast Alaska has lots of rain.

The Inland Passage to Alaska

the middle picture is the troll under the bridge in Seattle.

The kids in the picture were my room mates for two nights. They were a church group going to Sitka to paint houses and help the elderly. they would have meetings and hacky sack games where I was. They were a good group of kids.
Here is the beginning of the ferry ride. I drove on the ferry just outside of Bellingham and got off in Juneau. On the ferry, I slept on a plastic lounge chair under the covered area. It also had heat. The trip was 3 nights and two full days.
It was quite relaxing and enjoyable. The scenery was amazing. It was like watching a nature movie live. My ferry, was ahead of schedule by 3 hours so we took a detour into passages not normally used to kill time. It was very spectacular. We even had some sunshine for a few hours. It rains a lot in Southeast Alaska.

I have a lot more to put on the blog, so more is on the way soon.

To Alaska with a stop in OR and then WA.

I left Wells today and I will be in Portland tonight. I have a lot to do in Portland and will take off to Puyallup, WA this weekend. I am going to get on the ferry to Juneau Aug 6. I am nervous and excited. I have a tough job in Juneau so I could really screw it up if I read kids, and parents, wrong. I might add that I always start a school year nervous. The chance of screwing the job up is always possible. I am in a good place because I am retired and honestly, I do not have to work for 20 more years to get a regular income.

I might also say that I had a year off and it was great. Remodeling the Wells house was a great learning experience and I got to be an involved Grandpa, which is good. I also found out that I am not ready to really retire yet.

Wishing all well. I do expect to blog regularly now that I am on my way north.



This picture is of the Wells house that Gar and I just got painted. We even have the porch done now but I forgot to get a picture.

Pole Creek, Nevada

Amazing day!

I was supposed to get firewood at Pole Creek but two chainsaws are messed up - No Go.

Then Tricia said she wanted to go to Pole Creek. I remembered I had wood stacked up from fall and we could go get that. We loaded up two grandsons and took the back road to Pole. It is 140 miles each way to Pole Creek and with a V8 engine, it can be spendy.

We took dirt roads exclusively and saved 50 miles each way. I got the wood loaded into the truck and then we took the little boys hiking. Pole Creek is at 8000 feet and it was 90 degrees at 5000 feet, so Pole is cooler. We found new firewood along a road. We only passed two cars on the entire trip. It was like we were on top of the world. Pole Creek is a pretty amazing place. I was in charge of Pole Creek last fall. It has 7 buildings which house various scientists and data gatherers for the Forest Service and Wildlife agencies.

I am back to painting the house, trying to get it done.

Wells

Taking a ferry to Juneau on Aug 6

I have made my reservation on the ferry to Juneau. I will be heading North Aug 6. A month from now, I will be working again. I hear the salmon are running in the streams, bears are out and about and the berries are ripe. I am also getting reports that fresh Halibut is being caught and whales are being seen in the process of catching the salmon.

I am looking forward to being back in Alaska.

Got some firewood

pole Creek is at 8,000 feet and it looks like these pictures but then there are big tree groves in ravines. A Big Fire burned the trees so they are available for fire wood. I sure do enjoy being out trying to get ticks on me.

I went to Pole Creek, NV to get firewood. I went alone and got 1 1/2 cord of wood. It was about 250 miles round trip. I went to Pole Creek because I can get 8 inch dry wood - which is all I want to tackle alone. If I go out with someone else, I go with bigger wood. Pole Creek has bigger wood too. I had a 3/4 ton truck and a trailer and it sure is sweet having a trailer.

Bike ride - Wells

This is a road that I have been riding. People say there are rattle snakes out here but I have not seen one yet. I have seen quite a few racers and a bull snake.
We have had some great weather 75 degrees. I was hoping to put up more pictures but the program will not let me.

Firewood

I went and got some firewood at Ruby Guard today with my 5 year old helper. Here is a picture of the Ruby Mountains. I got in a 20 mile bike ride that was awesome! When bike riding, I went to the Humboldt mountains and the then got a good view of the Ruby Mountains.

Wells - flowers along the road

I generally ride a bike and ignore the little things like flowers, etc. I went up a big hill and had to stop because rocks got in my way - I noticed flowers and took a picture of it. So now, I am stopping on occasion now to take pictures. I saw these while bike riding.

THE BP OIL SPILL - views from the Gulf

Here is a link to a man named Drew who is working to help the birds harmed in the BP OIL MESS! Please check it out!

http://birding.typepad.com/gulf/

Here is a YouTube video done by Drew Wheelan about what he has seen in the Gulf!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6WG-oxq-uIk&feature=player_embedded

Wild Horses

These are wild horses in the South Ruby Mountains. We saw about 15 horses but they did not move. I got out of the car and walked up to them. There was a foal laying on the ground and the mares were surrounding the foal. When I got 20 yards away, the foal got up and they moved away. Later, we saw a single horse - the stallion. The last picture is of other wild horses who we came across. There was a beautiful mare with a baby. We also came across a third set of horses. We will be getting wood in this area in a few weeks.

Grandkids 4/2010

here are pictures of the Grandkids. Most shots are in Wells, NV but the bike riding was on the Willamette River in Portland.

Where is SPRING?

I am in Oregon and we have a day or two of great sunshine and then 3 or 4 days of rain in various degrees. What happened to our sun. I am getting in my bike riding but it sure can be cold and windy. I am amazed actually about how different weather impacts my riding. Sunny days, I can go 30 miles rather easily. Cold and blustery days I go 10 to 15 miles but it is fighting my body. I think it has to do with muscles being warmed up easily on warm days. I think too that mental outlook is better on sunny days. I see the sun and feel so much better.

Sun - too much is a good thing though. I lived in San Diego for a year and constant sun got old. Air Conditioning in Jan, Feb, Mar is crazy but it was needed. So, I like the variety of weather but I like to escape to warm weather after being in cold for a while.

Alex and I are heading to Nevada in a couple of days. He (3) gets to hang out with his cousins (2,4) for a week and I will take Tricia to her medical appt next Monday in Salt Lake City. I see there might be snow falling on the way to NV.

I am ready for spring.

Alaska

I am going back to Alaska Sept 2010. I was asked if I would consider teaching in AK and I said yes.