Alaskamarge Travels

Dora, Aaron, Misty, Mosely, and I made it safely home from Denali last evening around 8pm…having left our campsite on the Teklanika River about 12 hours earlier.  We had wonderful weather and a wonderful time.  I’ll post just a few pictures here to tide interested parties over until I can write more.  Remember, you will see a short description of the photo if you place your cursor over it.

Stay tuned.

About 4 years ago or so, the Alaska Railroad introduced a Whistle Stop Train where tourists and locals alike can hop on the train and get off at any number of stops in the backcountry, spend a few hours or up to 4 days, then hop back on for a ride back to civilization.  My friend Sue, whom you may remember from the canoe trip, had planned to take her visiting sister on this trip and asked if I’d like to join them and since I had yet to ride the Whistle Stop Train, I said yes.   So, along with another friend, the four of us drove down to Portage yesterday to catch the train out to the first stop, which is at the Spencer Glacier. 

What fun it is to ride a train!  Our trip took us just 20 minutes up the valley along the glacier fed river to the Spencer Glacier Whistle Stop.  Most of the folks on the train disembarked at this point as they were all headed out on a rafting float trip which would take them down river and back to our starting point.  The four of us were left alone to walk the trail out to and along side the Glacier.  Much to Jane’s chagrin (Jane is the visiting sister from Florida) we did not see any moose along the way, but I think she was most pleased to see her first glacier.  One of the high points of the 2.5 hours we had before the train came back by, was seeing the glacier calve.  For those of you not in the know, calving is when a piece of the end of the glacier breaks off and falls into the water making a very loud sound like a rifle report at close range and a huge wave.  Of course another high point for me were the four geocaches I was able to find and log while there.

Tomorrow morning I leave for Denali National Park with Aaron, Misty, and Mosely.  I am beside myself with excitement, so stay tuned.

Sue, Conductor, Sister Jane, and Mary

Too often in this world good deeds and positive events are pushed aside in order to discuss and publicize the more negative and sinister side of life.  It seems like the worse a thing is, the more attention it gets while our everyday heros and good deeds go unrecognized.   I’d like to take a moment today to underscore and applaud the actions of a local tire shop called, Wingfoot.  Tires, I realize are on the side of mundane, I mean, who really cares about tires, but I was so pleasantly surprised, I wanted to spread the goodness.

During my many months of research into RV’s prior to purchasing Dora, I learned a thing or two about tires…or at least I thought I did.  The most prominent point was the importance of replacing  RV tires not solely on the basis of the wear on the tread, but on their age as well.  Tires, I learned, should not be used for more than 5-6 years, no matter how many or few miles they had on them due to sidewall deterioration.  Armed with this information, I knew Dora would need new shoes since, although she only had about 14,000 miles on her odometer, she had been wearing the same ones since she came into existence. 

I shopped around town for places who provided commercial truck tires and came up with a few.  Even during my initial calls, Wingfoot stood out among the others due to their seeming genuine interest to help me find what I needed and offering me options to boot.  After some discussion, we decided to special order 6 new tires for Dora at the cost of just under $3000.00, installed.  Well, this was quite some time ago.  Turns out the delivery kept getting delayed and finally was delayed past the point of my first  trip, which is to Denali National Park this coming Sunday, 240 miles away. 

I expressed my concern about taking Dora on the road on her current tires and  Tom promptly suggested I bring her in so he could take a look at her and let me know if it was safe or if I should buy a set of in stock tires before the trip.  Now who knows a tire dealer who would tell a potential customer that her tires are fine just the way they are?  Anybody?  No one?  Well, I don’t either…that is, not until now.  I drove Dora over to Wingfoot, found Tom, and followed him out to conduct the inspection.  After taking a look at all her tires, he stood up and told me I didnt’ need new tires at all.  I couldn’t believe it.  I asked about the hard and fast rule I had learned about not using tires past a certain age no matter what and Tom proceeded to educate me.  This lesson took about 15 minutes and involved looking closely at my tires as well as going around back to look closely at several tires in various states of deterioration.  First he showed me a tire that was far gone as far as side wall cracks go, then a tire with much smaller and fewer cracks, but was still no good, and finally a tire with the smallest of cracks so fine, I would not have noticed them without being shown what to look for.    Not until you see this, he said pointing to the fine hairline cracks on the sidewall, do you need new tires.  (assuming of course the tread is still good)  Tom went on to say, “here’s what we’re gonna do.  I’m going to have Johnny over there give your rig an air service and we’re going to send you on your way.”  I asked about the tires he had special ordered for me and he waved me off saying he’d figure it out.  No cancellation fee.  No restocking fee.  Nothing but a free lesson on recognizing tire deterioration, a free air service, and best wishes for a fun trip to Denali.

Thank you Tom!  That’s $3000 back in the maintenance kitty to be used another day.  If any one finds themselves in Anchorage and in need of commercial truck tires, Wingfoot is your place.

OK.  So even my Mother knows about the winds along the Turnagain Arm.  She knows about them not because  she and I have ever discussed them, but because she follows the USA Today type news and weather of places in which she knows people.   My point being that the winds of the Turnagain Arm are known to folks as far away as the East Coast (at least to USA Today reading folks).  A typical weather forecast in the Anchorage Bowl will 7 times out of 10 mention the winds along Turnagain and the Hillside and you’ll remember that Dora and I are parked up on the Hillside above the Turnagain Arm. 

Listening with half an ear, I seem to remember the local weather forecast yesterday predicting a storm with high winds along Turnagain Arm and the upper elevations, which now includes me.   I think I vaguely remember hearing something about the possibility of winds gusting to 50-60 mph, but really didn’t give it much thought.  I mean, I’m not used to living up here, just hearing about the winds up here and I don’t think I put two and two together until I was in the middle of an F-5.  Not really an F-5, but those of you who have seen the movie, Twister, will get the joke.    So now that I’ve set the stage, I’ll get on with the story. 

While trying to take the dogs out for a walk around the school before heading to bed, I noticed the winds that had been, well, just windy last time I was outside, had picked up substantially.  My first clue to this was the fact that one of the gusts almost knocked me off my feet.  I felt like I was in one of those extreme Chicago street scenes they show on TV with everyone’s umbrellas turning inside out etc.  No wonder Dora had been rocking.  Guess I’ll gather up my poor geranium planter that had blown across the parking lot along with a folding chair and outdoor area rug.  By the way, has anyone seen my table top grill or the table on which it sat for that matter?  Just kidding about the table and grill.  I had the forethought to put them away earlier, but who knows why I didn’t put everything away while I was at it?

After gathering up my outdoor gear and dogs, I made it back inside and pulled the door shut with two hands (literally)  in an effort to keep it from whipping off into the night Wizard of Oz style.   Safely inside, I proceeded to bed as normal, but could hardly concentrate on my book for all the wind buffeting my house.  Of course this made me start thinking about how much wind would it take to actually flip Dora over or even make her move.  Well, since I didn’t know and even if I did know, I didn’t know what to do about it, I thought it a wise move to try to pretend like neither scenario was even a remote possibility. 

Time went by, but I still could not really read or sleep due to the winds outside.  I began picturing mobile home parks after a tornado and thinking about all the money I just spent having one of the awnings reattached to the house and thought maybe I should bring the slides in so the canopies covering them wouldn’t get torn.  I was also wondering if the extra surface area the slides provided would give the wind that extra bit of purchase it needed to have an adverse affect on Dora.   After getting tired of wondering about this, I finally got up and brought both slides in  thinking this would save the canopies and would make us all the more aerodynamic and therefore less likely to be a participant in any surprise and unwanted house relocations.

Back in bed with the winds still howling and gusting high enough to keep me nervous, I started wondering if I should get up and fill all my tanks with water.  Because you know, a gallon of water weighs about 8 lbs, I could add quite a bit of weight with hopes that it would help keep me anchored.  I decided this was silly and finally fell into an on again off again sleep which would last the night.

A friend called me today to ask how I fared during the storm.  Turns out she had been thinking of Dora and me up here in this wide open area with winds she felt would have gusted up to 70-80 mph.   So, my question is, how much wind would it take to make Dora roll over and play dead?  I know her GVWR (gross vehicle weight rating) is 22,000 lbs.  This means that fully loaded with full tanks, stuff, people etc, Dora should not weigh more than that, but I don’t know how much she weighs now nor how to determine how much wind it would take to flip her.  I think I’ve decided that unless I’m in a tornado or hurricane, I’ll be fine.  Who knows if this is true or not, but it makes me feel better to think it.  And one of the great things about living in a home on wheels is that if I find myself in an area where a tornado or hurricane is predicted, I can simply start the engine and make a quick get away.

Eagle River is a community about a half hour north of Anchorage and offers some great hiking and entrances to the Chugach Mountains.  There is a wonderful Nature Center at the end of a 12 mile paved road which follows the North Fork of the Eagle River up into the valley toward Eagle Glacier.  The valley is home to both brown and black bear, beaver, wolverine, moose, and wolf to name a few…not to mention spawning salmon in the later summer months.  In fact, the State maintained trails closest to the river and spawning grounds are closed to pedestrian traffic when the salmon are running due to the high concentration of bears coming to dine.  These closures are for the protection of both the bears and the people.

Joanne (caching handle Meljo) and I headed out for some geocaching fun in Eagle River.  Having arrived at our first destination, we found road construction and associated crew/vehicles (welcome to summer in Alaska) surrounding the pull off that was to be our parking area for the first few caches.  We squeezed in among the trucks and trailers etc and set about gathering our gear and dogs for a trek into the woods and along the river.  A nearby flagman kept an eye on us and when he realized we two middle-aged ladies were about to head off into the woods, he hollered over to us that there had been a brown bear wandering around the area earlier.  Hmmmm.  How long ago, we asked.  About 2 hours, he said.  Well, that bear could be all the way in another valley by now we thought and we’ve got caches to get, so off we set waving thank you to the man who just stared after us with who knows what on his mind.

People trails are non-existent in this particular section of wilderness, so we made lots of noise while bushwhacking from one negligible game trail to the next, bear spray at the ready.  Fortunately for us, we found all three caches we were looking for and saw no bear nor even any evidence of bear…at least not during this portion of our caching day.  Later, on our hike out from the Nature Center, we saw and happened to follow some black bear tracks (they were headed the same way we were), but did not ever see their owner.  It just goes to show you that bears are everywhere here in Alaska.  Just the other day I saw a beautiful black bear cross the street in a heavily populated residential area.

Joanne and I enjoyed several hours of hiking and caching in Eagle River.  Another wonderful day in Alaska.  I’ve included some photos below:  Sitka roses which grow wild all over, a beaver made pond of sorts which is one of many area salmon spawning grounds, and a cast of a brown bear footprint from the Nature Center.  Yes, it is a real cast made from a real and actual foot print.  Note:  the cast is of a Kodiak Brown Bear, so it is quite a bit larger than ones found anywhere but on Kodiak Island.  Goodness, how would you like to run into that bear?  During my three weeks working and hiking on Kodiak  last August, I must say I have never been more bear aware than at that time.  They sure do grow ’em big over there!

Stay tuned.

So last night I let the dogs out for their evening constitution before heading to off bed.  A normal practice around here.  Mosely has taken to ranging a bit far to the south and has been finding “things” in the woods to eat, so I thought I’d keep a loose eye on him in an effort to keep him closer to home.  When I stuck my head out the front door to see where he was, I noticed him a short distance off to the North…standing at attention and starting into the brush/woods.  A sure sign something was there.  Is it a moose?  Is it a bear?  Is it a porcupine?  Any of which could make him act this way and none of which are good choices for a run in.  All I could see were varying shades of green and brown amongst the shadows.  I called to him to come and he let me know he wasn’t at all sure he was going to obey me or interact with whatever was out there.  At the same time I called, they moved and so I saw them.  A small herd of moose were browsing their way through the neighborhood.  Moose usually travel alone or with their offspring, except for in the Fall, so this was a bit unusual.  At any rate, one of the moose was clearly not liking his presence and had her head down, her ears back, and her hackles up.  Now this is a moose you don’t want to mess with, so I called Mosely a second time and he came running. 

 I am lucky that Misty and Mosely learned not to chase moose during our first winter here, 7 years ago.  They chased a moose then, got chased in return, and led the thing right back to Aaron (age 3) and me.  Whew!  Nothing like being stuck in thigh deep snow while  desperately trying to get out of the way and having a moose blow by you with about two feet to spare.  High excitement in AK!

Back to the original story.  After getting Mosely inside, I ran in to grab my camera, but by the time I got back out there, they had moved on and were no longer in sight.  I could hear them, but they had taken themselves deeper into the tall trees.  Since I don’t have shots of those particular moose, I have included a few I’ve taken over the years.  Moose in the yard is certainly not unusual up here.  Two of my friends currently have moose as regular visitors.  They have their babies in backyards, they get into kiddie pools left in yards, and they seem to like sprinklers and swingsets too.  I’ve even seen a photo of one up on someone’s porch looking in the window.  Standing well over 6 ft tall at their shoulders and with heads as big as a child’s bicycle, they make for some fine encounters.  Be sure to check out the baby moose who visited my Census Training Class a month or so ago.  He gave us the pleasure of his company for 15-20 minutes.  Too cute.

Another sunny day in Anchorage.  The plan today was to hike up one of the smaller area mountains called Near Point.  The trailhead is about a 15 minute drive from the nearest Wal-Mart and the peak is about a 2-2 1/2 hour hike from there.  The reason I say its 15 minutes from the nearest Wal-Mart is to illustrate what can be experienced just out of town.  The running  joke is that Anchorage is 15 minutes from Alaska. 

Unfortunately Misty and Mosely are of the age where they are no longer able to hike with me and I couldn’t drum up a friend on short notice, so I hit the trail solo.   Not an uncommon event.  I just whistled every so often, especially when approaching blind corners and noisy water.  To scare off the bears, don’t ya know.  Both black and brown inhabit this area.  Anyway, as I said, it was another sunny albeit hazy day in Anchorage.  The sun is quite strong up here, so lots of sunscreen as well as mosquito repellent were in order.  Not to mention Bear Spray.

I’ll attach some photos below of the view from the top, the view part way up, and some alpine wildflowers (I can’t remember the name and can’t look it up since I sold my Alaska Wildflower book in my garage sale).  There is also a picture of a float plane flying by.  It is unusual to have a plane fly by BELOW you.

2 hours up and an hour back and no bear sightings. 

All morning and since being home, I’ve been listening to NPR which has had ongoing coverage of our men and women in the military both past and present.  Happy Memorial Day.

SWANSON LAKE CANOE TRAILS

What a gorgeous three days we had canoeing and camping on the Swanson Lake Canoe Trails on the Kenai Peninsula.  Sunny.  Blue skies.  Not a cloud to be seen.  Temps in the low to mid 70’s.  Wow!  Our trip took us across 7 of the many lakes  with 1/4 -1/2 mile portages in between and back again.  We had an old-time Old Town canoe which weighed 78 pounds empty and caused us to double portage each time.  Once with the canoe and once again with our stuff.  What a work out, but it was all good as we had no particular plan and all the time in which to do whatever we chose.

Here’s what we saw in addition to the general beauty of the lakes, trees, lily pads, mountains etc:  tons of fish, which made me wish for my sister and brother who both love to fish, nesting Bald Eagles, nesting Trumpeter Swans, loons, and beaver.  Surprisingly, no moose and no bear, not even a blackie.  The mosquitos were non-existent until the last day, which was both amazing and welcome.

What a lovely trip.  My friend Sue and I are thankful for the experience and are looking forward to another adventure….

DUMP STATION MADNESS

I arose this morning back in my new house and had to face the fact that my tanks were full, which meant I could not avoid the DUMP STATION (cue music of the most dire sort) any longer.  Hmmmmm.  Well, I won’t even go into all that happened during my first visit to said station, but suffice it to say, anything and everything that could go wrong did go wrong.  It was decidedly not a pleasant experience.  Goodness gracious. 

I ended up back at the RV dealership where I had to play hide and seek.  I had to seek as they were all hiding from me.  We are at the point where once they see Dora pulling into the lot, they scatter while saying to each other, “It’s your turn to help her.  No it’s not, I helped her last time, it’s your turn.  No it’s not.  I’m outta here!”.  Poor things.  Anyway, I managed to find and lasso one of the service managers to give me a hand which actually involved some minor reconstruction of my sewer system and all turned out well.  I’m off after this to buy some hefty gift certificates to one of the nicer local restaurants for him and his assistant who have consistently helped me with smiles on their faces even though I know they would have prefered to kill me or at the very least, ask me to please take my business elsewhere.

Stay tuned.

Just a quick post to mention my first cookout of the summer.  What fun!  The weather was still stunning and the company was great.   AND, I got to show off Dora again.  I love giving the tour.

In attendance, were 4 humans and 5 dogs.  You’ll notice my Misty-Moo decided not to take part in the picture taking portion of the evening, so I decided to post a photo of her taken down in Homer last summer.

On the menu was:  BBQ chicken,  bell pepper shish ka bobs marinated with olive oil infused with garlic and thyme, a salad of fresh baby greens and summer vegetables, a fresh fruit salad in a watermelon bowl, Hawaiian rolls, and cookies.  What a spread!  Perhaps one of the guests will send in photos of the dishes.  It was definitely a group effort as it was sort of pot luck affair.

Flower was the star of the evening.  An 11 yr old “pet quality” Shelty named after the skunk in Bambi.  She has stolen yet another heart…mine.  Try as I did, I couldn’t talk Becky and Sasha into letting me have her.

I’ll be heading out on my canoe trip on the Swanson Lake Canoe Trails on the Kenai tomorrow morning, so won’t be able to post until my return on Friday.  Since all good things must come things must come to an end, the weather has decided to turn from sun to rain, but remember, there is no such thing as bad weather-just bad clothes, so we proceed as planned.

Stay tuned.