Journal Entries
Columbia Glacier Ice Field
Posted Jul 10, 2007
Tuesday, 9 July 2007
Mrs. Phred wants to Kayak around a glacial ice field. It's a two hour boat ride to the ice field from Valdez, Alaska. After an hour, we pass Bligh Island, where young Bligh and Captain Cook looked for a Northwest Passage.
Bligh Island is where the Exxon Valdez hit the reef. They spent $20 billion on cleanup and recovered 11 percent of the spill. Exxon lost the lawsuit over the cleanup costs 20 years ago, but the case is still on appeal.
We see more Orcas hunting seals and salmon and finally get an acceptable picture. Usually the delay between pushing the button and opening the lens puts them back underwater for the picture.
The bergs from the bottom of the glacier are brilliant blue. The ones from the top are so dirty gray that we mistake them at first for rocks. Our young guide reads some the same books as Woodpigeon. We discuss Jared Diamond's "Collapse" and "Guns, Germs and Steel" as we paddle along.
As we kayak though the icebergs, several seals pop up to take a look at us. Today my arms are sore, but Mrs. Phred is happy.
Look at those icebergs video (ten seconds)
http://good-times.webshots.com/video/3060517020074333758PCIeMD
Slideshow
http://community.webshots.com/slideshow/559820226Rmowmt
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Latest reply: Jul 10, 2007
A Dog Named Pat
Posted Jul 9, 2007
Valdez, Alaska – July 9, 2007
On the way to Valdez, we meet a lady in Slana. She is about 75, we guess. Her art is done with bits of elk and moose antlers. Her dogs are all dead and the three log cabin dog houses stand empty. I imagine them chained up in the deep snow and huddled inside on the straw. The rusty chains and straw are still there. A nameplate says that one dog was named Pat. Pat was probably a Husky.
The lady has outlived three husbands and many in this place over a fifty year period. She collects camping fees at the nearby State campground and tries to operate a lodge and RV park by herself. She also operates the Slana Post Office. She makes the beds, mows the lawn, burns the trash and cleans the salmon that she catches in her fish traps. She seems lonely now. Everything is hard. It's a 100 mile trip in to buy gasoline for her generator so she can have electricity.
She no longer has time to sell her art that she makes in the winter, since she has no help. We are her only guests. It's a slow summer. She built the lodge with her own hands. There is no Home Depot here, but I see three trailers to haul things in the yard. She talks to strangers like us. Mrs. Phred feels sad for her. I tell Mrs. Phred that there are a million stories here and we can't even change the outcome of our own.
The drive into Valdez is though jagged mountains capped with glaciers that come down to the road. We go fishing for pink salmon and catch eleven that are about four pounds each. We eat one for dinner and freeze the rest. The bay is surrounded by snow-capped mountains. You can see bears in the meadows with binoculars. We see a seal next to the boat catch a salmon for lunch. The fish here are released from a hatchery and have no place to spawn. They just mill around in the bay looking for a stream that doesn’t exist.
We see a purse seine boat catch about 15,000 pounds of salmon in its net. The sea otters and seals on buoys float in front of the oil tankers next to the refinery tanks at the end of the Alaska pipeline.
This morning we will take a water taxi for a two hours ride to kayak under a glacier in the icebergs.
Pictures of Valdez:
http://community.webshots.com/slideshow/559804834ibuHPV
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Latest reply: Jul 9, 2007
DB Cooper: You have a message.
Posted Jul 6, 2007
Alcan Highway: The Yukon – Mile 1135 – July 6, 2007.
On the 4th of July we took a hike though the Chilkat rainforest near Haines, Alaska. The trail comes out on a rocky beach overlooking a glacier across a bay. It’s quiet. All you can hear is a waterfall under the glacier about ten miles away. I try my luck fishing with the usual result.
Later, we encounter a huge grizzly bear. She has her new cub with her. She is eating yellow flowers and pretty much ignoring us except for an occasional glance. You can tell a grizzly by the size and by the hump on the back. Black bears and brown bears are smaller.
In the evening we go up to Chilkoot State park to watch the “Mad Raft Race” on the Chilkoot River. There are four rafts in the race, all home-made. In last place are two little girls on a raft built of milk jugs. Their raft disintegrates as they pass, but they float on in the swift, cold water to finish. A fisherman stands in the current and brings in a salmon. So far this season, only about 10,000 “reds” have crossed the weir. The big run should start soon.
We drove north from Haines on the 5th and reentered British Columbia, then the Yukon. Northern Alaska is about 60 miles from where we camped last night. As we drive we pass a bald eagle preserve area where about 3,500 eagles gather to feast on salmon later in the summer. The campground is full of abandoned WWII highway construction equipment.
The bears here in the empty Yukon put on fat for the winter in September when the “chum” or “dog” salmon come to spawn. Chum salmon are considered the least desirable of the five species of Alaska salmon by humans.
They say to wear little bells and carry pepper spray when you hike in the woods because of bears. We see lots of bear droppings on the hike. You can tell black bear droppings by the berries and squirrel fur. Grizzly bear droppings are full of little bells and smell like pepper spray.
Here are some bear and forest pictures.
http://good-times.webshots.com/slideshow/559778242ltktSp;jsessionid=abcNn67l_Qs__cFV-KDor
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Latest reply: Jul 6, 2007
Seals on the Buoy
Posted Jul 1, 2007
Juneau, Alaska – June 30, 2007
We took a catamaran to Skagway to Juneau yesterday. It’s a three hour trip down a wide fjord misnamed the Lynn Canal by Captain Cook. Juneau is the State Capital of Alaska, but you can only get there by boat or air.
We see lots of wildlife; orcas, bald eagles, humpback whales, porpoises, harbor seals, stellar seals and a black bear. The rugged coast has glaciers and waterfalls as high as 1,600 feet. No people.
We arrive in Juneau hungry. We walk past lots of jewelry stores and saloons and finally find one called the Red Dog saloon that serves food. The floor has a thick layer of sawdust.
There is a buoy in one spot that made the cover of National Geographic a few decades ago. The picture had seals on the buoy and a glacier in the background. Here’s a short video.
http://good-times.webshots.com/video/3083847760074333758kWKvjv
The campground is full of Canadians from Whitehorse. I think they are celebrating a national holiday. They all bring plywood boxes and try to throw large beanbags into a small hole in the box. The sun stays up until about a 11 PM and I fall asleep listening to the “thwack…thwack” noises of beanbags hitting plywood.
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Latest reply: Jul 1, 2007
The Land of the Midnight Sun
Posted Jun 29, 2007
Skagway, Alaska – June 29, 2007
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
-Robert Service
This is dangerous country. You can still die of exposure, get eaten by a bear or get trampled into the mud by a herd of cruise boat tourists. There are three cruise ships in port today and the tiny town of 900 has its population swollen to 6,000 until about 7 pm.
There is only one road into town. It leads over a spectacular pass to Carcross in the Yukon, 70 miles away. We spent a night in Carcross. It seems to be mostly populated by people whose ancestors migrated over the Siberian ice bridge 20,000 years ago. A notice in the place we stopped announces that a dogcatcher will soon be hired to collect unleashed dogs before any children are injured. The Alcoholic Anonymous bus leaves at 5:30 on Friday nights for the meeting in Whitehorse.
We started hiking up the brutal Chilkoot trail yesterday. Back in the rush of ’98, Mounties were waiting 33 miles away in the Yukon and required each gold seeker to have a ton of supplies. That required nearly 40 trips over the brutal trail unless you were lucky enough to have $200 to pay natives to $10 each to carry 100 pounds on your behalf. I get worn out after a half-mile of rock climbing with no pack and turn back.
We’ll take a ferry later this week to Juneau. It’s the state capital but only accessible by boat or air. Haines is our next stop; it’s about 10 miles away by ferry and 360 miles by road. The White Pass railroad up to Carcross was completed in 1900. You can still ride it up to the Summit. At the time it beat a broken ankle.
Soapy Smith established himself a Marshall and dictator of Skagway during the gold rush. He ran various cons on the miners. He offered telegrams at $5 each for any that didn’t notice that the wire ended in the bushes. Usually a "collect" reply came an hour later. Another good one was a free medical exam in a tent. You stripped for the exam and when you emerged your watch, clothes and boots were gone. We will walk out to Soapy’s grave this morning down the railroad track. He would be pleased that the town is maintaining his tradition.
I still tell Jack London bedtime stories to my grandchildren, but I had forgotten Robert Service. He made almost $500,000 off his poem, “The Cremation of Sam McGee”. Imagine the Japanese tourists listening to “The Ballad of Blasphemous Bill” about sawing off frozen arms and legs to get Bill into his coffin. Put that in a haiku and smoke it.
Here are some shots of Skagway.
http://community.webshots.com/slideshow/559671561sRgLoL
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Latest reply: Jun 29, 2007
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