eagle tales

This is one of the many exquisite photos taken by Peter Ashman here in Kodiak. See more of his work here.

I have observed some interesting eagle behavior over the last few days. These up close and personal observations are probably the result of the fact that there are more eagles here then I have ever seen in my life. This spring they have been flocking around town, standing sentry around the canneries and the boat harbors.

Bruce calls this one my "Wyld Amaricah" moment (imagine Bruce doing a Marty Stouffer impression here)...

Last Friday afternoon I had just returned to my desk from lunch when I looked out my window. I saw a juvenile eagle carrying a freshly killed sea gull in his mouth, supporting it with his feet as he flew. He made a landing on the roof of the American Legion building, just across the alleyway from my window, dropping the gull in the process.

The gull plummeted to the ground, hitting the pavement beak first. The eagle started screaming and making a fuss and he was soon joined by three or four other, adult eagles, who accompanied him in his noisy protest. The birds didn't want to fly down to get the gull-it must have been too congested for them in the parking area. A woman then came walking by to enter the Legion, leading her small dog. I prepared myself for the worst, afraid the eagles might swoop down for the dog, but the woman saw the dead gull and hustled her pet inside.

Moments later, a man came out of the Legion with a trash bag. He stomped on the gull's head, making sure it was dead, scooped it up and dropped it in the nearby dumpster. Geez! All of the eagles flew away, except for one straggler who remained, yelling to whomever would listen about the injustice that she had just observed. I sat there with my mouth hanging open as the entire incident unfolded. It was intense.

Then, this morning, driving with Bruce to the airport for his trip to Ouzinkie, we nearly hit an eagle on the highway. As we came around a bend in the road we saw some ravens sitting along the center line. As expected, they flew up out of the way as we approached. I could see some small road kill smeared along the pavement. Just as we were about to drive past the remains,

a eagle dove in for a closer look and Bruce had to swerve onto the shoulder to avoid its giant wings.

Never a dull moment...

Another shot by Peter Ashman.

Spring Travel in AK

Ouzinkie Harbor from the air

Well I am scheduled to travel to the village of Ouzinkie on Tuesday. This will be my first village visit since the extended stay in Akhiok back in December. Although we are facing 50 mph wind gusts this afternoon, the forecast is calling for snow and calm winds (10 - 15 mph) on Tuesday. Tonight I will pack what I hope to be only an "overnight" bag including sleeping bag, pad and one change of underwear. As an added twist, my coworker promised the students in this village that we would bring Taco Bell on our next visit. So tonight Meghan and I will make a "run for the border" to order 30 burritos and perhaps a couple of Double Decker Tacos.
Travel around Alaska has been quite the endeavor this spring. In addition to high winds and blizzards here on Kodiak, the Anchorage area has been dusted with ash from the recent Mt. Redoubt eruptions. The eruptions have cancelled many flights to and from Alaska, not to mention the dozens of cargo flights that use the Ted Stevens International Airport. Today we received word that a teacher and a group of students on a class trip will have to wait in Seattle until Friday before returning to Kodiak due to the massive delays.
And, like clockwork, Redoubt has been sending ash plumes thousands of miles into the atmosphere every third day. I spoke to Ian, a good friend who lives in Anchorage, and he says that when the ash falls it's almost impossible to keep it out of your eyes. Says Ian, "at first it was really cool to see it falling, then after about ten minutes it really sucked."
Hopefully Mother Nature, Brother Wind, and Mister Redoubt cooperate and allow us to return home safely tomorrow afternoon.

Redoubt Rumblings...

The Redoubt ashcloud advances on Homer in this photo by Dennis Anderson in the ADN. Still clear skies here in Kodiak...

Blizzards and Volcanoes

We were under a blizzard warning yesterday afternoon-a total of twenty inches have fallen from this storm! Bruce got a call last night that his office would not be opening, but I still planned to go in to work...at least until we woke up and saw 5 cars stranded in the snow on our road. It's now 4PM and the plows have not made it to Shahafka Circle, yet. The forecast calls for more snow overnight and flood warnings for tomorrow when all this powder starts to melt. At least the Redoubt ash hasn't blown our way!

Bruce and I headed out the front door for a "ski to the sea." It was the first time we've been able to ski out from the house-it felt like life on the farm in Wisconsin!

We made our way around the multitude of stranded vehicles to Island Lake. We skied over the river and through the woods to Fort Abercrombie, which was deserted.

Trail's end.

The road out towards Bell's Flats was closed this morning due to an avalanche. A large shipping container also blew up from the lot where it was sitting and across the road during last night's storm. We ran into a friend on our ski who was working to get shoveled out so that he could head down to the harbor to check on his boat-there were reports of boats sinking in their slips due to the snow accumulation.

Below is a great shot from the Anchorage Daily News. Mount Redoubt erupted 5 times late Sunday/early Monday. Thus far, the prevailing winds have sent the ash fall to the east, well away from Kodiak.

So, if the floods, the snow and the ash don't get us, we might survive springtime in Kodiak!

We've survived our first Alaskan winter!

Winter is behind us now as we move into Spring up here in the Future. We're already enjoying so much light that I'm not sure what we'll do by the time July rolls around and the sun shines late into the evening...midnight sun madness awaits us.

Happy Equinox to all!

(Rebel might be the most excited member of our family to see the return of the sun-it is essential to his daily basking/wienie roast.)

Am feur a thig a-mach sa Mhàrt, thèid e staigh sa Ghiblean.

(The grass that grows in March disappears in April.)

Last night for St. Paddy's Day I went with my red-headed girlfriend, Missy, to the B and B, the

oldest licensed bar in Alaska. Its a tiny old building right on the harbor-always lots of characters. The nice thing about going with Missy is that any folks who are on probation and therefore aren't supposed to be drinking usually get up and walk out when they see her come in. She is the in-court clerk so all the defendants see her when they appear before the judge. Generally, most of the worst clear out and we're usually able to enjoy our libations in relative peace and quiet.

Before we made it to the B, we watched Kodiak's St. Patrick's Day parade make its way through the American Legion parking lot outside our offices. For the past two days we've been enjoying a timely spring blizzard, so I was impressed by these hearty marchers. The parade consisted of about 8 brave individuals, and they carried an Irish flag, the Alaskan flag, a boombox playing Irish fiddle music, and pussywillow branches-apparently as a harbinger of spring. One of the flag bearers tied a sprig of the willow to his flag and hoisted it up to us through the second story window.

After a few toasts with friends I went home and took Rebel for a romp through the snow-we got about 3 inches yesterday and more is falling today-it's beautiful. Then we watched a French film-Il y a longtemps que je t'aime- and ate leftovers. This is the first year I haven't made a corned beef in a very long time.

After only one flight cancelation, Bruce arrived in Anchorage yesterday around noon. He said that all the staff and students at the Anchorage Montessori School remembered him and were excited to see him. He got in trouble in the lower elementary classroom for bouncing a ball-the teacher had to tell him that "they don't bounce the balls." He is going to observe another school today where an upper elementary class is in session, which is what he would teach at AMS-basically middle school aged kids. He said that the students had to come in from recess early yesterday because a moose wandered through the playground, twice.

Busy Weekend

Alexander Andreyevich Baranov

Meghan endured a fairly active week - knitting group, birthday party, dinner and a movie night. Customarily she looks to the weekend for a respite. This weekend, however, provided no such rest. We seemed to be rushing from one engagement to the next. On Friday afternoon we hurried home to walk Reb and headed back downtown for the Grand Reopening of the Baranov Museum. After months of renovation the 200 year-old museum offered a behind-the-scenes look at its collection and a door prize drawing. Later we learned that Meghan's name was called as a winner after we left the museum. We are still waiting to hear from the Museum about her prize. We joined our friends and KHS graduates Rob and Mary Jane at the Museum and dined at Henry's Great Alaskan Restaurant afterward.

Java Flats Restaurant

Saturday morning the alarm clock rang early to wake us for a three hour shift at our good friend Alicia's cafe Java Flats. Meghan covered the register and treated the customers like a seasoned food service veteran. Meanwhile I dusted off the cobwebs and relived my days as a barista. We were happy to help a friend and our boss even let us have a much needed shift meal.

On Sunday the Alaska Avalanche School offered a free eight hour avalanche awareness class. It's been a couple of winters since my Level I avalanche class and the free class here in Kodiak was a great way to refresh my backcountry travel skills and knowledge. The instructors for Sunday's course were quite knowledgeable. Greg Runyan and Nancy Pfieffer, both certified climbing and skiing guides, drew upon their decades of experience in mountains throughout the world to deliver a dynamic look at backcountry travel and rescue techniques. We started the day at the Bayside Fire House, Meghan's "yoga studio," and spent the afternoon in the field practicing avalanche search and rescue strategies.
On Monday it was back to work and tomorrow morning I fly back to Anchorage for another look at the Anchorage Montessori School.

Along the Iditarod Trail: Update

Matt Hayashida of Willow, Alaska drives his team along the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race trail near the Takotna, Alaska checkpoint (3/11).

Day five of mushing brings more news of crashes and scratches along the Iditarod. Norwegian Bjornar Anderson was seriously injured after a crash in a treacherous section of the trail known as the Buffalo Tunnels. Named for the Farewell Burn bison herd that winter in the area, the "Tunnels" sounds like the exact opposite of good dog sledding terrain. In some spots the trail narrows between spruce so thick that only a sled width will slide through. When not guarded by trees, the area opens up to an ice-covered field bumped with frozen tussocks. It would be hard enough to ski through this section let alone mush a sprinting dog team safely across. The Anchorage Daily News reports that Anderson lost control of his sled and was dragged through the unforgiving terrain bouncing from tussock to tree stump. Though the veteran musher thought his health might improve during the mandatory 24 hour rest period, he soon realized that after constant vomitting and other definite signs of internal injuries he would be forced to scratch from the race.
Experts say that after the mandatory 24 hour rest period the field begins to separate. The contenders pull ahead while the novices slide farther back. As for the Colorado mushers, looking at the current standings Tom Thurston is way back in position 54 and Kurt Reich is well behind him. And defending champ Lance Mackey? He is "right where he wants to be" averaging over four MPH with 16 dogs out and holding third place.
Oh, and for you gear heads, I found a blog about riding the Iditarod Trail on a mountain bike - check it out. Just goes to show that if you think that you are doing something hard core, there is someone in AK doing it more to the core.

Hiking with the Queens of Kodiak, Missy and Alicia, near Miller Point on Monday evening...

Along the Iditarod Trail

Defending Iditarod champion Lance Mackey departs the Rainy Pass checkpoint (3/9).

It’s the third day of mushing on the Iditarod Trail and I can’t help but to get caught up in the excitement of the race. The event is a big deal throughout the state. Although Kodiak is more than a thousand miles from the finish line in Nome, our local public radio station, KMXT, broadcasts race updates every morning and afternoon. Born from a diphtheria epidemic, the Iditarod Sled Dog Race signifies a compelling moment in Alaskan history. On February 2^nd 1925 a sled dog team, part of a relay that began in Anchorage, delivered diphtheria serum to Nome. Diphtheria, a contagious respiratory tract illness, took 14,000 lives in the U.S. during the 1920s. In Nome alone nearly 10,000 individuals were threatened by the 1925 outbreak. Earlier, in 1918 a Spanish flu epidemic killed 50% of the Native Alaskan population in Nome. The expected mortality rate of the diphtheria outbreak was estimated near 100%. Winter ice had blocked all shipping traffic to Nome and the board of health rejected a proposal by an Alaskan delegate to fly the necessary antitoxin to Nome. William Fendtriss “Wrong Foot” Thompson, publisher of the Daily Fairbanks News-Miner wrote several scathing editorials about the decision not to fly the serum from Fairbanks to Nome. As the illness spread members of the federal government proposed a second plan to fly serum to Nome from Seattle. The Navy, pilots and Governor Bone rejected the flight plan. For those suffering in Nome the only hope was a relay team of sled dogs and mushers who would brave the 1,000 mile slide across frozen tundra. The -40º temperatures and gale force winds that dropped the mercury to -85º afflicted mushers and sled dogs alike with severe frostbite. Many dogs did not survive their leg of the relay. Through sheer determination the dog sled teams rushed the diphtheria serum to Nome effectively saving the population from a larger epidemic.
Today dogs and mushers race toward Nome for personal glory, though hazards remain. A rookie musher and her team crashed early this morning at a precarious spot on the Iditarod Trail. Read the Anchorage Daily News account of the crash, ensuing bottleneck, and rescue here.
Who's your musher? One might ask. While it's easy to root for a proven champion like Lance Mackey who has amassed a small fortune with his Iditarod winnings, I have to pull for the two Colorado mushers - Kurt Reich from Divide and Tom Thurston from Oak Creek.

fish kiss

Here I am kissing my first halibut-we released this little one back to the sea.

Fish ON

Meghan lifts weights the Kodiak way

"Fish ON!" Our landlord, friend and all around good guy Stan shouts as he runs past me from the cabin of the F/V Buccaneer to the starboard trawl line. Before I have time to gather my senses Stan hands me the pole and impels me to "reel 'em in." As I take the pole it is immediately pulled by a very strong force down toward the sea. The downward force is a large king salmon. Soon Meg and skipper John are at the stern shouting commands and encouragement. Later, John will compare learning to fish with a king salmon on the line to learning to shoot a rifle while in battle. The commands I am able to understand instruct me to keep constant tension on the line and keep reeling. After what seems like minutes of fighting my left forearm, holding the pole, soon reaches a threshold of fatigue and I am forced to focus on the water, my feet on the deck, anything to relieve the thought that I might not be able to hold on much longer. The fish rises and dives several times before offering himself to the surface. A large net will lift him from the icy blue North Pacific to the ship's white deck. Seconds later our next catch is netted, an equally magnificent king salmon, and dropped on deck. Within moments after a couple of hours of trawling in Mormot Bay near Kodiak we've caught to two king salmon weighing a combined 55 lbs.

Pacific grey cod; man

Reeling from the success of our salmon haul, Stan and the Skipper decide to drop anchor and retool to hook halibut. Soon the tide levels out, good for fishing we are told, and the Buccaneer brings us another round of luck. Off the port side Skipper John soon hooks a few halibut and flounder. We keep the largest halibut and Meghan gets to kiss her first flatfish, a local tradition. After watching skipper John's success I reel in my line to check the bait. Sure enough a lucky halibut has bitten off the tail end of the herring on my hook and escaped unscathed. I string another herring to the hook and soon feel a tug. Stan and the Skipper instruct me to "reel 'em in slowly." Pulling the line from a depth of 140 ft. a Pacific grey cod soon presents himself to the surface. After 4 hours at sea we sailed back to port with two king salmon, cod, halibut, and a experience we will not soon forget.

Back to harbor

Low Tide

After work today Meghan practiced yoga while Reb and I took a hike around Fort Abercrombie State Park. Although we've hiked in the park dozens of times, we found our way to the shoreline about an hour after low tide. The receded water level revealed new colors and points of view. Rebel and I were able to step out past our usual paths to climb beneath cliffs often guarded by cold surf. A result of the sun, moon and earth's rotation, tides are stronger during the new and full phases of the moon when the sun, earth and moon line up to form a syzygy. As you can see from the image below the moon is in the waxing gibbous phase on its way to full on Tuesday. As the days grow longer we can feel our energy levels increase and the urge to explore seems to strengthen daily. At 11 hours and 4 minutes of daylight, we have gained 2 hours of light in the last month. For an individual who is constantly amazed by the power of natural forces, living in Alaska is like living in playground.

Ptarmigan Convert

Last night we joined the Saltonstalls and some of their lovely friends for dinner. We had a delicous meal and enjoyed great conversation. The entertainment for the evening was provided by CeCe, Nora and Stuart, stars of the Young Players Theater Company and Bruce was happy to get in on some of the action.

The dinner menu included ptarmigan, a bird that I had never eaten before. It was so tasty-many compliments to the chef!

Resolution Mt. from the Fowler-Hilliard Hut

I have seen ptarmigan on several occasions while hiking-the most memorable sighting took

place during the forced death march outside of Aspen, under the auspices of a hut trip. I remember feeling ready to collapse into the snow after climbing yet another mountain in my nordic skis, continuously breaking through the crust, when, suddenly, the snow screen lifted momentarily and a ptarmigan appeared. It was quite a vision, let me tell you, and I think the bird leant me its strength to finish the hike and to find the hut. The GPS that a friend was carrying didn't hurt, either.

My friend Shelley and I saw some ptarmigan on our climb up Pyramid last fall.

We were excited by our encounter with Kodiak's wildlife. On our hike back down the mountain, we ran into a man who was making his way up to do a little ptarmigan hunting-we suspected his hunt was successful. The circle of life...

Anchorage Hop

In preparation for our move to Anchorage in August I have been applying for jobs like mad from Kodiak. Most of the positions have held telephone interviews with me. One employer, after conducting a telephone interview, decided to fly me over to Anchorage for a tour of their school and a second interview. I jumped at the chance for a "free ride" over to the mainland and packed my skis.

Halfway down the North Face looking into the Turnagain Arm

After the interview on Thursday I headed down to Alyeska Ski Resort on Friday. Clear and sunny, Alyeska offered pockets of soft snow, splendid views and no lift lines. Perhaps the best skiing was off the High Traverse and North Face - nice and steep. It will be nice to have a place to ski next year even when the avalanche conditions in the backcountry are hazardous.

A moose wanders through the parking lot of Ian and Sammy's building.

While in Anchorage I stayed with Ian - a friend whom I have known since middle school. Ian and his girlfriend Sammy are teachers who moved up to Alaska from Colorado a week before Meghan and me. We swapped "new to Alaska" stories, shared photos and dined at the Bear Tooth (Meghan's favorite).

Following Ian through Kincaid snow

Saturday: snow, lots of snow. Ian and I drove to Kincaid Park to nordic ski. Part of me wishes that I could have been at Alyeska shredding the 8" of new snow. Then again, I enjoyed the peaceful meditation of sliding through the woods on Kincaid Park's miles of nordic ski trails. Kincaid, the city's largest park, offers lit and groomed nordic ski trails surrounded by birch and spruce trees - Meghan will love it. Often a great place to spot moose, Ian and I only saw white on our 2.5 hour ski. Funny thing about Anchorage, sometimes the wild is right out your door.