Alaska – Page 2 – Travels with Billie

Just a Moment

Sometimes an amazing moment happens so quietly, unnoticed by most. This was one of those moments. The photo isn’t one of my best, but it captures something special so I’m going to include it here anyway.

The other morning I was leaving our housing to walk across the street to have breakfast at our larger facility, which houses our Employee Dining Room. Because it was early in the morning, no one was about, and I was focused on starting my work day.

I walked out the front door and onto the deck, which is only about 10 feet deep. I nearly walked right across and down the steps, but thankfully I noticed the moose that was standing right next to the stairs. I didn’t see her at first because there is a railing there and it blocked most of my view of her. I say thankfully, because moose, particularly females, can be very aggressive. You really don’t want to get into an argument with a creature who weighs over 1000 pounds, no matter how docile they might seem to the casual observer.

She was just standing there quietly, not moving, until I came out the door. She lifted her huge head and looked at me, standing only ten feet away. I was so astonished I just stood there and stared at her. It wasn’t until she started to casually stroll away that I came to my senses and started frantically digging for my iPhone to take a picture.

She walked across the parking lot, across the street, into the parking lot of the bar/restaurant across the street, and disappeared into the woods behind the bar. No one else was around, she didn’t run, she just slowly ambled away and into the woods. I stood there for several minutes looking at the place where she vanished into the trees, and finally walked across the street to breakfast. It was almost like it never happened. Almost.

What a Great Weekend!

This is what I’ve been waiting for since I arrived two months ago…

I finally got to take the shuttle into Denali Park on Saturday. I rode to the Eielson Visitor Center, and saw my first grizzly of the season. Actually, the tally was 31 Dall sheep, four grizzlies, 14 caribou, six moose, and three ptarmigan. None of our encounters was extraordinary…no bears walking down the middle of the road, no baby moose, and no view of the Mountain (Denali, for the uninitiated). But the landscape continues to call to me, the sheer joy of being in a land untroubled by modern civilization.

Well, there was one bear reasonably close, and since it was my first good look for the season, I’ll take it.

The plan for Sunday was to relax, do laundry, and maybe venture over to the Park entrance to hike to Horseshoe Lake. It’s an easy hike, under a mile, with a pretty lake with beavers and other wildlife (including the gigantic Alaskan Mosquito). Somehow I never made it. My friend Diane convinced me to do the hike early instead of later, so we started out toward the Park only to be waylaid by a moose and twin babies. Of course we had to stop and take lots of photos.

Finally, off to Horseshoe. We got about halfway in to the lake when Diane spotted an owl having a disagreement with a raven. It seems the raven had its eye on the owl’s nest; whether it was for baby owls or eggs we don’t know. We spent a good deal of time watching the drama unfold, and at one point the raven came right to the owl’s nest, who proceeded to spread her wings and cover the nest to keep the raven out.

Pretty amazing day, right? Well, we never got to Horseshoe Lake. We got a call telling us we could take a glacier landing flight if we could get back to the lodge in a half hour. So we hustled back, always within the speed limit, of course. The weather was beautiful, but I was worried that I was in a t-shirt with no jacket, heading up to Ruth Glacier on Denali. I needn’t have worried. I was so excited, and the weather was so beautiful, I never noticed the chill.

This was a bit of my personal history coming back to me. When we landed, the pilot pointed out a building that belonged to the famous bush pilot, Don Sheldon. Many years ago when I was just a child, Don was in my mother’s restaurant and tried to talk her into letting him fly me up to the glacier. Mom’s reaction was mostly along the lines of “Are you kidding me? I’m not letting you take my 9-year-old up to land on a piece of ice!” Of course, I was doing every bit of wheedling I knew to get her to let me go, but no dice. So, Mom, wherever you are up there, I finally got to go!

This is why I come back to Alaska in the summer. Why I actually work when I’m supposedly retired. Because you never know what you might see around the next corner.

I Spoke Too Soon

I guess I got a tad overconfident about the weather when I posted last weekend. It seemed like Spring. It felt like Spring. But Mother Nature had other plans.

Beginning early yesterday morning, we got hit with a major snowstorm that is just now finally moving on to bother someone else. When you’re in a business that’s involved in transporting vacationers and giving them a wonderful experience, a snowstorm is a BIG DEAL. All we could say was “Welcome to Alaska!”

My hopes of driving into Denali National Park today were dashed, so instead I’ve spent most of the day watching movies. I’m figuring that no self-respecting grizzly would be out wandering around in a blizzard anyway, and even if he was I wouldn’t be able to see him! I did go out and clear about eight inches of wet, heavy snow and ice off the car I leased for the season. There wasn’t an ice scraper or snow brush in the car-it was only for the summer, after all.

I’m holding on to great hopes that I might get into the park tomorrow, which is the last day cars are allowed to drive beyond Savage River. With the snow it’s likely I won’t get beyond Savage anyway, but it’s worth checking, anyway.

Alaska has a long-standing tradition called the Nenana Ice Classic. It started in 1917, probably by people who were suffering from cabin fever and needed something to do. Why not bet on Spring? Besides, Alaskans will bet on almost anything. So every year a tripod is set up on the ice on the Tanana River, in the town of Nenana, south of Fairbanks. When the tripod falls over, breakup is official. People buy tickets and make their guess on when the ice will go out. Last year the winner received $350,000. The latest the ice has ever gone out was May 20, 1964, the same week I graduated from high school in Anchorage. I remember it being a cold spring-I wore a heavy coat over my graduation gown because it was so cold. It looks like this year might set a new record. On May 6 the ice was still 40 inches thick. That was the last measurement, because the ice starts to get soft and it isn’t safe to go out on the river. With the very cold weather we’ve been having, I somehow think that ice hasn’t deteriorated all that much in the last couple of weeks. I’ll keep checking and let you know when the ice goes out. I;m ready for it right now!

I always try to live in the moment and enjoy whatever comes, especially in Alaska. There is so much beauty here, and the many seasons and types of weather make it a constantly changing picture. But I’ve been here now for seven weeks of winter. Seriously, I’m ready for summer.

Spring Is Late This Year

According to the TV weather, this was the third coldest April in interior Alaska since they started keeping records. Of course, this had to be the year I spent April in Denali. It got to the point where every morning my coworkers would wander into the dining area, look out the window, and moan “Oh, no, more snow!” As our maintenance crew was working to haul away the snowbanks on the hotel property, more was falling to take its place. This was the view of Healy on the first of May. Oh, the building in the middle? That’s our grocery store! The Stampede, where I’ll live for the season, looks like a perfect winter scene.

Once the snow started melting, it began to freeze at night, making walking treacherous. We were required to wear studded snow tires on our boots to help prevent falls.

The good news is that Spring did eventually come. In just two weeks’ time most of the snow has melted (with some stubborn snowbanks still creating mud as they melt away). After living in Arizona for so many years I thought I had completely acclimated to the warm country, but when it hit the upper forties here I found it wonderfully mild!

Baby, It’s Cold Outside!

Baby, It's Cold Outside!

Arriving in Denali early meant coming to the Interior of Alaska while it’s still in the grip of Winter. While the rest of the country experiences Spring, what Alaskans look forward to is Breakup. It means the snow is melting, the ice is turning to puddles (or lakes…or rivers…) and there is mud everywhere. Unfortunately, we’re told by the TV weather people that this is the coldest April in the Interior since 1927. I believe it.

Northern Lights

When it comes to the Aurora Borealis in Alaska right now, there’s good news and there’s bad news. The good news is that it’s still winter in Alaska. That means it actually gets dark so you can see them. The bad news is that it’s still winter in Alaska. Which means that while you stand outside in awe, the cold seeps into your hands, your toes, and eventually every part of your body.

Thanks to a sun event, the likelihood of seeing the Northern Lights has been high the last couple of days. I set my alarm and crawled out of bed at 1 AM and bundled up to venture outside and check on the show.

The sky in Healy, if you get far enough away from the lights around our building, is an inky black velvet with glitter scattered across it. When the lights are mild, the sky turns into black silk, with a sheen across it that can be mistaken for light clouds. But on a good night you can see ribbons of light, dancing and changing, moving as you watch. Last night I didn’t get to see the rarer red lights, but they were white ribbons, silent and beautiful. I stood outside for about an hour, and at the end the lights faded to that cloudy look. I kept hoping they might return, but the cold finally chased me inside. Well, the cold and the dark figure I heard approaching on the road. It was too dark to make out what it was, but moose are known to travel on the road just like we do. I began to make my way back to our housing, and was happy when the figure, approaching fast, turned out to be a fellow worker who was out enjoying the lights.

Soon the nights will begin to shorten to the point where we won’t see dark again until September, and seeing the northern lights won’t be possible. So I guess standing outside in the cold in the middle of the night is worth it right now.

A New Year in Denali

I arrived back in Denali on April 3 this year. I’m hoping to do a better job of blogging the summer this year; I finally gave up last year after struggling with the Internet service. The good news is that my Internet connection is working MUCH better this year.

We drove up from Anchorage on a beautiful sunny day in the 40s, and The Mountain (Denali) was out in all her glory. So I was thinking, “Great! Breakup is upon us and Spring is here!” Wrong. The next day it started snowing and continued for a couple of days, with the temperature dipping into the -20s every night. Yesterday we woke to no water and no heat, but that was fixed very quickly. The first day I worked in my office it was 55 degrees in the room, but fortunately Maintenance found a space heater for me and that made it very comfortable. It’s been a long time since I’ve been in weather this cold, and I’m starting to relearn some things I forgot: ALWAYS wear your hat and gloves, don’t bother with earrings because they’re pretty cold in subzero weather, walk carefully because there’s ice under that snow.

It’s a small crew up here getting ready for the season, but it’s growing almost every day. We’re all stuffed into the Stampede housing until they open up the other building, so it’s starting to get a bit crowded. We have a great group of people working together here, so I’m really looking forward to the season.

My only wildlife sighting so far has been a huge eagle feasting on a baby moose carcass. The biggest eagle I’ve ever seen! There were several ravens standing by, but none of them seemed interested in challenging the eagle for a meal.

This is the scene behind the main lodge of the Denali Princess Wilderness Lodge. It looks a lot different now than what our guests will be seeing this summer.

Fireweed

As a child living in Alaska, I remember seeing Fireweed everywhere during the summer. It grows wild and loves areas that have been newly cleared or burned. Since most of the populated areas of Alaska were newly cleared when I was growing up, there was a lot of it.

This summer, living in Denali has given me the opportunity to get reaquainted with my old pal Fireweed. It seems as though there was none in evidence just a couple of weeks ago, and suddenly it’s everywhere, two feet tall already.

As wonderful as the Fireweed is, there’s a sad side to it. You see, Fireweed blooms from the bottom up. All Alaskans know that once it reaches its full glory, with the blooms going all the way to the top, it tells us the first frost is nearly due and winter isn’t far behind.

That’s OK, Fireweed, I’m glad you’re here anyway. You make me smile every day.

Silence Is Golden

Mountain Rainbow — This was my reward for hiking on the top of a mountain in Alaska.

One thing I’ve always enjoyed about the wilderness is the silence. Well, the wilderness isn’t really silent. But it’s quiet.

There are few places you can go in this country today where you can hear nothing but the sounds of the wild. Even most of our national parks ring with the cacophony of cars, trucks, people, airplanes, and all the other sounds of civilization. But there are rare times when I’ve been able to find that corner of quiet, where the only sound is the wind, the water, the birds.

Last weekend I had the privilege of going on a heli-hike. One of those noisemakers, a helicopter, took a group of eight of us to the top of a mountain and dropped us off for a three-hour hike through the high tundra. For a number of reasons, it was an experience I’ll cherish all my life. One of those reasons was the silence.

Yes, there were eight of us. But all were lovers of the outdoors, and the conversation focused on the experience we were sharing. There were also some opportunities to walk up over a ridge and find a few quiet minutes. The wind carried away the other voices, and the only sounds were those made by Nature herself. Definition of magical: one of those moments when the world seems to expand, when you can look around you and feel a part of something greater than yourself.

I stood at the top of a mountain and looked across the valley, two mountains tied together by a rainbow. I could hear a bird calling, and the wind murmured back. The ground was soft under my boots, a cushion of tundra decorated with tiny alpine flowers. Yes, magical.

Trains

Living in Denali has brought me back to a memory of my childhood. I grew up in both Alaska and Montana. Please don’t ask me how much time I spent in each-I’m getting old and having trouble remembering what I did yesterday, let alone what happened fifty to sixty years ago. The bare bones are that I was born in Montana and first went to Alaska when I was six. From then until my Junior year of high school, where I lived depended on what stage of marriage my mother was in. I did spend my last two years of high school in Anchorage, and graduated from there. But I attend the Cut Bank, Montana high school reunions. Go figure. But I digress.

Growing up in Montana, I grew itchy feet early on. Inherited from my much-married mother, I suspect. We lived in a house on the edge of town overlooking the railroad trestle off in the distance. I spent many hours sitting in front of the big picture window watching the trains go by. I’d count the cars in the long trains pulling the oil tankers from the refinery outside of town. And I’d watch the Empire Builder, wondering where the people on board were going. Were they headed to Chicago? To Seattle? Somewhere even farther and more exotic? Like Minneapolis? (I was a kid. My geography wasn’t always accurate.)

So that’s a long intro to the trains of Denali. I’m again living in a place where I can see the trains go by-now they are Alaska Railroad trains and the river is the Nenana River. And my bedroom is situated so I can hear them rumble by. Those trains are the lifeblood of this area. They bring the guests for the hotels and the National Park, and they carry the coal from the coal mine in Healy. The trains during the day are the people movers, and at night the coal train starts its trek to the coast for shipment. I can lie in bed at night and hear the train rumble by, sometimes for a long time-lots of coal going somewhere. At first it was a little disconcerting, but then I started remembering the trains of Montana. Now I can listen to the rumble and know how lucky I am. Now I’m in one of those exotic places I wanted to go.