Making like a Tree and Leaving

I thought you would get a kick out of this sign I passed the other day with all the hype about McCain's VP choice. Since his announcement there has been something everyday on the front page of the newspapers about Gov. Sarah Palin and most Alaskans are still divided on her role as a major politician.

After three weeks of straight rain I decided I was ready to leave Alaska. Then miraculously there was a break in the clouds and the sun came out one morning. I took the opportunity to take my bike out for one last farewell ride.

I passed an interesting house that just looked so typical 'Alaska' (complete with large barking dog).

I continued on my bike up Nash Road which winds around the other side of Ressurection Bay. It was interesting to see everything for the first time from the other side.

I had some nice views even though I could see another storm coming. I also passed a big waterfall along the way.

And for a moment before the storms rolled in I remembered again why I love it here.

You can see the fall colors starting to change on the mountain and the air is turning nippy.

My favorite Alaskan wildflower, fireweed, normally looks like this:

But now it is starting to look like this:

However I love that the fireweed continues to give brilliant color to the landscape even as it's dying. It is also edible in the spring, and it is one of the first plants to start breaking down the soil for other plants to grow after a glacier has receded. It makes me want to start singing, "Give Said the Little Fireweed."

And so I say goodbye once again to this great state of Alaska knowing that there is something addicting about it that just may bring me back here in the future.

I'll be back in Utah tomorrow and hopefully I'll be able to pop in and say 'hello' to some of you!

Following Fields and Fjords

This is what Seward has usually looked like this summer. When it does finally clear up and we get a few sunny days (which has been about 1 or 2 days out of 10 rainy ones), I take every opportunity to go outside and do something fun.



This weekend I had a couple of days off so the first day I went out on the Kenai Fjords National Park boat tour. I went out once before in the beginning of the season, but it was cold and most of the mountains were still covered in snow back then. This time it was more beautiful even though it is getting late enough that most of the animals are starting to migrate already. But of course the sea lions are always on their favorite haul-out rocks.






I also saw three whales but my camera was giving me trouble so I didn't get pictures (which is Ok because whales can be difficult to photograph anyway). I always feel a sense of wonder when I see or hear whales. There is something mysterious about them that I feel with every encounter. It's one of the reasons I came back to Alaska. We moved on and went as far as Northwestern Glacier.






It is a pretty active Glacier and we saw lots of big chunks calve into the water.






The vastness, beauty and power of glaciers are other reasons I wanted to see Alaska again. Of course wherever there are many glaciers there must be an icefield feeding them. The Harding Ice field feeds all the glaciers in Kenai Fjords National Park and about 9 miles up the road from where I live is a trailhead to a lookout point over the ice field. So the next day my friend Andrea and I decided to hike the 4 steep miles up to see it.



The views were incredible.

Of course we girls appreciated all kinds of views . . . .

The trail follows Exit Glacier (a piedmont glacier, or one that ends on land) up all the way to the mother source of it's super-compacted ice.

As we got further up the trail other hikers kept warning us that they had seen multipe bears (as many as three different ones) So we kept our eyes open and our granola bars hidden. Sure enough we saw one foraging up on the hill. We watched and waited until it passed behind us.

A little while later I started wondering if we would see any others since other hikers had warned us there would be more. Right when this thought came into my head I looked up and saw a bear eyeing us not far from the trail. It meandered along and went behind a rock out of sight. We waited and waited for it to come into view and never did. So I inched my way up to peek around the rock when Andrea saw it's head pop up in a different place further behind us. We stayed in one place and continued to talk and sing loudly. Eventually it kept going up the snowy mountain.

As we continued on the trail we saw where the bear had crossed in front of us. The paw print is a little bit bigger than my hand, which isn't very big for a bear, but still big enough to rip my face off.

We continued up and made it to the emergency shelter which is just before the Harding Ice Field lookout point. There was something about the place that made me want to light a big bonfire to help Gondor call for aid.

When we finally made it to the lookout there was an amazing view that looked kind of like what Idaho looks like in the winter. But this was August - we weren't in Idaho, and I knew this vast land was the source of all those beautiful glaciers down below.

As we were gazing over the land suddenly two of our rebel friends stopped by to say 'hello.'

Ok well maybe not, but it did remind me of the Hoth system in The Empire Strikes Back.

The views were beautiful again on the way down only we had to keep moving because the sun actually goes down now and we had to make it down before dark.

As we were coming down the path we met a little marmot friend who was not scared of us at all.

And as long as we are on movie themes, this little guy reminded me of something right out of the Kingdom of Narnia.

We made it down the trail with plenty of daylight and went to the restaurant for a big plate of nachos. I'm pretty sure it was the nachos that made my stomach hurt the next day and not from drinking giardia infected glacier water (though I guess that could have done it, too). But I feel fine now even though it's back to raining all day again.

Delightful Denali

Now to continue with the trip I took last week to Denali National Park. This is the view we had the day we took the shuttle bus deeper into the park. The little brown dot on the hill is a bear and there were two cubs with her, although you can't see them in the picture.

It looks like a fuzzy picture but it's not. There was actually a blizzard that day that caused the roads to be closed and all the busses had to turn around and go back. Though one good thing was that in addition to the bears we also saw some foxes on the road that day. But the snow made for a cold and wet beginning to our trip - and there's only one type of dryer when you're camping . . . .

The park employees were good enough to give us another pass to go up the next day since we didn't get to see or do anything. So we waited for the bus to take us once again . . . .
It turned out to be a good thing we went the next day because even the employees said that this day was one of the clearest days of the summer - which meant we had a good chance of seeing Mt. McKinley. Only 20% of the visitors see the mountain.

Some interesting Wikipedia information about the mountain:

Mount McKinley has a larger bulk and rise than Mount Everest. Even though the summit of Everest is about 9,000 feet (2,700 m) higher as measured from sea level, its base sits on the Tibetan Plateau at about 17,000 feet (5,200 m), giving it a real vertical rise of a little more than 12,000 feet (3,700 m). The base of Mount McKinley is roughly a 2,000-foot plateau, giving it an actual rise of 18,000 feet (5,500 m).

The mountain is also characterized by extremely cold weather. A thermometer left exposed at an elevation of 15,000 feet (4,600 m) on Mount McKinley over 19 years recorded a temperature of −100 °F (−73.3 °C) at some point during its exposure. There is also an unusually severe risk of altitude illness for climbers, due to not only its high elevation but also its high latitude. At the equator, a mountain as high as Mount McKinley would have 47% as much oxygen available on its summit as there is at sea level, but because of its latitude, the pressure on the summit of McKinley is even lower (42%).

Mount McKinley is commonly referred to by its native name Denali, which is the name currently recognized by the State of Alaska. When Denali National Park and Preserve was established by the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act, December 2, 1980, the Alaska Board of Geographic Names changed the name of the mountain back to Denali. However, the U.S. Board on Geographic Names maintains the name McKinley, ostensibly to help visitors avoid confusion between the mountain and the park. Use of the name "McKinley" remains common, particularly in the Lower 48; however, Alaskans and mountaineers generally use the name "Denali" to refer both to the park and to the mountain.

The first ascent of the main summit of McKinley came on June 7, 1913 by a party led by Hudson Stuck. The first man to reach the summit was Walter Harper, an Alaska Native. Harry Karstens and Robert Tatum also made the summit. Tatum later commented, "The view from the top of Mount McKinley is like looking out the windows of Heaven!"

The mountain is regularly climbed today, with just over 50% of the expeditions successful, although it is still a dangerous undertaking. By 2003, the mountain had claimed the lives of nearly 100 mountaineers.

I was more than happy to view it from down below. At the bus stop just before the main viewing visitors center the boys decided to get off the bus to go hiking to get a different view of the peak.
I was glad they would get a chance to do a more difficult hike without me slowing them down. I stayed on the bus and went to the new viewing center (opened this past April). I didn't worry about them despite the sign we had seen earlier on the road:
For those who need to get their glasses out to read the sign it says: "Warning - Restricted Wildlife Area - No Hiking Off Road" and the edges are chewed off. I guess it is used as a scratching post for bears. Don't worry, nobody got out to hike in this area. We all got amazing views of the mountain that day . . . .
Oh beautiful for spacious skies . . . . .I also saw some more wildlife on the ride both going and coming.

Caribou grazing . . .

A moose foraging next to the road . . . . Ptarmigan (the state bird of Alaska) . . . . .A bald eagle in a tree (these are common in Seward but not in Denali because they feed on fish) . . . .
We also saw a wolf walking down the road, but I wasn't fast enough with my camera to get a shot of it. It was a good day for seeing things as the tallest mountain in North America faded from view . . .
The next morning we did some shopping and went out to eat after 5 days of eating oatmeal, sandwiches and noodles. I also snuck away to grab a shower at the campground just outside the park. On the drive home I got to be the DJ. We took a little detour through some more mountains and I couldn't help but put on some Lord of the Rings soundtrack as we went over Hatcher Pass . . . .
I could imagine the Riders of Rohan passing through . . . .

All in all it was a beautiful and amazing trip. I was lucky to see so much and have good company. I have one more month here in Alaska and I'm not sure what else I'll be able to see.
Until then, I'll see you further on down the road . . . .