Another One Off The Bucket List

Hi, All:

In light of the fact that the Alaska experience is coming to an end, we're trying to push through all of the blog posts we've collected in our back pockets the last few weeks.  We apologize for the onslaught of posts, but we wanted to make sure to get these out there so the documentation of all our experiences is contained in one neat location.

As you may recall, one of our goals for the bucket list was to go on a backpacking trip through Crow Pass (near Girdwood, where we used to ski in the winter).  Steve satisfied the backpacking goal last weekend at Red Shirt lake.  But a few weekends ago he also got the opportunity to hike, though not backpack, part of Crow Pass.

Steve headed out to Girdwood with Rebecca, Henry, and Alex on Saturday morning.  They began the hike to the pass, which goes along an old mining trail still strewn with mining equipment.  Indeed, the Crow Pass trail is also the historic Iditarod supply route!  After starting the trail with a fairly steep incline and a few (minor) river crossings (more like creek crossings), the land levels off at the top of the pass and you walk by a beautiful lake.  Immediately after the lake, you come upon this sign:

Although the Crow Pass hike is 26 miles in its entirety (in fact, there is a marathon running the pass every year!), the hike to the pass is only about 5-6 miles.

One of the coolest parts of the hike is how close you get to a glacier.  If we had climbing equipment (and were willing to lug it the 6 miles) we could have gone out again for another day of ice climbing.  And if we had brought a tent, we could have camped on the glacier.  Sadly, we did neither.  But Alex had his awesome camera and got some pretty sweet shots of the glacier as we sat around eating and chatting.

Anyway, that was our hike up to Crow Pass.  Although we didn't backpack it, and so we can't consider it a total cross off the bucket list, I think this would suffice as at least a partial strike off the list.  And maybe the backpacking from this past weekend finishes the line.

Hopefully there will be more posts to come in the final days here; stay tuned!

A Last Hoorah!

Hi, Everyone:

We're down to the last week here in Alaska, and we have one final, large adventure to report from this past weekend.  I imagine there will be one more blog post before I leave remembering our time here, but for now . . . let's focus on the Alaska-adventures still being had.

This past weekend some of the clerks bound together and rented a public use cabin in the Nancy Lake area (about 1.5 hours north of Anchorage).  Public use cabins are the best things ever in Alaska.  Basically, the State has built a bunch of cabins around Alaska in both easily-accessible and not-so-easily accessible areas.  Some can be driven to, and some have to be hiked to.  Some are only accessible in the winter (when you can ski across a lake) or by boat, others require miles of hiking, and others are float plane only.

Anyway, the general public can rent these cabins pretty cheaply (I think about $40/night).  The cabins are bare; they usually contain a couple of wooden bunk beds, a woodfire stove, and an outhouse.  But they make for easy accommodations when camping.

The clerks rented one on an island in Red Shirt Lake.  Getting there required us to hike 3 miles to the lake, including carrying our own food, clothes, bedding, and firewood.  Once we got to the lake, we rented canoes for an approximate 1/2 mile ride to the island.

Here are the clerks geared up and ready for the hike:

And here is a picture of one of our canoes.  Note that Tammy was here with us in spirit:

After a beautiful hike (approx. 1.5 hours) and an easy canoe trip (about 20 minutes), we arrived on the island.  Here are Jimmy, Suzanne, and Rebecca hanging out on the porch of the cabin:

After we set up camp, we decided to take advantage of the evening and go for a nice canoe ride around the lake.  Elena and Peter were going out, so I though I would go with them and row them around while serenading them . . . gondola style.  Keep in mind, I hadn't canoed since Tamarack.  But I figured it was like  riding a bicycle . . . which is accurate . . . assuming you ride the bike in circles for about 10 minutes trying to remember what to do.  Thanks for being so patient, Peter and Elena!

Peter (see the hunting adventure from last week for a description of who he is) took a fishing pole to try and catch some pike along the way.  And catch some he did; after trolling for a few minutes, he ended up catching 5 or so, including this massive beast:

We then saw a bald eagle circling around trying to catch Pike.  Peter offered our fish as a peace offering, but the bald eagle wouldn't have it.  That bird just sat in its tree waiting for us to leave before it would come down to try again to get food for its kids.

So we released the fish and continued on our way.  Of course, the paddle around the lake was beautiful by itself.  As the sun began to set, we got some pretty unreal pictures.  I think Elena managed to get something like 200 pictures.  I was somewhat limited (as the rower), but I managed to snap a few myself:

(That round piece of land on the left is the island where our cabin was).

Then we came back to the cabin to give some other people a chance to row.  Here's our boat docked and ready for the next group to go out:

Here's the next crew leaving the cabin:

With most of the groups gone, we hunkered down by the fire and made some dinner.  We also got some awesome shots of the lake from the porch of our cabin:

Once everyone came back, we shared some drinks and snacks, played some mafia, told some stories, and went to bed.  This morning we got up, ate breakfast, and shuttled the canoes back across the lake:

We put our packs back on, hiked the 3 miles (in under an hour!), and drove back to Anchorage.

A VERY successful end to our Alaska time together.  Thanks to Claire for organizing such an awesome trip and to all of the clerks who came for making it so special.  Here's to our future reunions and time together back in this glorious State.

Be Very Very Quiet . . . We're Hunting Ptarmigan.

Hi, Everyone!

With less than two weeks to go here in Alaska, I thought I would try a new activity I had never done before.  (Now that Tammy has left I can talk in the first person!)  Given that this is the land of great wild animals, I decided to give hunting a try.  I had never shot a gun and thought it would be a cool, "Alaska" experience.  And thanks to one of my fellow clerks, Peter, this became a reality.

We hiked up to Mt. Baldy after work.  This is apparently great hunting grounds.  It is also the place I proposed to Tammy, if you'll remember.  Here's what it looked like today:

 We decide to go after ptarmigan.  These are little birds that closely resemble chickens.  In fact, there is a town in Alaska named "chicken" simply because the residents didn't know how to spell ptarmigan when they first settled there.  Also, for the record, ptarmigan are the state bird of Alaska.  Here's a picture of one (post-shooting):

I don't have a license, or know how to shoot, so I left the bird hunting to Peter and his friend, Jeff.  I just came along for the ride.

We started off walking through alders trying to push out the birds.  Here we are pushing our way through bushes:

After a little while of walking around, we stumbled across a whole bunch of these guys.  They just sprang for the bushes, and Peter and Jeff took aim.  Then, BANG!

 In the end, the two of them got 6 ptarmigan.  This will definitely make for a filling dinner sometime this week. And it apparently will taste like chicken . . . literally.  (P.S. the next photo is kind of gross, so just scroll through if you don't like blood . . .)

Anyway, my first hunting outing was a great success!  I'm looking forward to trying some of the birds Peter and Jeff shot.

There will be more adventures in the next two weeks; hopefully I'll be ok at maintaining the blog even though Tammy is not here anymore.  Talk to you all soon!

The Better Half Disappears

Hi, Everyone:

Although last week was a fantastic week around Anchorage, it was also a pretty sad week for the blog.  Last week was the week when Tammy packed her bags and moved to DC to begin her MBA program.  The better half has left Alaska.  Steve will be finishing up his clerkship over the next few weeks, and will then be heading to DC to meet her.  We still can't believe this whole experience is coming to a close . . .

But, have no fear!  The blog posts will continue, at least for the next few weeks while Steve is still in Alaska.  (This is particularly true in light of the fact that Steve has been the one posting the blog posts all year).

In light of Tammy's recent departure, however, we thought it'd be nice to put up a few Alaska shots that didn't make the blog on the first round.  Enjoy!

The Families Come to Visit!

 Hi, Everyone:

It's been a really exciting two weeks here and we couldn't wait to share it with you.  Two weeks ago, Steve's family came into Anchorage after spending 7 days on a cruise up the inside passage.  Their adventures were quite incredible, and you can read all about it here: http://ruthalan.blogspot.com/

Once they got into the Anchorage area, we met them in Whittier for a weekend trip down to Seward.  

After exploring the sea life center together, we went for a short hiking trip at Exit Glacier.  On the way, we ran into the Tamarack Camps bus again (woooo!).  The afternoon we were in Seward, it was close to 70 degrees and the ice was melting really quickly.  It led to an overrun of the road, which required cars to go through probably a foot of water.  It was pretty intense, and we had to make a few shuttle runs because we weren't sure Tammy's car could make it through  Nonetheless, it was pretty cool.

We hiked up to the toe of Exit Glacier.  On the way, we took some neat family shots:

We also got to get really close to the glacier, which was really neat given how quickly the ice was melting off of it:

The next morning the family headed out on a 3-hour sea kayaking (insert Gulligan's Island theme song here about a 3-hour tour).  We paddled around Resurrection Bay and actually got closer to a Bald Eagle than either of us had seen thus far.

Over the next few days, Steve's family explored Anchorage and the surrounding areas while he worked.  Then on Wed, Tammy's family came to Anchorage for a visit.  Tammy's family was heading out on a 10-day excursion the following morning, but the two families got to spend some time together and get to know each other a little bit better.

Luckily, the two families were in town on an incredibly beautiful day.  We decided to take a walk around Kincaid Park (where we did a lot of cross-country skiing in the winter), and Denali/Mt. McKinley was out full force:

We stopped for a few photos of the entire family (minus Steve's Dad since he was taking the pictures):

After eating lunch in Kincaid and going for a short walk, we decided to show our families where we got engaged.  We drove the cars up to the starting point for the trailhead to Mt. Baldy.  While we waited for everyone to get geared up, we began taking some impromptu engagement photos.  It seemed appropriate:

(Yup, that's Denali in the background)

Once the families were ready, we started our hike up:

Although we didn't go all the way to the summit, we reached a point where we could show our families the point on which we got engaged.  You can see it here:

That evening, Steve's family flew back to Michigan.  The next morning, Tammy's family left on a 10-day excursion around Alaska, which we'll discuss in a subsequent blog post.

We have less than one month remaining here, which is incredibly saddening.  But we have had one of the most amazing years of our lives thus far, and we are excited for what's next in our future together!

We'll have a few more blog posts over the next few weeks here as our time comes to a close.  Keep on reading!