Hot Dice, Cold Bets

I was assisted with my second major auto dig-out today, which was nice as the most recent snow dump was heavy.  Temps soared up to +32F, generating lots of powder, which was good for skiing but calamitous for tourists hoping to see the aurora.  The three questions I never want to hear again are: Do you have wifi? When will we see the aurora? Is the hot water free?

We do not have wifi.  You will see the aurora when it is good and goddamn ready to be seen, which is not when it is snowing.  And there is a sign directly above the hot water spigot that proclaims "HOT WATER - $2.95."

Maybe I'm just a little salty ending a seven-day workweek with hosting, after the actually-more-fun annual kitchen deep clean and awkwardly being filmed for Japanese TV.  Luckily my weekend aligned with the solstice, and we combined Silent Dance Party with Craps Night.  The backstory is, when covid first hit, things shut down and the coworkers here used the extra time to build a craps table and play a bunch so they could travel together to Vegas and win big when things reopened.  We brought out the table and I was given some vague and bewildering explanations; there was excited shouting and nickels and quarters won and lost all around.  And then the true kindred spirits pranced and spun and kicked and swam through the waist-deep snow, jamming out quietly under the stars to help pull the sun back in our direction.

After first accidentally throwing the dice in Derrick's face, I redeemed myself by rolling for over an hour.

Pretty colors the last clear day.

Delightful moody blue light.

Powder Blue

Krista came through with room breakfast and story time this weekend.  We had a floor picnic of eggs and bacon and hashbrowns and yogurt and fruit and giant pancake, then read aloud from classics and new literary delights, like "We Found a Hat" and "This Is Not My Hat."  It was lovely to stay inside and sit around in pajamas for hours.  Otherwise, I have been getting after it -- skiing every other day, re-breaking the trail after 18" of snow, miring in the woods where it's thigh-deep, farcically crashing through thin ice coating a huge culvert, even...rowing along to Ke$ha in the gym.

The days have narrowed to the extent that it's dusk when I wake up at 11:30am and nighttime at 4pm.  The beautiful blueish light of the muted half-tone landscape, the subtle pinkish-peach airbrushed hillsides when clouds part, and the snow's seeming luminescence meld into an alluring, mellow palette.  Soon we'll reach the nadir, and again the light will grow; but for a time we pause, becalmed in the quiet cold.

Other Claire mushing while Dan breaks ahead

Ptarmigan(?) tracks by the river  

Got the Honda free again.

The Sun's Gonna Shine Again

It's hard for me to remember things as a server such as who ordered Diet Coke because I don't give a shit.  I'm oddly fascinated by this lack of attention to detail as Editor Claire was formerly so invested in the proper employment of punctuation, page layout, and index development.  I'm trying to perfect my technique handling biscuit and potato roll dough, and I clean with adequate enthusiasm -- but my hosting/serving is mediocre at best.

There are many diverting things crowding my brain and reducing its interest in recording whose burger gets tomatoes on it.  The river steamed mythically for a few days as it iced over; the sun crept lower and disappeared below the horizon for the next two months; moonglow lit the trail for night skiing; a horde of dogs whipped our sled over the tundra; Cleo and I gossiped over a glass of wine in the ladies' bathroom; I transformed butter reserves into 500 cookies; and a bush plane carried off my favorite bike hobo.

No more polar bear plunge access.

See you somewhere soon, comrade!

Doggies pulling like beasts.

Wintopia

After a few flirtations with hypothermia last year, I committed to always taking extra layers skiing.  A couple days ago, we finally plunged down to proper winter temps; -1F isn't too bad for these parts, but somehow every ten minutes I went from toasty to chilled and back, resulting in a slow-motion fashion show, pulling on and peeling off to briefly parade assorted tops and gloves.  Today I achieved a dual-shirt equilibrium and was able to enjoy the view through unfrosted glasses the whole time.

Biking is a beast of a different kind.  We have a small fleet of fat-tires to grind through powder.  Churning over sand dune-like hills calls for, unfortunately, the opposite of the technique of standing for extra leverage on single-speed trash bikes that I've been honing over the last decade or two.  I'm learning to quell that instinct, downshift, and keep my butt in the seat for adequate traction.

A lot of tourists ask (incredulously) what draws us to live and work here, particularly when buffeted by wind on cold dark nights awaiting the aurora.  When I say there's good skiing, it's both an honest and deflective answer.  I'll flip your burgers and wash your plates but I won't try to explain what Thoreau so aptly wrote: "The snow lying deep on the earth dotted with young pines and the very slope of the hill on which my house is placed, seemed to say, Forward!"

shared moose path

Krista pet all of Dan's dogs that day while I stayed just beyond chain's reach.

Dalton Drive II

The distance from Coldfoot to Anchorage is the same as from Detroit to New York City.  A long drive, but significantly less than the 4,000+ miles from Michigan to Alaska.  I don't need a car for the winter, but I really want one for next summer.  So my dad identified some promising wheels in Anchorage; I choked back the bile that accompanies purchases over $200 and commitments longer than six months, and drove a big chunk of the latitudinal distance of this big ol' state. (Thankfully, with a pause in the middle courtesy of my Fairbanks friend, whose cute cat and myriad assortment of tea did much to dispelled the town's dingy dreariness.)

I'm settled back in at Coldfoot, treading the (very) well-worn floors, dancing between the fryer and flattop and fridges, chanting to myself the components of breakfast plates and burger orders.  And I'm hosting/serving, so awkwardly hunting and pecking around the computer screen for the button that adds chicken tenders to customers' salads and inventing the extra charge based on how amiable they are.

My two favorite truckers remembered me, which was nice.  I'd put them both at about late 50s, though its hard to tell with weathered faces.  One remarked on an uncharacteristically southern herd of caribou I'd seen on the drive up, noting it's been over twenty years since they'd chomped trough their favorite lichen all the way down to Livengood.  Maybe on the next clear day I'll drive a bit to see if I can spot them again.

The cafe has its tables back this year.

It's still in the 30s and Slate Creek is barely beginning to freeze over.

The season ends with Lego Batman and lots of lox

In a normal year the lodge becomes The Cottonwood Club: for one night as many of the company staff as possible crowd into camp to dance, drink, and play ping pong.  Cocktail attire and eccentric outfits are strongly encouraged, and dedicated attendees coordinate multiple costume changes.  Because of covid, the remaining ten or so of us turned the evening into a tent-pub crawl: in festive garments, our happy mob traipsed from tent to tent for a beverage and a surprise.  We drank grape-juice mimosas and watched anime; sipped Dark & Stormys while learning our love languages; fired off postcards to our future selves with hard spicy kombucha; scribbled poetry with watermelon gin; played Pass the Face, contorting our expressions 'round the room with rummy ice cream; performed an impromptu talent show with red wine + Coke; and stuffed our mouths with marshmallows after hot chocolate with whiskey.  And after all that, tipsy ping pong to keep up tradition.

The next day we moved out of our tents, cleaned up a bit, and read and dozed in the woodfire-warm lodge.  A feeling of slack tide prevailed -- sated from a full summer, we paused before a long exhale, then departure, flowing outward in disparate directions.  Clean up, put away, talk over the season now passed, last hike, last kayak, last dinner, goodbye.

September is a transitional month.  Already the Chugash mountaintops had frosted over.  Back in Michigan it has been beach-summery and chill-rainy and in between.  I'm glad that when I get to Coldfoot it will be definitively winter, the drear death of autumn already mercifully cloaked by snow.

great wig on a great boss

I still like you even if you barely work, Stove.

TWO 'bows

Courtesy of Trevor and Kait's loan of a perfectly equipped VW Westfalia camper van, and the friendly Berkeley family that adopted me for a weekend, inviting me to hike, kayak, cook and eat with them on Tutka Bay.

lake girl

By the shores of woodsy lakes: I grew up.  I learned to swim.  I learned to paddle and row.  I learned to fish (a bit).  I sang and talked to myself.  I played with frogs and toads and pollywogs and minnows and shells and rocks.  I splashed and dove with friends and theorized about people and the future.  I made out with boyfriends.  I read, and walk, and watch sunsets and fireworks.  I said yes, and I honeymooned.  I visited the Transcendentalist's cabin.  I thought there was still a way; I knew all was lost.  I enjoy the sun-sparkles reflecting off the water.  I try to absorb good engineers' advice.  I washed off the sweat from tramping.  I got a long-awaited hug.  I stare at the light, the dark, the stars, the moon, the shadowy branches and boughs that fringe the sky and the lake, connecting the liquid realm below with the boundless blue above.

Skilak Lake on a shifty morning.

Is it another kind of biscuit?

The zombie fish arrived about two weeks ago.  These are salmon on their last legs, exhausted and physically deteriorating, with white leprous patches and milky eyes.  They swim lazily near the surface, often with dorsal fins cutting above the water like sharks.  Their resounding smack! as they catch a final snack in our silty water punctuates all hours, day and night.  Occasionally, one will porpoise, leaping repeatedly for a hundred feet, as though the frantic spasms will propel them up an imaginary waterfall.  Eventually some wash up on shore, an easy meal for the eagles, ravens, seagulls, and bears.

Us humans gleefully tucked into the spoils of a successful day in the kitchen for me, with buttermilk biscuits, super fudgy brownies, and frozen custard.  We don't have electricity to spare for an ice cream machine, but a memory percolated through my brain of, I think, my 25th birthday, recreating at home the then-novelty of Shake Shack's "concrete" dessert.  This batch was quite nice, and true to its name required slicing with a knife.

And to round out the week, I finally accomplished my solo bear-country backcountry camp out.  Happily, nothing attacked me or went amiss, but I did writhe around, heart pounding, when coyotes called to each other and particularly loud fish-plops made me fear a curious moose was approaching my tent.  Perched on a gravel bar where the glacial outwash meets the lake, I felt as vulnerable and resigned as when I had to pass the night in a rural Italian train station my first time alone in a foreign country.  This time, my transport was ready early, and the toilet paper was free.

Past his prime.

Gray but calm; my trusty paddler at rest in the muck.

Fun Time Days

Summer is chugging along, with autumn nipping at its heels.  We had Christmas in July, with almost all of us in the staff lounge opening thoughtful, artistic, funny homemade presents.  Another developing tradition, a couple of us have been quietly stoking the sauna some evenings to enjoy post-dinner roasting, accompanied by lake relief dips on now-awkwardly slimy rocks, as the lake level and sunshine are optimized for algae.

Last weekend, some extra days off (aka fun time days, aka adventure opportunity days) aligned with a friend visiting, and we drove north a few hours to an absurdly scenic hike.  Gold Mint Hut at Hatcher Pass transported us to New Zealand: classic u-shaped glacial valley, countless clear creeks to quench your thirst, craggy alpine peaks with giant granite boulders at their feet...!  We walked miles alongside a river, hillsides slathered with wildflowers -- violet monk's hood, magenta fireweed, tall nodding grasses.  Who knew all that fresh air could make five-day-old grilled hot dogs taste so good?

And since it was my birthday, later we had some grocery store cheesecake in the Hope Point trailhead parking lot.  Later, when we finally came back home to the lodge, it was windy and cool, I was dirty and damp, there was a pleasant surprise.  Years ago, dozens of times, Matt and I returned from long days sailing to his mom's pasta sauce and meatballs.  It's distinctly satisfying and comforting to come in from the glorious and exhausting ocean salt and sand and sit down to a giant pot of food made by a loving Italian woman.  So I was really pleased that upon my return a nice little staff dinner was waiting, of spaghetti and meatballs with homemade sauce.

Maybe the cutest hut in this hemisphere.

Krista contemplates

The Food

Some, uh, interesting plates have gone out on my dinner nights.  If you ever wanted to be transported to a mid-90s Better Homes & Gardens dinner party that is either Brought to You By the Color Mauve or subtly revealing of a personality disorder, welcome, sit right down.  It will all taste good (really!) -- even if I awkwardly describe the salad as being tossed with homemade pickle-liquid dressing.  Somehow, duck night is so very purple: cherry-red-wine sauce, cabbage or roasted cauliflower, fingerling potatoes...some force swallows light frequencies throughout the visible spectrum, leaving only shades of violet.  "Middleterranean" night is vibrant yet dingy (perhaps an irrepressible manifestation of the region's sociopolitics?) with chalky tapenade and flecks of spice all over.  Italian night is a brilliant frenzy of color, culminating in a dessert composed with fine-dining precision.

Are things too brown, too beige?  Sprinkle some paprika.  Yes, even on chocolate cake.  All the eggplant mushy and discolored?  Roast or grill the shit out of it, saving the skin to chop into tiny squares you can caramelize and sprinkle like confetti.  Some stuff looks pretty nice.  Thinly-sliced radish makes the salads elegant, and grilled pork tenderloin is just classic.

And then there's breakfast.  Ahhh, my chance to have total order and replicability.  The symmetry of rows of pancakes on platters, the grace and harmony of simple things done well.  Because no garnish or sauce or special treatment can improve upon a pile of crispy bacon.  And for a while, on clear days, that's when the sun shines in the kitchen windows.

I derive an inordinate amount of happiness from this lemon tart + shortbread cookie + lemon curd + brie.

EAT YOUR COLORS

It's a good thing.

The Wind in the Alders

I'm not usually one for "doing the voices" -- maybe a bit higher or lower tone depending on age and sex, clipped and precise or drawling.  I'm sure my nephew would enjoy goofier interpretations when I read to him, and luckily the characters were vivid enough on their own when Matt and I read to each other.  But of late I've been inspired by two of my day-off buddies to amp things up a bit.  Their creative accents and tones so bring to life "The Incorrigible Children of Ashton Place" and "Skunk and Badger" that I'm following suit. From within a tent we put on quite a performance for anyone in the vicinity of Kayak Beach on Kachemak Bay the other night.

We started reading aloud a couple weeks ago when, after dinner dishes and work was done but it was a bit early for bed, several of us gathered of an evening.  This past weekend we had extra days off, and three of us journeyed in storybook fashion to a storybook land: a boat ride, a short drive, a long drive, another boat ride, to Grace Ridge trailhead at the far end of a fjord, in misty, densely wooded mountains.  Past towering stands of devil's club and cow's parsnip; along a steep and muddy path; traversing a land now lush with ferns, now low mossy tundra; filling the air with varied cries to warn bears of our presence as we encountered alarmingly frequent and fresh piles of poop; we ascended to a hollow just shy of the summit and set up camp among the clouds.

It was very beautiful.  Some patches of snow provided drinking water, and intermittent rain didn't stop my stove kicking out good meals.  The next morning began with heavy fog down below which rolled up to sock us in with uncanny gauze.  It wasn't quite to the level of imminent danger, but our perspective and sense of time were utterly suspended as we wound our way down, seeing only a hundred feet or so ahead.

And like Rat and Mole after an Edwardian adventure, I'm back in my cozy den, washed up and well fed, curling under heavy blankets to be rested for the next chapter with my fellow creatures.

Dramatic foreshadowing...

Not quite its thickest, but you get the idea.

view upon arrival

On Hats

One of my earliest memories is being 3 or 4, riding in mom's Datsun in winter, with my knit hat on.  It was scratchy against my forehead and pressed my ears against my head, muffling my hearing.  As snow melted in the car's warmth, little spheres of water beaded along the hat's edge and tiny rainbows fringed my view.  I enjoyed this effect; but I did not like hats.  As a perspire-acious person, a warm person, an itchy person, a self-conscious and not naturally fashionable person, hats have always been a source of compound discomfort.

Ok, I guess the pictures are going here this time.  The wild roses are still going strong.

Yep.

A wonderful little beach to pull off on.

Among the many joys of my current job is not wearing a hat in the kitchen.  Our mixer might not always get full power, I might pause with floury hands to clap the life out of a dozen mosquitoes, but I'm not getting forehead rash from a sweaty cap.

But I have to concede there is one activity for which I willingly don a brim.  Kayaking along our shore, east and west in the near-endless afternoon, I more thoroughly enjoy the craggy curving coast and boundless forests when I can minimize squinting.  I was also pleased to find during yesterday's rain that my hat bill protrudes enough to keep my hood up and my glasses mostly dry.  I felt like a huge dork, and the loons were surprised enough by my sartorial choices to stare back at me for some minutes before diving, perhaps to chortle over the awkwardly maneuvering paddle-creature.

Cooking with Gas

Our stove (most of the time) is one tough motherfucker.  Four giant burners nearly incapable of being set to simmer low, a bit of flattop griddle, a shelf that supports a couple gallon water kettles, and an oven that will bake both shelves full of food.  The caveat is, the oven seems to run between 50-100 degrees low (we're waiting for a thermometer...each day is a surprise!), and the door requires a carefully-tuned balancing act: ax heads weigh it down so it doesn't snap shut.  (This is a huge improvement over the bungee cord that used to prevent it from easing open.)  We get along most of the time, but last week she let me down over and over, to the tune of me making four desserts one night to have anything worth serving.  But she's got decades of service more than me, so I'm trying to absorb some of the wisdom that comes with (r)age.

Most mornings I walk out to the sloping rock face at the far end of the beach, to look out over the lake and across to the mountains, and enjoy the the varying shades of Listerine the sunlight brings out in the water. Strong winds whip up chop and the waves wash the gravel shore; milder ripples reflect the sun's rays onto the leafy trees like a slowly undulating barbershop pole; calm days feel primordial, as though the lake has been and will be exactly so, for time without end.  But of course everything changes, and each day is new.

shifty weather coming in

this week's new flower

The Road to Mirth-dom

Wow, so, hold on -- I just sat to start writing and something amazing happened.  I was going to describe our solstice celebration/mosquito-killing-voodoo, and as I took a moment to watch my flickering candle, a mosquito was drawn to it, foundered in and ultimately succumbed to molten wax.  (Oh the symbolism!)  The gods have been appeased by our sacrifice!

Ok, let me back up: a couple nights ago, several of us walked through the woods, processed across a log bridge with lit candles, built a fire on the beach, and burned a dozen or so mosquito carcasses collected from the common area.  We plead for relief from the blood-sucking demons, marked the passage of the sun's annual zenith, and threw in some scraps of paper scrawled with our hopes-to-be-manifested for good measure.

I also happened to see my first fireweed blossom of the summer on the solstice.  The magenta beauties are popping along with wild pink roses, little droopy bells of the low cranberry bush, starry white buds, and other colorful members of the flower parade.

The parade of guest dietary restrictions is also shifting into top gear.  This week's menu will simultaneously accommodate gluten-free, vegan, green-avoidant, no-foods-starting-with-"R," and zebratarian requirements.  We'll start with dried out spinach, an appetizer of salted water, then a savory oatmeal steak with soybean purée, and finish it all with a bowl of unsweetened cocoa powder you dip your tongue directly into.

Fireweed!

Rainbow-speckly guy!

The view from across the lake in a breezy mosquito-free zone.

Basic Kneads

One thing I thought I'd have down pat here was bread --after all, I made it every day a couple years ago, and at least once a week this winter.  After some finagling with the mixer, frantic kneading by hand, and giving the oven a good talking to, this week I was able to produce tasty rustic loaves, flatbread, and focaccia.  Bread and dessert are the first tasks of my dinner shifts, and I enjoy devoting my (mostly) undivided and fresh attention to baking before the time crunch of service shifts my actions into triage mode.  

Another happy thing is we are putting together a little newspaper here, with a satirical bent akin to "The Onion."  Writers have been assigned based on subject inexpertise; the advice columnist has received a multitude of questions; comics, the police blotter, classifieds, and foreign bureau reports are accumulating.  

We are also generating buzz for our Solstical Celebration Spectacular.  Plans are still forming, but one thing for sure is we'll burn a large effigy of a mosquito.  Their presence has markedly intensified, and last night I fought swarms off my face as I hastily set up my tent on a gravel beach.  An hour later, the wind gusted strong enough to blow over my tent while I stepped outside, as the stakes had little purchase in said gravel.  It was annoying to move everything behind a tree windbreak, and perpetually slither down my sleeping pad as the new spot sloped steeply, but at least the mosquitoes fucked off.

Calm before the storm, viewed through my tent mesh.

sunny paddle

focaccia with roasted eggplant tapenade and creamy Gorgonzola 

Advanced Retreat

I've made almost enough trips down to the basement to know where most of the food is now.  We have a fairly ingenious storage system given our restricted utilities capacity, making due with a couple freezers that run at night, a few propane-fueled fridges, and a half-dozen coolers fortified with ice packs.  There is enough electricity to run the KitchenAid mixer, though fucking up your chocolate frosting takes a noticeable toll on the battery bank.  Most often the stereo plays at a moderate volume, but once guests depart after breakfast, it's fun to crank up Dead Kennedys to finish washing dishes.

It's hard to say if the lake is really slightly warmer or we're building up our cold-water tolerance.  The level is rising as more mountain snow melts.  I performed my "wet exit" -- turning over and escaping from a kayak -- and can now paddle off on my own (with a radio, don't worry, mom).  Which will be a nice break in my routine of reading in my tent before dinner shifts start.

This weekend is a combination of group travel and accomplishing tasks that in civilization take five minutes but are woefully futile in the backcountry.  Electronically signing a PDF, getting blood drawn, obtaining camp stove fuel, drinking espresso, downloading episodes of a bizarrely entertaining food-obsessed anime series...  Nine of us crammed into an AirBnB condo to accomplish these and other mundane necessities.  But tomorrow we'll redeem things by hiking to a glacier, and I'll return to the sylvan retreat where I strive to make perfect little lemon tarts and crisp-skinned duck breast.

Pretty Great Sunset #1

Pretty Great Sunset #2

What's in the polenta? A lot of butter.

 I'm writing by candlelight primarily for the ambiance as the sun is still coming through my screen door at 10pm.  Yesterday we moved into our tents, and I've got a pretty nice setup with my bedside table doubling as a desk (I have a milk-crate-cushion chair).  We painted our ceilings white to help brighten things up, and with canvas wells and east- and west-facing windows I'm catching a good deal of our twenty or so hours of daylight.

For two weeks we've been collecting brush, splitting logs, shoveling gravel from the beach onto pathways, cleaning, organizing, and otherwise preparing the Kenai Backcountry Lodge for summer guests.  We are on a remote bit of Skilak Lake, a short boat ride or loooooong paddle from the road system.  Food and propane and replacement axes come in, trash and used toilet paper and thoroughly-danced-out leisure suits go out.*  We have solar panels, a generator, a couple wood stoves, and filter our water from a creek.

*Costumes are encouraged on many occasions, especially staff dance parties.

Today was my first full day in the kitchen, for a mock (run-through) dinner.  Ahem, friends: did you know that it has been EIGHT years since I was in culinary school and worked in fine dining?  That inventive garnishes and conceptual flourishes -- if they ever remotely took hold in my repertoire -- have utterly atrophied during my subsequent tour of industrial kitchens and humble cafes?  And now they want me to plate four courses.  And now my kitchen boss is making savory agar-agar jelly pearls for his Japanese molecular gastronomy.  Shit, man.  So I tried to play to my strengths and made a bunch of Italian food.  Runny polenta, you have carried me through yet another challenging situation.  And thank you April Bloomfield for acquainting me with how wonderful and useful fried rosemary is.

Weekend group hike up Cottonwood trail led us to 'bous.

Weekend group camping trip at the Skilak Glacier lagoon was more than pretty-ok.

tent home ❤️ 

Remix

"For all the sad words of tongue or pen,

the saddest are these: 'It might have been!'"

-John Greenleaf Whittier

----

The rucksack has primarily contained sweaty cheddar of late, as I drove through the prairies and through the pines to Colorado and back.  Kelly treated us to a large chunk of pecorino romano, and I got some comte at one point, but I guess amicably breaking up doesn't provoke my dairy binging.  We did indulge in a lot of Mexican food, and enjoyed many delicious meals with his family.

I will tell you the funny parts instead of the sad parts; I love Kelly and wish him well in all his endeavors as I head back to Alaska for lots of sunlight to brighten up.  And so, funny parts of traveling to Colorado and California:

- I stayed in a fantastically restored Victorian AirBnB in Council Bluffs, Iowa, containing 3 large parrots, 16 parakeets, and their crazy-bird-lady owner, who immediately roosted them on me.

- We stopped at the self-proclaimed world's largest gas station, outside Las Vegas, with 96 pumps; this is wryly funny to me as it was so appropriately named "Terrible's."

- While visiting Kelly's parents' nudist neighborhood, we admired the let-it-all-hang-out spirit of a dozen singers at karaoke, saw tennis played in only hats and shoes, and walked past a naked guy using a skill saw.

- Back at the RV place where we had planned to stay the summer, a gorgeous clear evening set in, and we sat peacefully enjoying the bucolic farm valley and mountains beyond, while one very agitated and totally goofy-sounding cow restlessly clomped around, her bellows echoing off the hills for nearly an hour, making me giggle with every mooOOOOooOOOooo.

- Upon my return to Michigan, the Pixleys all convened at dad's first race of the summer, where it was too windy for me to set up a tent so I curled up in the back of my worn Subaru in the midst of priceless vintage sports cars, and my nephew found a very large, very dead bullfrog. 

MMMOOOOOOO

My postcard from LA

Vernal Migration

Alaska is playing the long game to win me as a resident (at least part-time).  Happy summer of 2016 memories stayed fresh until enthusiastically renewed in the summer of 2019; now winter has nearly sealed the deal.  ENDLESS skiing, muted slant-light, Ice people sprinkled all over, a variety of weird remote places with high pay to explore...I'll be back again.

After leaving the cocoon of Coldfoot and grouchily (me) reentering society, Abby and I skied our hearts out with the help of two lovely ladies in Denali.  We also enjoyed the benevolence of local skiers in Homer, who maintain miles of trails atop the hills overlooking the Cook Inlet and peaks all around.  After lots of sightseeing and driving, I felt gratitude beyond expression to relax in Seward with (Shuttle) Josh and (Baker) Karen.  We hiked in the sun and had a bonfire in the not-sun and talked and ate good things.

So why would I leave such paradise?  What could possibly draw me back to moderate latitudes?  There is a tired person currently muddling through a layover in L.A. after flying from that other paradise, New Zealand, making his way eventually to western Colorado.  And I need to pile some of my stuff in a car and meet him there for an incredibly long and long-awaited hug.

The Caines Head trail is mostly ice, so there was a lot of butt-scooting to get down to the beach.

Whittier is accessible through a tunnel shared by the train and cars; the train couldn't make it through all the snow and we thought we might be trapped, which would've been ok if everything weren't closed.

Abby + old concrete + Seward sunset

With Apologies to Sonnet 130

Coldfoot's warmth depends not on the sun;

ground beef blood and pallet fires bright red;

the snow is white, and also gray, and dun;

if hares bound quick, their quickness saves their head.

I have seen mountains cloaked in snowy white,

and strived to keep from frostbite on my cheeks;

and on some trails, incredulous delight --

frozen bogs asleep so nothing reeks.

I love to hear the wind through spruce boughs

though such a cold and restless, keening sound;

I did at long-last see a bull moose go;

my skis did schuss their tracks upon the ground.

This place, I think, is hidden treasure, rare

in form, and quite well-worn, beyond compare.

pretty mountains

out re-blazin' the trails