I don’t know if this is a poor man’s paddle boat or maybe an off key house boat but how sea worthy do you think the Atco trailer on top of the steel bits is?

This craft has been parked down off Chena pump road on the Tanana River. I guess it normally lives upriver a mile or so. Totally taking the party on the road. The thing I like about it is that much like the octopus gold dredges in Nome, although at a glance it looks like a garbage pile, there is some incredible thinking and attention to detail going into this boat as you can see better probably in person but well worth the price of admission.

Taking to the not so high seas

Nome was rad, I was flying solo, the others were flying by airplane. Hopefully Jessie will put some of her pictures. I’m happy to be back though. Maybe get my second weekend of summer spent in Fairbanks this weekend.

Didn't end up being quite what I thought I was snapping a picture of...

We two humans just got back from the SP. Thought after a week at doggy daycare I’d further treat the hounds to a trip up the Steese. Leave it to Midge to close the party down. We headed home when she came out of the woods with a porcupine carcass. So uncool. I’ll post some trip pics before to long…

Ended up being stuck for four weeks due to cooler temperatures compared to last year. Pretty rough. We only got on the water three times (in the water once…oops…). So here’s a couple pictures of that plus flying back from Umiat (I started in Umiat but transitioned to Deadhorse via Fairbanks. Ideally I would have flown the 120 miles from Umiat to Toolik by helicopter but the weather was so bad I flew back to Fairbanks and then flew Fairbanks to Deadhorse. 36 hours in Fairbanks was extra nice though, got to catch up with out of town friends and a few in town ones, too.
Deadhorse was rough. The first day there we went out for a couple hours but it was blowing 40+ mph so we didn’t stay long. Then over the next two weeks we only got out three more times for a couple hours each. Just had the wrong kind of weather. So we alternated between getting ready and then not going out and spending all day in our hotel room (2 single beds, 2 end tables, 2 narrow closets, 0 chairs). I had a camp chair sent up and after that life became more bearable. Tough to do anything when the only thing for sitting on is the bed. But, had time enough to whip up some more things for the home station and some of our other stations. Eventually we got out for a couple of days. It was rad catarafting. I drove while the ADCP measured. It was blowing 10 increasing to 20 over the course of our time on the water. You’d think that would be rough but the cataraft was like a sail boat, point it at the right angle and the wind pushes both directions across the river. Way there was still rowing involved but could have been way worse. Got to coexist on the water with icebergs. Mostly they were to small to notice so we’d be keeping an eye open and then would see one floating close but already downstream. The clear ones were like that. The bigger white ones you could more often see coming down but they were pretty sporadic. This was all bottom ice breaking free after being frozen to the bottom during winter.

So here’s a first. I’m sending a remote post from out here on the tundra. Have a marginal cell signal and as you can see from the picture the fog rolled in as we came back to deadhorse tonight.

So if it doesn’t clear tonight hopefully we’ll be back tomorrow sometime. Not to bad out here otherwise, weather has been miserable, very foggy this is only the fourth time in ten days that we’ve left Deadhorse. The rivers are all on there way up. We’ve never seen U1 higher than it was tonight, to bad we didn’t get a chance to measure it…

Anyway, perhaps more a bit later.

…. The post script: we got off after a couple hours. Couldn’t get the phone to post from the slope though.

Action Shot:

So we went out flying today. My first trip. Went to Nenana to check out the ice (still frozen). Super nice day for flying aside from the 11 knot crosswinds at landing… Summer seems like it might have some pretty good potential for fun. We’ll trade car trips for plane trips since the car is doing something similar to dying… and getting more serious about it.

So today I decided to walk to Ivory Jacks instead of driving. Was meeting up with the usual crew for brunch. It was a great day, very sunny and a touch cold for a t-shirt and fleece (-8 F) it turned out, but not to bad. I was trading texts with Johnson and almost there when this dog sled goes slowly past me. It quietly passed just to my left on the road. Pretty cool. Nobody was driving though! I drank it all in, enjoyed watching the dogs running, and then turned around to see no one chasing it.

Once I snapped out of the appreciative daze I started chasing after it but even with four dogs it was a touch to fast. Just barely to fast but close doesn’t count in this foot race. Soon I was to the end of the road where a guy had corraled the dogs. They were pretty freaked. We assesed the situation together and I suggested he drive up the road looking for the owner and I would stay with the dogs. He asked if I was familiar with dog sleds. Uh no way dude, duh! So he showed me how to work the brake and headed up the road.
A few minutes later he returned without a dog owner. So just when I think I’m the new owner of a good but slightly used dog team the owner drives up. He and the team got attacked by a moose up on the ski trails by our house here. He had a loose dog running, too. They came hit a hard turn and the moose was right in the middle of the trail. It started kicking and he bailed. The loose dog got the moose off the team and eventually him and the other dog got back to the road. So everything worked out.

Coincidentally, I nearly got attacked by a moose out skiing two weeks ago on the ski trails. Jessie and I were headed down to the lake on the campus ski trails. I was leading by a fair distance coming around a hard corner at the far end of this thing we call the potato field. Off to the right in front of me is a momma and baby moose. I stopped quickly but spooked the baby. Spooked, the baby ran across the ski trail in front of me. The momma started to follow but started breathing heavy and took several steps towards me. I just tried to talk her down. Not like I could run anyplace with skis on. After what seemed like forever she followed the baby off the trail and I could signal to Jessie. The mooses were only ten to twelve yards away so it could have gotten ugly fairly quickly. Situation resolved peacefully though.

So anyway, pretty good day. Wrapping up things, when I got across the road to Ivory Jacks finally I saw that weird deal in picture 2 in the back of somebody’s pickup. Couldn’t begin to speculate on its origin or use. Looks like there’s a good story there someplace though…

The runaway sled

Well, we’re back home and finally making good headway on how far behind we fell with work while on vacation so time for an update right…

Trip was rad. Did equal parts reading, hiking, and hanging out in the sun. Perhaps due to recession pricing at the rental car place they upgraded us for free to a convertible. Since we were camping…

Not to many tourists in that neck of the woods. Two nights we camped with only one other group on the beach and another night there were only two groups up in the mountain campground. Lucked out pretty well. So, super nice weather, super good reading, high quality relaxing and a really fun time. The hiking was great, too. We only did the tip of the iceberg on that. So next time around we’ll hit that part a bit harder.

New to us eh! It’s still in the shop getting the final touches put on it but I was recently talked into getting a 172. It comes tricked out with skis, floats, big wheels, a big engine, a short take off and landing package and a sweet color scheme. All Jessie’s boyfriends at the hangar are quite jealous. Now we just have to go put some hours in it. But I think there’s one or two excited people around here…

Here we are almost finished with the annual maintenance.

Overhead view at the hangar.

We can’t all be serious pilots…

Taking delivery of the floats at the house.

The new pilot

Introducing sweet pea.

More garbage from Freddy’s

And you know these plastic signs were imported, too.