tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-25877158566176538972024-03-21T07:02:48.490-08:00Notes from an Accidental NaturalistNotes on life as a fantasy writer and wilderness guide, from someone who never thought she'd actually be doing either of those things for a living.Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.comBlogger66125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-30009652293374122812018-05-24T12:37:00.000-08:002018-05-24T12:37:28.450-08:00A First-Time Visitor to the NebulasA quick note here, as I just got back from attending the Nebulas in Pittsburgh. Put on by SFWA (Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America), it’s a little like the Oscars for genre fiction. I had a marvelous time, and came home with far too many books.<br />
<br />The conference was a great time to network and meet other writers, as well as my first opportunity to meet the folks who work for my publisher (Colin, Jae and Kaelin of <a href="https://parvuspress.com/" target="_blank">Parvus Press</a>). I also met one of Parvus’ other authors (Rekka Jay, whose steampunk/space opera <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/36401999-flotsam?ac=1&from_search=true" target="_blank"><i>Flotsam</i></a> was released two months ago). This was the first time I’ve ever attended a conference of this sort, and SFWA goes out of their way to make the conference friendly, and a welcoming space for newcomers, in all stages of their career. One of the facets I particularly enjoyed was the conference’s mentor program - pairing new conference attendees with others who have volunteered to give pointers about making the best of the conference. I was paired with the lovely Shanna Swendson, and we spent a nice half an hour on the first day of the conference chatting. Between her, and the folks from Parvus (most of which I only knew via email), it was good to have some folks I already knew.<br />
<br />After the awards, I watched some of the Alternate Universe speeches, which is an amazing thing I hope more awards programs will take up. Basically, it gives all of the nominees a chance to get up and deliver their speech. Some of them were amazing (like a ukulele ballad), and I really liked the fact that the Nebulas was making space to give voice to and celebrate all the nominees’ work, not just the winners. Just another instance of how welcoming and supportive I found the conference to be. <br />
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<br />As the alternate universe speeches would down, I ended up standing next to an acquaintance of an acquaintance, listening to a Notable Statesperson of Fantasy talk to a small group of rapt writers. <br />“You’re here for him, aren’t you?” said one of the gathered folks - a woman I knew only vaguely as someone acquainted with my publisher - and quickly pulled me in to the circle. I listened for about half an hour as the Notable Statesperson talked about the publishing business, and handed out some advice for early-career writers, before he was called away to have his picture taken with a Muppet. (Several were in attendance, as puppeteer Martin P. Robinson was the Emcee.) The next day, Notable Statesperson gave me a signed copy of one of their books at an autographing event, which cemented my need to have a checked bag sent back that was pretty much entirely full of books I’d been gifted or bought at the conference. Particular favorites - ARCs of Naomi Novik’s <i>Spinning Silver</i>, and V. E Schwab's <i>City of Ghosts</i>, a signed copy of Peter S. Beagle’s <i>The Overneath</i>, and <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22566044-fluency?ac=1&from_search=true" target="_blank"><i>Fluency</i></a> by Jennifer Foehner Wells, which Rekka recommended and I’m excited to read. Oh, and <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22718701-rebel-mechanics?from_search=true" target="_blank"><i>Rebel Mechanics</i></a> by Shanna Swindson, my lovely conference mentor.<br />
<br />I also liked that the conference actively solicited volunteers, even among the ranks of new attendees. I signed up to help with the last Office Hours session - mostly involving helping people who had signed up for a session locate their person, and a few instances of gently reminding people that someone else was waiting to start their slot. The office hours themselves are a great idea - a sort of curated form of networking and after-hours chatting, wherein willing attendees make themselves available in 15-minute blocks to talk with anyone who wants to sign up for a slot. The topics ranged from hypnosis to social media marketing, and many conference goers seemed to be taking advantage of the opportunity to chat.<br />
<br />Of course, one of the highlights for me was meeting Connie Willis, who has been a favorite author of mine since I stumbled on to her book <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/77773.To_Say_Nothing_of_the_Dog?from_search=true" target="_blank"><i>To Say Nothing of the Dog</i></a> as a teenager. (This also gave me the entirely erroneous starting assumption that the worst that was ever going to happen in a Connie Willis novel was someone attempting to murder a cat…) It was an incredible honor to meet her, both because I admire her work (I stayed up until 2 AM to finish <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/24984.Passage?from_search=true" target="_blank"><i>Passage</i></a> before leaving to go back to work on a boat… Anyone who has ever read <u><i>Passage</i></u> will realize this was a terrible life choice…) and also because her work, especially the Oxford time traveling novels, have left their fingerprints on more than one of my own works. <br />Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-63187495230854614812018-03-05T20:20:00.000-09:002018-03-05T20:20:05.152-09:00The Nooks and Crannies of the Inside PassageRumor has it the first seasonal worker of the summer has been spotted on the streets of Seward - a sure sign that summer is approaching. In a few weeks, I'll be headed down to Seattle to join up with the crew of the <i>Discoverer</i>, for another season exploring the nooks and crannies of Southeast Alaska. This year will be my fourth with the vessel, and my eleventh summer in the state overall.<br />
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In honor of another season as a guide in one of the planet's most captivating and untrammeled wild corners, I want to share a handful of memories from last summer - some of the memories that explain why I feel so lucky to be able to work in places like this. This is from two days at the end of July, part of a week when the <i>Discoverer</i> hosted a tour group from Japan.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXzlEI5TYkxeNjmoakdksjuImS8fB6NYwtIMCfN69SYVXl5uF6Uj1U_ihz48m3UDqJnTgxbURfim9GheMI2XCsI6ABLu2RuF0G2Wpi0l3zuXn-w2XCcihq7taBOfQd3B0OQx_mRUr8AWUV/s1600/3-IMG_0764.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhXzlEI5TYkxeNjmoakdksjuImS8fB6NYwtIMCfN69SYVXl5uF6Uj1U_ihz48m3UDqJnTgxbURfim9GheMI2XCsI6ABLu2RuF0G2Wpi0l3zuXn-w2XCcihq7taBOfQd3B0OQx_mRUr8AWUV/s320/3-IMG_0764.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Sunset, looking out over the bundled kayaks on the lowest deck</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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July 24, Glacier Bay National Park. At Gloomy Knob we spent about a half an hour watching the mountain goats - reasonably low, a few kids galloping along the cliff edge while their elders stand stoically overlooking our boat. Three hard-to-see eagles; which this trip are <i>haku-toe-washi</i>. <i>Todo</i> is sea lion. <i>Kuma</i> is bear. Travis printed a bunch of Japanese/English field guides with two reams of paper he bartered from the Bartlett Cove front desk; slowly I'm figuring out what means what. Coming through Russel Cut, we find four bears! Two on the beach, slinking behind rocks and in and out of the alders; a mother and cub, tucked even further into the foliage on the slope above. Mostly, the bears were present as bending branches in the alders, glimpses of bear-brown among the tree-brown and leaf-brown and dirt-brown. <i>Kuma, kuma</i>, lobbed back and forth - the one word becoming a plea for directions, or a photographer's frustration, or a binocular-wielding guest's delight.<br />
The bears were frustratingly hard to see; the boat was restless; Alaska was hiding just out of their viewfinder. We moved on.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhP5XX2hahQ1yZMguAFSEw5-XrUssJ6JHjadAmUU-55e-rrpfq3EJJlF7dBKrIPiU4T4pqwivGhfbYoT26-ylxg2y66pj5G_3mwopReIgIkob1sN5gJ4dU2kXQMZYd0UtDgyeUEWJ0Vf7pk/s1600/114-DSCN1981.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1200" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhP5XX2hahQ1yZMguAFSEw5-XrUssJ6JHjadAmUU-55e-rrpfq3EJJlF7dBKrIPiU4T4pqwivGhfbYoT26-ylxg2y66pj5G_3mwopReIgIkob1sN5gJ4dU2kXQMZYd0UtDgyeUEWJ0Vf7pk/s320/114-DSCN1981.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Bilingual Glacier Bay Wildlife</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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As we were pulling out of the cut, we spot another bear on the island, golden brown, pacing along the mussels just above the waterline. The call goes out - <i>kuma, kuma, kireina kuma</i>; the boat laboriously turns around in the narrow cleft. He is a beautiful bear, all whitish and brown, standing out so clearly from the dark mussels that in the late-evening dim he almost seems to glow. He stalks the tideline, flipping over rocks, the muscles in his humped shoulders rippling. The entire boat is on deck; the entire boat is silent. It's like the first bears were practice bears. The warm-up act, and now Glacier Bay is done with the previews. Turn off your cell phone; forget the popcorn. Here comes the real thing. Don't look away.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiImaZknM-fzMUuaZ31SF_vA7X4df3qGqiaqUA6PEupVCs8pHQgdsZXor0Q64FOSHDDG7LmMmKsE9rDNOQ4BbY9bo1l_q_Co4b-HFqFvSLbe7VZc8apLrTdqyPPpxyCnYQGhYhRjot0T9C2/s1600/058-DSCN1577.JPG" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiImaZknM-fzMUuaZ31SF_vA7X4df3qGqiaqUA6PEupVCs8pHQgdsZXor0Q64FOSHDDG7LmMmKsE9rDNOQ4BbY9bo1l_q_Co4b-HFqFvSLbe7VZc8apLrTdqyPPpxyCnYQGhYhRjot0T9C2/s320/058-DSCN1577.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Brown Bear, Glacier Bay National Park</td></tr>
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One gentleman is walking around the deck with a huge camera around his neck, and both hands over his mouth, like he knew he was being too loud before. I think he's a bit of a riot. The park ranger is giving a talk now, with the aid of one of the Japanese translators; got a shower with hot water for the first time in four days.<br />
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The next morning fog settled into Cross Sound; you could barely see the shore from our usual anchorage. We debated delaying the skiffs; Lex and I ended up going out with our skiff group after only a slight delay. The fog looked like it was trying to lift, but as we went into the pass between the islands, it settled in thicker than before. We kept close to the north side, going slow. A <i>lakko</i> - a sea otter - popped up with a mussel in his paws; the sharp clack as he broke into it echoed off the side of the island. Near the far end of the channel, we ran into more sea otters, and sea lions - <i>todo</i>. The fog was starting to break up; but the cover of the mist seemed to tempt some of the big bulls to come even closer to the skiffs than usual, as though they were having as much trouble seeing us as we were seeing them. They come to the surface smoothly, bellowing an exhale, loud and sudden; the guests facing the wrong way would jump. Some of them definitely were checking the boat for fish guts; I had to warn the folks to be careful with their fingers. Maybe I need to add <i>it bites</i> to my list of need-to-know Japanese phrases.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyMXFSLSyhTTyT8LVmPVYhIESXCdoPvSPp0xB6L2DSFxtDRxlsc_ko0PDVwhoBNt82FzF6PuqNXG4a6UkgNnYTPuC3TQlztf4wv0sbUIhrDtCCdnbIq6dzHOcJWN9Cj1zE_cm47SGtur-N/s1600/132-P7250023.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhyMXFSLSyhTTyT8LVmPVYhIESXCdoPvSPp0xB6L2DSFxtDRxlsc_ko0PDVwhoBNt82FzF6PuqNXG4a6UkgNnYTPuC3TQlztf4wv0sbUIhrDtCCdnbIq6dzHOcJWN9Cj1zE_cm47SGtur-N/s320/132-P7250023.JPG" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Steller sea lion - probably disappointed we aren't a fishing boat.</td></tr>
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<br />Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-45476045856893744872018-01-09T13:41:00.003-09:002018-01-10T09:15:00.750-09:00The Ethnographic Underpinnings of Court of Twilight<style>
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If I hadn’t ended up reading two fantastic
ethnography books back-to-back,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Court of
Twilight might never have been written in the first place. </div>
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Back in 2012, I was living in New Zealand, and working as a
receptionist for a hostel in a remote part of the South Island. The closest
bookstore was over an hour away on the other side of the Southern Alps, and the
closest library wasn’t much better. However, there was a small lending shelf at
the hostel, which became my primary source of reading material for the four
months I lived there. As a receptionist, there were often several hours a day
when the rooms had been cleaned, the laundry folded, the plants watered, and
the lobby swept, when there was legitimately nothing I needed to do other than
sit at the front desk and wait for someone to walk in about a room. Which meant
I spent a lot of time reading.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho4dqst1gfyi7tYga6YrTxZU1y-W9LESOGWgMTnK7CsVAGvK2bM7n5D3qPCaT8uaA1e4YRxNnCYU-eU3fpgo7H-IkMLNgD6s-PFLHLQ8EbttPN2LJ2bOHnAwoITts5My52rwuh3OW4CzZU/s1600/book+covers.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1200" data-original-width="1600" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEho4dqst1gfyi7tYga6YrTxZU1y-W9LESOGWgMTnK7CsVAGvK2bM7n5D3qPCaT8uaA1e4YRxNnCYU-eU3fpgo7H-IkMLNgD6s-PFLHLQ8EbttPN2LJ2bOHnAwoITts5My52rwuh3OW4CzZU/s320/book+covers.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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Two of the books that came my way that season were
ethnography books, which I ended up reading within the same week. <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/148394.Bury_Me_Standing?from_search=true" target="_blank">Bury Me Standing: The Gypsies and Their Journe</a>y</i> by Isabel Fonseca is a book depicting
Roma culture in Europe. The author lived among Roma people, mainly in Eastern
Europe, for several years in the 1990s, and the book recalls her experiences as
a guest and participant in their culture. The title is a reference to a
devastating Roma saying – bury me standing, for I have lived my life on my
knees. </div>
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This is an excerpt: </div>
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As we left Grabian, an old woman, so
thin that her cheekbones seemed to be pointing out of her face, hung onto my
sleeve. She wanted to show me something. She reached into her apron pocket and
produced a fuzzy scrap of white paper, no bigger than a gum wrapper, folded
down to the size of a thumbnail…She held it up close to my eyes, and I saw
nothing – maybe a slight smudge of dirt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I took it from her and checked the other side. Nothing. Apart from the
grubby crease marks it was blank…</div>
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What had I failed to see? Written on that piece of paper,
she claimed, was the telephone number of her son, a refugee in Italy. It
probably had been once, written in pencil that had long since worn away. If she
was illiterate, which seemed likely, and had never been able to <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">read</i> the characters, what she had seen
there was already an abstraction. Anyway, I am sure that she did see and
continued to see that telephone number. “<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Te
xav to biav</i>,” the old woman called after me as I climbed into the car: May
I eat at your wedding.</div>
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The picture Fonseca paints is of a resilient society struggling
against both the poverty and upheaval of Eastern Europe, as well as the
discrimination they faced, and both the pride and difficulties the Rom face in
being a people who consider their true home the road. </div>
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The second book is <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1928597.Meeting_the_Other_Crowd?from_search=true" target="_blank"><i>Meeting the Other Crowd: The Fairy Stories of Hidden Ireland</i></a>, by Eddie Lenihan and Carolyn Eve Green. It’s a
unique book of Irish folklore, set as a series of first-person accounts of
events attributed to fairies, along with brief passages by the authors
attempting to fit these stories into a framework that might explain the
fairies’ habits, beliefs, behaviors, and motivations. The book takes a very
open-minded view of the fact of fairies’ existence, treating them as an
invisible culture that lives along side, and occasionally intersects with, the
culture of the human inhabitants of Ireland. Many of the stories have the
flavor of ghost stories (and if some of the accounts had happened in West
Virginia, where I was raised, they would likely have been attributed to ghosts.)
Most of the book is written in dialect, and keeps closely to the oral traditions
that produced many of the tales. </div>
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An example, from the story ‘The Fairy Frog’ in which a girl
has been taken to a fairy dwelling to assist a fairy woman giving birth:</div>
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He took her out, anyway, up on the horse behind him again,
and off they went as fast as the horse’d go, and never stopped till they came
to this grove o’ trees.</div>
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He pulled up the horse and he says, “Did herself give you
anything that time they called you back?”</div>
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“She did,” says the girl.</div>
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“What was it?”</div>
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She was half afraid o’ him, that maybe he was going to rob
her.</div>
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“Tell me,” says he, “what was it.”</div>
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So she told him about the bag o’ gold and the necklace.</div>
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“You aren’t the first one to get the line,” says he. “And if
you’ll take my advice, and if you want to see your father and mother safe and
sound again, take that necklace now and tie it around the branch o’ that near
tree there.”</div>
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Reading the books pretty much simultaneously, I saw some
very clear parallels between the literal invisibility of Lenihan’s fairies
and the figurative invisibility of the Rom people. Both were societies that kept
themselves separate from their neighbors, and considered themselves different
in certain key respects. Relationships between their culture and the wider
community were fractious, and prone to misunderstanding. Interactions between
one culture and the other were proscribed by a set of rules and expectations. For example, fairy folklore stresses the
importance of not eating fairy food, with the results of doing so ranging from
an unbearable longing for it, to being trapped permanently on the fairies’ side
of their vaguely-defined border. </div>
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In <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bury Me Standing</i>,
Fonseca describes the Rom she lived with in Albania having similarly serious
concerns about food.<br />
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“The real reason Gimi stayed outside when we stopped in at
the house of Albanians was the food. Inevitably, and whatever the hour, our
hosts would prepare a meal. It was impossible to decline the hospitality, but
whereas for me it was at worst a nuisance, for Gimi it presented a danger.
Gypsies everywhere do their best to avoid eating food prepared by <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">gadje</i> [non-Rom], which almost by
definition is bound to be <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">mahrime</i>
[unclean].”</blockquote>
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I want to be clear that I didn’t intent my own fictional
Others, trows, to be in any way representative of the Rom - or any other human
culture, for that matter. What I did want is to use issues brought up in
both works of ethnography – issues of belonging, invisibility, and erasure, and
interactions across disparate cultures that can still go wrong even with the
best of intentions on both sides – to help inform the background and culture of
my own invented Others. </div>
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If you’re looking for more recommended books with perhaps a
more literal treatment of Ireland’s rich cultural history and beliefs, I would
recommend any of Juliet Marillier’s works. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/13928.Daughter_of_the_Forest?from_search=true" target="_blank"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Daughter of the Forest</i></a> is an engaging retelling of the traditional story The Six
Swans, but embeds its magical elements nicely within a real-world story about family and betreyal. <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6278019-heart-s-blood?from_search=true" target="_blank"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Heart’s Blood</i></a> is another compelling standalone novel, where the magical elements are
portrayed more as a burden than a gift. The Iron Druid novels by Kevin Hearne,
starting with <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9533378-hounded?from_search=true" target="_blank"><i>Hounded</i></a>, takes elements of Irish belief and transplants firmly them into modern day America. The first books are a little more combat-oriented than I
generally read, but the stories are engaging. I first got into the series
through my enjoyment of Oberon’s <a href="https://twitter.com/IrishOberon" target="_blank">Twitter account</a> (Oberon being the narrator’s
talking Irish wolfhound), which is worth following even if you aren’t into the
books.</div>
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Fiction, and in particular fantasy fiction, inspired by Rom
sources is a little harder to find. The only fantasy book I’m aware of in which Romani
beliefs and characters are central to the narrative is Charles de Lint’s uncharacteristically
gruesome horror novel <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/258475.Mulengro?from_search=true" target="_blank"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Mulengro</i></a>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Outside of the fantasy realm, I can
thoroughly recommend Oksana Marafioti’s introduction to modern Romani culture through
her memoir <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/12107713-american-gypsy?ac=1&from_search=true" target="_blank"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">American Gypsy</i></a>, detailing
her family’s immigration from Russia to Los Angeles when she was fifteen.</div>
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If you can recommend other books with an Irish or Romani connection, let me know! Or let me know what real-world histories, ethnographies, memoirs, and other real-life inspirations you've used, or seen used, in a fictional piece. </div>
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Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-13129549084808768682017-12-30T20:17:00.000-09:002017-12-31T10:48:43.872-09:002017 in a Nutshell<style>
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So as we creep towards the end of 2017, I wanted to
summarize a few of the things that happened this year. Which was a lot – partly
because a lot of things came to fruition this year that had been in the works
for a while. </div>
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So, in no particular order:</div>
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<b>Court of Twilight was published this fall! </b>This is
definitely the final stretch of a years-long process in writing and editing it.
The first draft was written in 2013, and the book came out almost exactly four
years later. It’s felt very satisfying to be finished with the book and hearing
from readers who’ve enjoyed it.</div>
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<b>Changeling has a second draft! </b>While it’s still unclear if
or when this will actually make its way to readers, I finished the second draft
right before Christmas. This was another long-term project; the first draft was
written as a National Novel Writing Month project in 2014, and it’s gotten only
sporadic attention since. </div>
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<b>I worked in Mexico!</b> I was in Baja California Sur in January and February
working as a guide on the Sea of Cortez. I saw my first blue whales, and we
were running into big pods of dolphins about every week. I saw grey whales on
their calving grounds. I skiffed around with playful juvenile sea lions, and
saw tropicbirds and blue-footed boobies. And a ton of beautiful sunsets.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And at the end of the month I met up with my friend and amazing co-guide Teresa and traveled around the southern cape
hiking, beach camping, and wallowing in natural hot springs. If you get a chance to travel to Baja, I would highly recommend spending time there.</div>
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<b>I worked an amazing Alaska season! </b>This was my third Alaska
season guiding aboard the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Discoverer</i>. The crew on board this year were lovely, and we had a
bunch of great trips. Probably the highlight was the week a Japanese tour
company chartered the whole boat. They brought five of their own guides and
translators, and a bunch of really, really good food. We got to stop at a bear-viewing location that I had never been to before, and watched brown
bears fishing for salmon.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And got to
watch a group of bubble-net-feeding humpbacks get streaked by an orca pod that
charged through right where the humpbacks were trying to get themselves
organized… </div>
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<b>I wrote a few small things that turned out well!</b> One is an
article being published next month. And I wrote the first short story I’ve
written in maybe eight years, of which I am super proud, and might be
unintentionally hilarious to anyone who’s ever worked at the Glacier Lodge. </div>
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<b>I‘m making an ops guide to Southeast Alaska! </b>I journal every
day when I’m guiding. Over the past three years, I’ve accumulated a huge amount
of notes on the places I’ve visited while tooling around Southeast on a tiny
expedition ship. Last spring I started compiling the entries by location, and
I’ve ended up with a huge Scrivener file listing over seventy different
locations I’ve visited, with info on bushwhacking and paddling routes,
landmarks, wildlife sightings, and notes on the history of the area. It’s going
to be a great resource for refreshing my memory on these locations as I revisit
the sites this summer on various trips. And since most of these sites are bays
in the middle of nowhere, (not designated wilderness, but close), there’s very
little existing publicly-available documentation on them. (Yes,
this is why you should visit Southeast Alaska on the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Discoverer</i>, because we know where the cool stuff is…)</div>
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<b>I’m done with the requirements for my captain’s license!</b>
This is another thing I’ve been working on for a while. I first started working
on boats ten years ago, as a deckhand on the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Aialik Voyager</i> back in 2007, then spent five years hopping on and
off water taxis while working at a lodge that was only accessible by boat. Three
years ago I joined my current company, working as a guide on the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Discoverer</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At the end of the summer, I finally earned
enough sea time to apply for my license. I spent the fall studying, and passed
the exams earlier this month. </div>
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<b>I worked a few winter kayak trips!</b> I was lucky enough to
meet up with a Seward-based kayak company, who was looking for someone to run
trips for them in the winter. It’s slow, as it’s winter, and we’ve had a few of
the trips turn into winter hikes because the seas were snotty, but it’s been
lovely to be able to get out on the water in the off-season. On our trip
yesterday, we ate lunch at the base of a 75-foot frozen waterfall, and three
juvenile sea lions were following our boats on the way home. Tell me that isn’t
an amazing day job? (Of course, the day before, I beached us a half-mile into
the paddle, because the wind came up and my novice-paddler clients were getting
blown into a giant sandbar. Ran the rest of the trip as a hike. And got frost
nip on two toes from walking around on snow in rain boots. This is
why guiding is like a giant lottery, and I can never bring myself to stop
playing.) </div>
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<b>I spent time with my grandmother.</b> This isn’t an entirely
happy update; my grandmother passed away in August. But I was able to spent
over a month with her in March and April. I came back to see her twice on my
breaks from the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Discoverer</i>, including
just before she passed. If there are two things I can say that will in any way
sum up the sort of person she was, it’s this: by the time she died she had
happily given away most of the paintings hanging in her house to people she
thought would appreciate them, and the day before she passed, she asked me to
come over and fix her ceiling fan (which I did, and it was the last time I saw
her).<br />
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So that was 2017. I hope you're finding some good memories to look back on as we start a new year, and I hope you have many exciting things to look forward to in 2018. </div>
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Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-20724249075275856542017-12-04T20:39:00.000-09:002017-12-06T11:19:24.935-09:00The Real-World Science of Ignoring Gorillas<style>
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I want to take some time to talk about a few of the sources
that helped to shape my novel, Court of Twilight. One of these is
a well-known cognitive psychology experiment, that's actually mentioned in the book by one of the characters. The experiment is also the titular illusion in the book <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The
Invisible Gorilla</i>, by Christopher Chabris and Daniel Simons. Written by two cognitive psychologists,<i> The Invisible Gorilla</i> is an explanation of erroneous assumptions about how our
brains work - what the
authors refer to as everyday illusions. The researchers discuss the effects these assumptions have
on how we perceive our world, and also how we act based on those erroneous
perceptions.</div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><img alt="Image result for invisible gorilla book cover" class="irc_mi" height="180" src="https://media.npr.org/assets/news/2010/05/19/gorilla_wide-2ecca108d5f93d1e908526e46b22d1c75ed718b2.jpg?s=1400" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; margin-top: 0px;" width="320" /></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><i>The Invisible Gorilla </i>cover image. Credited to ABSODALS/Getty Images</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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The <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Invisible Gorilla</i><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">'s </span>cover is striking . A man in a business
suit, reading a newspaper, stands obliviously next to a gorilla, who is also
reading a newspaper. I think the visual image, as much as anything, was
something I remembered when I was mulling over my own ideas for a story about
modern-day fairies. Here is an image of something entirely unexpected (for a gorilla) but also something entirely normal (for a person). Aur gorilla is standing next to a
rather urbane-looking businessman, who is either completely indifferent to his
simian companion, or else completely unaware of him.</div>
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If you’re not familiar with the titular experiment, I would
highly recommend you experience it for yourself. There’s a link to it <a href="http://www.theinvisiblegorilla.com/videos.html" target="_blank">here, at the Invisible Gorilla website.</a><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span></div>
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No, go ahead, I’ll still be here when you get back.</div>
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Got it? Pretty cool. To summarize, the video shows two teams
of players passing a basketball back and forth. The viewer is asked to watch
the video, and keep track of the number of passes made by the players wearing
white, while ignoring the passes made by the players wearing black. After
watching the videos, the researchers ask the viewer how many passes they
counted. And then, the researchers ask if the viewer saw anything unusual in
the video – such as an actor in a gorilla costume walking through the middle of
the players?</div>
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Although the gorilla is clearly visible in the video – it
turns and thumps its chest at the camera, no less - about half of viewers fail
to see it. The authors refer to this phenomenon as inattentional blindness. The
brain, when concentrating on a task, shunts its attention to that task to such
a degree that it starts ignoring everything irrelevant to that task - even things
that are unusual, notable, and significant. Something else that Chabris and
Simons note is that many people, when told that they did, in fact, ignore a
gorilla walking through the middle of a basketball game, react with shock. Some
study participants even went so far as to accuse the researchers of tampering
with the tape, so certain were they that there hadn’t been a gorilla in the
video they’d seen. </div>
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It’s a startling experiment – I was certainly surprised when
I saw the video, posted on a friend’s Facebook page several years ago. And no,
I did not see the gorilla either – which was probably a good thing, because I
don’t know if I would have remembered the video if I hadn’t been one of the
people on whom this rather suprising illusion worked. The illusion is startling
mainly because we’re not used to distrusting the accuracy of our perceptions.
Our brains, we’d like to think, present us with an accurate and infallible view
of the world – with no omissions, paraphrases, or edits. When we do happen upon
an instance where our brain’s editing, filtering, and paraphrasing mechanisms
are revealed, it feels like a cheat. Like we’re getting the Cliff Notes version
of reality, instead of the real thing.</div>
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When looking for a way to ground a traditional feature of
fairies into a modern setting, using a beefed-up version of inattentional
blindness seemed ideal. It gave me a way to ground the trows’ magical abilities (or
liabilities) within a framework that had a real basis in psychology. I hope
that the mention of inattentional blindness in Court of Twilight might also
provoke some readers to learn more about the cognitive illusions discussed in<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> The</i> <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Invisible
Gorilla</i>. As Chabris and Simon say in the introduction to their book “When
you finish this book, you will be able to glimpse the man behind the curtain
and some of the tiny gears and pulleys that govern your thoughts and beliefs…
Ultimately, seeing through the veils that distort how we perceive ourselves and
the world will connect you – for perhaps the first time – with reality.”</div>
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<i>The Invisible Gorilla</i> is available for purchase <a href="http://www.theinvisiblegorilla.com/buy_book.html" target="_blank">here</a>. More information on Chabris and Simons' experiments on everyday cognitive illusions can be found on their website, <a href="http://www.theinvisiblegorilla.com/" target="_blank">The Invisible Gorilla.com.</a></div>
Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-59696744339591258052017-11-02T21:17:00.000-08:002017-11-02T21:17:01.480-08:00So it has been a ridiculously long time since I’ve added any content to my blog. I do have an excuse, of sorts - I wrote a novel, which has recently been published by a small SciFi/Fantasy publisher out of Washington, DC. Which means that for over a year now, getting that book edited and out the door has been the main focus for what writing time I have outside of guiding gigs. I am ridiculously happy with how the book turned out (I have a marvelous editor, and the folks at Parvus have been lovely to work with) and if you are at all into fantasy books, I’d encourage you to check it out via any of the links to the right, or through whatever bookstore you’d like. (And if you like it please leave a review - those are hugely helpful in helping connect Court of Twilight with readers who might enjoy it).<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4uEY2vmWqC_AhET8qPASRWxWurUeLXJClVEU_8hJiPuMRQuN6X1lqY5ug-9DNa_WGiJjl8Fm3C5Fqo0r4HHo-C2CnbK49y1Pdwep79i6hwgWARfU9Tbxb1-4iJb-JyOAjwMyc-ux7g1HY/s1600/CoT+Postcard+Front.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1067" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg4uEY2vmWqC_AhET8qPASRWxWurUeLXJClVEU_8hJiPuMRQuN6X1lqY5ug-9DNa_WGiJjl8Fm3C5Fqo0r4HHo-C2CnbK49y1Pdwep79i6hwgWARfU9Tbxb1-4iJb-JyOAjwMyc-ux7g1HY/s320/CoT+Postcard+Front.png" width="213" /></a></div>
<br /><br />Court of Twilight is, for all intents and purposes, a a story of a girl who goes looking for her missing flatmate - and ends up finding an entire society of hidden beings living in Dublin, under the unsuspecting noses of most of the city’s inhabitants. It’s a story about isolation, friendship and family, and whether being a hero is still a good thing to be if you’re risking yourself for someone you don’t know all that well. Ideas that ended up in Court of Twilight came from all over the map. (It was written all over the map as well - the idea that became the novel started in New Zealand, the first draft was written almost two years later in North Carolina and West Virginia, and was finished and revised in Alaska. And some of the editing was done in the linen storage locker of a boat in Mexico.) <br /><br />One idea I had for this blog was to briefly touch on a few of the elements that went into the novel - where the idea came from, why I thought it was appealing, and how I incorporated it into the story. In as non-spoilerey a way as possible, hopefully. And for the first topic -well, let’s say there is a reason why two of the three characters pictured on Court of Twilight’s front cover are translucent. <br /><br />I’ve heard writing described as writers are fashioning the books that they themselves want to read - or would have wanted to read as children, if they’re writing for a younger crowd. Writers are our own book’s first audience. If we want to write something that’s meaningful to other people, it first has to be meaningful to us. I also think this applies to writers who are trying to add scary or unsettling elements into their books. If a writer is going to write something unsettling - it has to be unsettling to the writer, first.<br /><br />I have been frightened by invisible thing since I was a kid. It didn’t matter what it was, I was always much less frightened of monsters that I could see and give a name to than to anything that remained unseen and undefinable. The best example is in the TV shows that scared the daylights out of me as a kid. One was the classic Star Trek episode Devil in the Dark. In the episode, Kirk and Spock are trapped in a mine, trying to evade an apparently murderous alien life form made of rock, and also trying to repair a sabotaged nuclear reactor that’s only hours away from exploding. Perhaps, compared to current CGI monsters, the rock alien the Horta looks more comical than dangerous. But at seven years old it sure scared the dickens out of me. I remember being afraid to go to sleep because I was certain that the alien (who actually turns out to be a sympathetic character by the end of the episode) was going to tunnel through my bedroom wall and eat me. Hidden in the rock, it could travel anywhere - and you wouldn’t know until it was too late.<br /><br />I also watched a lot of old-school Doctor Who - mostly the Tom Baker years - back when the only way to get ahold of such things was through battered VHS tapes ordered from obscure branches of the county library system. One of my favorite episodes was the Pyramids of Mars. The episode features mind control, killer robots disguised as mummies, and trapped evil alien entities posing as Egyptian Gods. But to me, the scariest thing I remember about the episode was actually a force field. <br /><br />Just that. Not the mummies or the explosions, the villainous Sutek or the archaeologist he’s possessed. The force field. Because traditional monsters, you can run from those. You can fight them, or outwit them, or negotiate with them, or any of the other things that Doctor Who and his companions did so well on screen. But it’s hard to do any of that when you can’t even see what it is you’re supposed to be fighting. It’s less like fighting an enemy, and more like a force of nature. Something you can’t see, or hear, or touch. Something that constrains your options, locks you in, and isn’t interested in having any sort of gloating conversations while your hero is stalling for time. It just is. You can’t fight it, you can only withstand it or work around it. And it’s an idea that I think has popped up in many of the characters - good and bad - that populate Court of Twilight.<br />
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Sound intriguing? I hope so. I'll be posting a little more about some of other elements that ended up in the novel - from Irish and Scottish folklore, to psychological theories about what we pay attention to and why - in the coming weeks.Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-33521273687790411182015-09-08T14:57:00.000-08:002015-10-19T21:43:03.174-08:00Things You Should Know About Expedition Cruising<br />
<br />
I’ve spent the last five months working as an expedition guide for a small-ship cruising company in Southeast Alaska. Here are some tips I’m passing on to prospective passengers on expedition-style cruises. These are NOT the big Holland America sorts of cruise ships. <br />
<br />
<b>What is an Expedition Cruise?</b><br />
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Expedition cruising is less about port stops, and more about visiting places that aren’t listed in the travel guides. Remote bays, tiny islands, and un-named salmon streams are all potential destinations. There are no on board gift shops, no evening entertainments, no water slides or squash courts. Instead, there is a group of people all united in their quest to seek out the most of wild Alaska that can be possibly crammed into seven days. Instead there are Zodiacs, kayaks, paddle-boards, and snorkel gear. If your cruise company’s brochure spends more pages talking about its launch system for their on-board fleet of kayaks than its gambling options or evening entertainment, you might be on an expedition cruise. <br />
The difference between big-boat cruising and small-ship cruising is the difference between looking at Alaska and actually experiencing it. Expedition-style cruising is very nature-oriented - small groups, wildlife and scenery-focused itineraries, and options to hike or kayak or explore in zodiacs right from the ship itself. Companies like Lindblad, The Boat Company, Alaska Dream Cruises, UnCruise, and the now-defunct Cruise West are examples of this sort of cruising.<br />
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<b>A Few Things You Should Know About Expedition Boats</b><br />
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So you’re considering a small-ship cruise for your next vacation. Here are a things to consider as you prepare for your vacation.<br />
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<b>1. Cabins are Small</b><br />
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For all but the most expensive cabins, cramped living quarters are a reality of life on boats. However, there are things you can do to maximize space in your cabin. First of all, do what your embarkation documents suggest and bring collapsible luggage. Something like a gym bag or soft-sided roller bag, that can easily be crammed in a corner under your bed once you’ve unpacked, is ideal. Also, consider what clothes you're most likely to use on board. Warm layers, sweaters, rain jackets, hiking pants, brimmed hats, gloves, and woolen socks should rate highly on the list of stuff to make room for. Go ahead and pack a sweatshirt or something comfortable to slip into after a day of adventuring, but definitely plan on most of your clothes being outdoors oriented. Skirts, jewelry, and fancier outfits may not be worth the space they will take up in your cabin, let alone your suitcase.<br />
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Another thing you can do to maximize space in your cabin is to look at the various bed arrangements available in the cabin you’re booking. On my boat, many cabins can be configured either with two twin beds, or one queen (made by shoving the two twin beds together). In the queen configuration, one of the people in the bed is right against the wall, and has to climb over their partner to get in or out. Some couples are OK with this, others aren’t. Many passengers find that a room set up with two twin beds is a better use of the space, as both people have access to the aisle between the beds, as well as the bedside table.<br />
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If you are much over six foot three, it is also worth inquiring about the ceiling height. Not kidding, unfortunately. On my boat, there were always one or two guys per week who walked around the dining room with their head cocked at a weird angle because they were too tall to stand up under our boat’s ridiculously low ceilings…<br />
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Finally, if you choose to book the least expensive class of cabin on the boat, remember that those cabins are less expensive for a reason. You might be closer to engine noises, galley noises, generators, or the occasional whiff of exhaust fumes. Your room might be smaller, or your ceiling lower. Weird air ducts might be snaking across your ceiling, or gurgling water pipes running down your walls. Remember, these cabins cost less for a reason. <br />
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Just remember, your cabin is really only the place you go where you sleep. Regardless of what you pay for the cabin, everybody on the boat is still eating the same food, seeing the same whales, and exploring the same wilderness… <br />
<b><br />2. Boats are Noisy</b><br />
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Ships, especially small ones, are inherently noisy places. There are engines. There are generators, cranes, anchor winches, bow thrusters, pulleys, water pumps, and fans. Most cabins (with a possible exception of the most expensive ones) are often in some way exposed to vessel noise. This isn’t just during the day. If the boat is cruising overnight, the engines will be running. On some itineraries, the boat will cruise to reach an overnight anchorage (dropping the anchor around 11pm, say), and hang out there with the engines off for a few hours. Then, at four or five in the morning, the boat will take off to the day’s operating area, with all the noise (starting the engines, lifting the anchor, firing up the bow thruster) inherent in that process. <br />
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Just remember, you don’t come to Alaska in the summer because you want to get lots of good sleep (the jet lag and the constant daylight make that a difficult goal). Between hiking, the kayaking, the great food, and the wine list, most people don’t have a problem falling asleep at night. Just know ahead of time that your cabin won’t be as quiet as your favorite hotel. (But I’ll bet your favorite hotel doesn’t have whales eyeballing you through the lobby windows, either…)<br />
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<b>3. Motion Sickness Probably Won’t Be A Problem</b><br />
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Smaller vessels are more affected by ocean conditions than larger cruise ships. That being said, sea sickness is generally not a problem for our passengers. The waters of the Inside Passage are usually very calm, and the ships themselves have an interest in staying in waters that are mild enough to let passengers get out in zodiacs and kayaks and play. <br />
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However, certain cruising routes ( as well as certain times of the year) can be more exposed to open ocean conditions. If in doubt, talk to the company - or look at the route map. Is there always land between the route and the open ocean? Are there places where the route goes into places where there isn’t land between the boat and the open Pacific Ocean (such as the Dixon Entrance)? Those are places where the boat may be subject to a little more motion. Rougher sea conditions are also more common very early and very late in the season - a cruise with an exposed route in April or September will probably be much bumpier than a cruise along a protected route in July. <br />
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If seasickness is something you are concerned about, I would recommend picking up a few remedies before getting on the plane. Ginger candy is a good option (I am a big fan of Ginger Altoids), and some passengers have good success with wrist bands and pressure points. A number of over-the-counter medications also combat motion sickness, though the medication needs to be taken before you start feeling ill in order to be effective. If you are worried about possible bad weather while on board, just ask one of the boat crew. They will likely be able to tell you whether you should consider taking the medication. Another very simple solution to motion sickness is to just lie down if you start feeling unwell. Sea sickness is caused by your brain perceiving a conflict between what your eyes are seeing (I’m not moving), and what your inner ear is reporting (I’m totally moving). By lying down and closing your eyes, you’re giving your brain less conflicting information. <br />
In summary, the Inside Passage is protected enough that you shouldn’t let fear of motion sickness (or past bad experiences with motion sickness) bar you from getting on a boat. Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-69395874655779284922014-10-12T11:37:00.001-08:002014-10-12T11:37:42.883-08:00Angevin Hunting Lodge, or, Mare versus the WaspsThis fall I’ve found myself in the Midwest, taking a break from the cold of Alaska, working as a hospitality person for a place I’m going to refer to as Angevin Hunting Lodge. I got here around the end of September, where the high temperatures were peaking in the 80s and 90s. Most days it was even warm first thing in the morning, and it has rained exactly two days in the three weeks I’ve been here. The climate has definitely been a welcome change from dealing with rain and cold most of the summer in Alaska - I’ve seen warmer temperatures here in the past three weeks than I have in the past five years. <br />
<br />The staff house is near a small riparian corridor where a seasonally intermittent creek flows for part of the year. Right now, its home to a series of scummy looking ponds with marshy areas in between, loosely bounded by creek banks. It seems like the only place on the property that’s wet enough to allow trees to grow, and it seems to be a huge wildlife magnet. I’ve seen white-tailed deer down there, as well as foxes, rabbits, wild turkeys, pheasants and a grab bag of smaller birds, including red-tailed hawks and harriers. There's also a beaver dam, which accounts for some of the ponds, and I've seen recent evidence of their handiwork on several freshly gnawed trees, but haven't seen the beavers yet myself. The rest of the property is a mix of open grassland and planted crops - mostly corn and beans, and also full of birds, and Old-Testament Plague numbers of insects, mostly flies and grasshoppers. Since Angevin is a hunting lodge, I haven’t been able to explore much of the rest of the property for fear of being mistaken for a game animal, but going by the creek bottom has become part of my daily walk to and from work. <br />
<br />There is very little artificial light here, and most nights are clear. The most prominent landmarks after dark are the cell phone towers, which are all topped with a bright red light, and they can be seem from miles and miles away. I actually got up in the morning to see the lunar eclipse a few days ago, which is the first time I’ve been able to see something like that since college - clear, dark skies not generally being a feature of Alaskan summers. Often I use my headlamp when I’m walking back to the staff house after evening shifts, and I’ve seen a lot of cool wildlife on those walks. Mostly I just see a speck of eye-shine that blinks and disappears in pretty short order. I’ve been inadvertently headlamping a lot of deer this way. Also, rabbits are never scarier than when six of them are running pell-mell towards you out of nowhere because they’re disoriented by your light.<br />
<br />I’ve also taken to jogging around some of the farm tracks in the immediate area - whenever I can time it so that I am doing so around guest dinner - a pretty safe bet that no one is still going to be out hunting at that hour. I discovered that if I get off of the most heavily used farm tracks, parts of the property are covered with sand burrs. The burrs around here are not screwing around - these are serious darned burrs. The first time I got covered, I made the mistake of trying to pick them off with my fingers. They hurt; and I got a few spikes that broke of inside my finger for the trouble. I pulled the rest of them off with tweezers when I got back to the house. I’ve taken to carrying the tweezers with me when I run now, so that I can deal with them as needed while I’m out. <br />
<br />It’s also very windy here - gusty enough that the wind could legitimately knock you over if you weren’t paying attention. One warning you get is that you can hear the wind in the grass get louder a few seconds before a big gust moves in. The terrain in some ways reminds me of the ocean - big, gentle rolling hills, like someone had taken a sea full of big, glassy, forty-foot waves and frozen it, and then planted grass. <br /><br />I was here for a week at Angevin before the guests arrived, and the first few days at work was a lot of deep cleaning, getting things ready for the guests to arrive. There is a huge fireplace in the main room that is absolutely covered with taxidermied animals and mounted heads - deer, elk, bears, coyote, pheasants. Most of them look pretty impressive - except for one animal that I think must be a badger, that’s been set with a snarling, distinctly un-badger-like look on its face. Like whoever was mounting it really wanted to be working on a bear instead. There’s also one deer that was mounted with its ears in a weird pose - sticking straight out from each side, with an open-mouthed look that I more associate with long-eared dogs sticking their heads out of moving car windows. Otherwise, they look pretty classy. And covered with cobwebs. So I spent an hour with a dusting cloth on a pole, swatting away at the antlers and ears. Some of them were pretty high up, and I have absolutely no idea how they’re attached to the wall, except that they seemed to be swinging around a lot while I was working. I kept picturing in my mind the headline if one of the elk heads fell off the wall and gored me as I was cleaning it - <i>Trophy Animal’s Last Revenge</i>? <br />
<br />The rest of the time was spent vacuuming, mopping, and rubbing wood polish on every piece of wood-furniture in the place. And waging an on-again, off-again war of attrition against the local insect population.<br />
<br />The first week I got here, I was sweeping between 80-100 dead flies out of the staff house every single day. Thankfully the population of insects seems to have diminished with the cooler temperatures, but I estimate that I personally have vacuumed, swept, dusted, mopped, or squashed into oblivion between 1500-2000 dead flies in the past month. At least they don’t bite, which is an advantage they have against the mosquitoes. There seem to be way more dead flies in the house than live ones, and the overall population of live flies never seems to diminish. In addition to being sort of creepy, this raises all sorts of questions about their replacement rate. Is 80-100 the number of flies that are entering the house daily? Are they breeding inside? Where were today’s crop of dead flies yesterday? Were they already inside buzzing around? If so, why didn’t I notice some huge fly horde migrating through the house? Why do they always want to die on the windowsill in the kitchen?<br /><br />
I’m beginning to understand why people in the Middle Ages thought that flies were born via spontaneously arising from rotting meat. I really don’t see another explanation.<br />
<br />Going through the guest rooms a few days before the first clients were arriving, I found a small army of wasps in one of the downstairs rooms. They were all hanging out in between the window and the window blind, so I didn’t actually see them until I’d left the room and saw them all crawling around. Can 12 wasps count as an army? Maybe a brigade. Or a division? Certainly 12 wasps can comprise a wasp SEAL team. The were enough in there that I worry their presence is going to be a persistent issue until we identify and block up their exit. Girl who’s faced down bears afraid of a two inch flying insect? Oh yes.<br />
<br />The day before the guests arrived, I went through all of the guest rooms with another housekeeper and did some last-minute cleaning - including taking on all the wasps. It would not have been possible if the weather was any hotter - it was cool the night before and the wasps were not moving too fast. They were all congregated around the windows and doors. They kept falling out of the window frames as I moved the curtains around and I just hoovered them up as fast as I could. At the end of the day, we had two vacuums filled with angry, pissed-off, wide-awake live wasps. The dust bag on one of the vacuums was see-through, so we got a rather disturbing view of what they were all doing in there, which was mostly crawling all over the place looking angry. World’s Most Disturbing Terrarium. It was very red in tooth and claw in there, and we had no idea how to empty out the vacuum bags without precipitating a mass escape. Eventually, we left the vacuums sitting in the walk-in fridge for a few hours, figuring that if the cold didn’t kill them outright, it would at least slow them down enough that we could deal with them before they attached en masse. <br />
<br />When we got the vacuums out, the wasps were motionless, which was good because we ended up accidentally dumping out the entire contents of one of the vacuums on the floor of the downstairs hallway while trying to figure out how to empty out the Little Vacuum Bag of Horrors. (It was a Dyson - they’re great vacuums, but they are super confusing to operate sometimes.) We ended up using the second vacuum to suck everything back up, and then emptied it out, again.<br />
<br />The wasps are also a feature of life in the staff house. There are at least fewer of them in there, but the vacuum we have doesn’t have enough suction to suck them out of the air like the Dyson at Angevin Lodge, so I’ve mostly left them alone. The wasps have for their part returned the favor - except, apparently, when I cook orange food for lunch. I’ve heard about bees being attracted to the color blue, and I know that the color red can set off seagulls like you were waving a cape at a bull, but I’ve never heard of wasps having anything similar.<br />
<br />I heated up a bowl of tomato soup a few days ago, together with a side of baby carrots and a glass of orange juice. I put the plate down on the kitchen table. Immediately, a wasp comes zipping out of the crack at the top of the windowsill, and starts circling my food, apparently enraptured by all these orange things. I swatted at him a few times, which did nothing to get him to leave. Eventually, I just grabbed the plate and ran outside, hoping he would content himself with the orange juice and let me eat my food. At least outside its generally windy enough that the bugs have to lie low.<br />
<br />The staff house is interesting in other ways as well. For instance, there are two mounted heads in my room - a deer head and a set of caribou antlers. I almost moved rooms to begin with because I found the deer head was creepy - especially waking up with him looking at me - but I’ve sort of gotten used to it. I’m still tempted to use the mounts as towel ‘racks’ every time I come back from the shower…Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-4279874027822772022014-03-10T21:56:00.000-08:002014-09-15T18:32:04.160-08:00Twenty-three sat phones, sixty-nine SPOT trackers, and thirty-two jars of mayonnaiseLast week I spent a few days in Anchorage - visiting my cousin and cheering her on during the Tour of Anchorage ski race, and volunteering for the Iditarod. For those of you who did not grow up reading Gary Paulsen books, the Iditarod is a thousand-mile dog sled race stretching from Anchorage to Nome. The route follows both traditional Native Alaskan trading routes, as well as dog-sled routes used to connect turn-of-the-century gold mining towns to the railway, sending out gold and bringing in mail, food and supplies. The network of dog trails across Western Alaskan were collectively referred to as the Iditarod trail. (Except in Iditarod itself, where it was referred to as the <i>Seward</i> trail, my town being for a time the southern terminus.) The historic trail is perhaps best known for being the route of the serum run to Nome in 1925, in which a series of mushers relayed diphtheria vaccine nearly 700 miles from a railway station outside of Fairbanks to the isolated village of Nome in the wake of an outbreak after the village's port had been cut off by ice for the winter. The mushers relayed the vaccine to the village in only five and a half days. Some of the old mining towns along these historic routes, such as Iditarod itself and Ophir (named after the biblical city that was the source of King Solomon’s wealth), are basically uninhabited apart from the ten days every year during the race.This year is the forty-second Iditarod and the field started out with sixty-nine teams. <br />
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That's sixty-nine humans, actually. The dog count for the race is somewhere north of a thousand. Sixteen dogs per team, times almost seventy teams is… a lot of dogs.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lake Hood, Anchorage, as seen from behind the Millennium Hotel</td></tr>
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One of the first things I did on arrival at the Iditarod HQ (also known as the Millennium Hotel, who graciously sponsors the race by allowing the race’s admin and logistics people to basically take over the hotel for three weeks in March) was take a dog handler class. This is mostly a quick and dirty introduction to sled dog handling for people who are helping at the race’s two starts. (More on the multiple starts later.) I wasn’t handling at either event, but I did want to get checked off as a handler, because it’s a prerequisite for working on the trail checkpoints, which I would like to do in the future. After a quick talk inside, we headed out to the hotel parking lot, where a kind and patient musher whose name I never did get let us practice leading a team around the parking lot. By lead I do not mean standing on the sled, or anything quite that cool. By leading I mean, hanging onto a leash or gangline for dear life, and try to simultaneously (a) keep the team from bolting hell-for-leather down the road and (b) keep slack out of the dog's lines, so that the dogs wouldn’t tangle themselves into immobility. All while jogging on an iced-over parking lot trying to keep up with the dogs. <br />
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After a quick consultation about whether the musher had collision insurance on his sled, the first set of handler-trainees took off around the hotel parking lot. I ended up going around twice, and once I put it out of my mind that I was jogging on ice, it was actually kind of fun. The dogs were, I think, very accommodating. If you ever see or watch footage of the real start, the dogs aren’t quite so laid-back. In fact, once a musher arrives in the starting chute, you’ll see about six burly guys rugby tackle the sled to keep the dogs from charging out early. Our trainee mini-runs were much calmer. After a few circles around the parking lot, they’d figured out that they weren’t actually going on a real run, and they were a little more willing to trot at a sedate speed. By the end of practice, we hadn’t hit any cars, though we did drench the musher when the sled swung wide and into a giant mud puddle. <br />
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The idea with all of this is to make sure that handlers are able to handle the dogs in a safe manner. So no boot spikes, no dangling necklaces, earrings, or lanyards, nothing that could potentially injure a dog’s paws or otherwise trip them up. After all, <i>we</i> aren’t the ones who are running to Nome. And if there’s a question between what’s safest for the human and what’s safest for the dog - well, let's just say that the Iditarod is very careful about making sure that all human volunteers are covered by the race’s insurance policy while they are working. The one bit of human safety information that was passed on to us concerned the sled. This was: if you fall, roll clear of the sled as fast as you can, because it might not be able to stop before running you over.<br />
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This has only happened once in the past few years, but apparently it was pretty dramatic. In the words of one race person - “I have never seen a human body swell up that quick. It was like watching someone inflating a raft.”<br />
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And because once just isn’t enough, the Iditarod starts all the teams twice over two consecutive days. The first is a non-competitive twelve-mile run through downtown Anchorage, which is mandatory for the teams, but for racing purposes doesn’t count. The teams are limited to twelve dogs, and are pulling two sleds and three humans: their musher in the main sled, as well as a handler in a second sled (called a tag sled) and one very lucky Iditarod supporter who has bid on the chance to get carried around Anchorage in the sled’s cargo bag. The calculus of more weight plus fewer dogs means that the teams are a little easier to control (Anchorage’s streets and bike paths not being designed around the turning radiuses of dog sleds). The teams depart every two minutes. After making a twelve-mile circuit through Anchorage, the teams finish up at the Campbell airstrip, where everything gets loaded up into dog trucks and driven two hours north to Willow. Where we do the exact same thing the next day.<br />
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Willow, for most of the year, is a small town of around 1500 people. Except for the day of the Iditarod restart, when it becomes Alaska’s fourth largest city. The ‘real’ Iditarod start happens on a frozen lake in town, at 2pm the day after the ceremonial start in Anchorage. Thousands of people turn out and tailgate on the lake - we could see the smoke from all their barbecues on the TV footage back at HQ. As before, the teams leave in two-minute intervals, but this time there are no tag sleds, and no additional personnel. It’s just one musher, sixteen dogs, a sled full of gear, and a thousand miles of Alaska wilderness. Usually the last teams are starting out across the lake just as the sun is beginning to set.<br />
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Besides being the race's start, Anchorage serves as home base for some of the Alaska-based and Outside media, at least for the first part of the race. In addition to Lower 48 news crews, this year the race is also hosting Norwegian journalists (mostly following Norwegian racers Robert Sorlie, a two-time Iditarod champion, and Joar Ulsom, who finished 7th last year as a first-time Iditarod racer) and a news crew from Al Jazeera(?). There is a big difference in how Alaska newspapers cover the Iditarod and how Outside media cover the Iditarod. Alaska papers cover the race like a sporting event. Outside papers report that Martin Buser has taken an early lead, and IS IT REALLY GETTING DARK AT 4PM? and he is racing hard to the checkpoint in Rohn and THERE ARE NO ROADS TO ANY OF THESE GODDAMN PLACES and Aily Zirkle's taken the lead, pressing her advantage along the iced-over Yukon River and HOW DO PEOPLE LIVE SOMEWHERE THIS COLD, I CAN'T FEEL MY FACE and Jeff King is overtaking the leaders with his more recently-rested team and THERE ARE NO HOTEL ROOMS LEFT IN NOME! Chalk it up to Alaska's ability to impress. But I find it a little amusing.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The Iditarod dropped dog lot behind the Millennium Hotel</td></tr>
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Anchorage is also one of the main staging areas for dogs who are dropped from the race by their musher. Like any endurance athletic event, there are the occasional strains, sprains and bruises, and the Iditarod dogs are no exception. Any dog with an injury can be dropped at a checkpoint, where the dog is looked after by vets and checkpoint staff, and then flown back to Anchorage. There, the dogs are cared for at the Millennium hotel until one of the mushers’ handlers or relatives can pick them up. On March 5th, the back of the hotel was very busy with several dozen dogs who had just been flown in from Rainey Pass and Rohn. About twenty people were running around the dog lot looking after them. Volunteers were draping fleece blankets over any dog that stayed still long enough. Others scoured the lot with buckets and shovels, on pooper scooper patrol. Others made seemingly endless round trips to and from the water cooler and dog food bin, topping off their charges’ dishes. Vets were walking about with stethoscopes. Any dog that yipped or howled was immediately cuddled and made much of - showered with food, water, blankets, fluffed-up straw, cooing noises, high-pitched baby talk, contemplative ear-scratching, deep-tissue shoulder massage, or some combination of the above.<br />
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8R82sIaineC-SF1sL-yMlk05-DhShvmKaXCR6EXbSqlrlInlvbw3Dwo72PD7idr3S5boE5PybdVXT28DvEE1S14Z8gaAEqBY1nHxbrsMM4a3fcEgRLGGKIGTNHLx3J00q0xH83VdCvOfM/s1600/dog+and+plane.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg8R82sIaineC-SF1sL-yMlk05-DhShvmKaXCR6EXbSqlrlInlvbw3Dwo72PD7idr3S5boE5PybdVXT28DvEE1S14Z8gaAEqBY1nHxbrsMM4a3fcEgRLGGKIGTNHLx3J00q0xH83VdCvOfM/s1600/dog+and+plane.jpg" height="320" width="319" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A dropped dog getting some love from a volunteer. One of the Iditarod Air Force planes is in the background. - note the skis.</td></tr>
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The Iditarod has twenty checkpoints, strung out over a thousand miles of wintry Alaska wilderness. None of these checkpoints are connected by road. All transport to and from the sites happens by snowmachine or small plane - a huge number of flying hours being donated by a roster of about thirty bush pilots known as the Iditarod Air Force. Their job starts several weeks before the race even begins, flying out bags of food (people and dog), straw (the dog bedding of choice), and extra supplies to all of the checkpoints. The checkpoints are staffed starting about 48 hours before the first musher is expected to arrive, and are taken down once the last musher leaves - though occasionally weather and or unusually fast/slow mushers can change things considerably. In 2013, musher Martin Buser arrived in the checkpoint of Rohn after running the dogs for nearly twenty hours straight (whereupon he immediately declared his mandatory 24-hour layover). He arrived a good ten hours before the checkpoint was expecting dog traffic. (This move gave him a decisive early lead in the first half of the race, though in the end Buser finished 17th.) Fortunately, with the advent of mushers carrying GPS trackers on their sleds, HQ is able to better track mushers’ imminent arrivals. Frequently during the course of the Iditarod, there is a race-within-the-race to get the checkpoints staffed and set up before the front-running mushers actually arrive.<br />
<br />
While all of this was going on, I was working my first shift in the
Comms department back at the Millennium Hotel. The Comms department is
in charge of internal race communications, and is in some ways sort of a
throwback to the days when none of the checkpoints had internet access,
and were communicating with HQ via sat phone and landlines. The
checkpoints would call in to the Comms office, and we’d write down their
message (teams arriving or leaving the checkpoint, weather forecasts,
numbers of dropped dogs, etc) and get it to the person in HQ that needed
to deal with it. With most (but not all) of the checkpoints having
internet access, the checkpoints mostly email things directly, and we
don’t have quite as much running around to do. But Comms is in charge of
tabulating various reports that the checkpoints send in (weather,
numbers of dropped dogs, lists of volunteers/staff in any given
checkpoint), and also shipping out and troubleshooting all of the remote
communications equipment that is sent out onto the trail. Or assisting
relaying information form one checkpoint to another, such as a
checkpoint with no working internet attempting to call a checkpoint with
no working phone. Over the days I was there, we were dealing with
about one checkpoint a day that was laboring under some form of
communications blackout. <br />
<br />
For example, this year the telecom company that provides our sat phones sent us the wrong kind of power cable. Instead of chargers that plugged into a regular 120 volt outlet, we got chargers that plugged into the cigarette adapter of a car. By the time we discovered this, several of the sat phones had already been flown out to the trail. The telecomm company, when contacted, was helpfully suggesting that the checkpoint staff run out to Radio Shack and buy an adapter. Or they could just charge up the sat phone in their car if the battery went low. Not the most practical of suggestions in a place with no roads (and therefore no cars), and where the closest Radio Shack is over forty miles away by snowmachine. On top of this, one of the checkpoints couldn’t get their computer to work at all. So for the first night of the race, this checkpoint could only report the in and out times of the teams by calling in on sat phones that they were unable to recharge. There were similar sorts of issues throughout my shifts in Comms.<br />
<br />
Mostly what I do as a Comms volunteer is sit in front of a computer, file checkpoint reports, and relay messages down the hall. It’s a lot of hurry up and wait. The same thing happens at the checkpoints as well, where the wait times can be extremely lengthy if the front mushers are delayed (not a problem this year) or if the weather is too bad to fly the volunteers out after the checkpoint has closed. The staff at Finger Lake were stuck at their checkpoint for nearly four days after their last musher left, first because of weather, and then because the flight to pick them up was diverted at the last minute to pick up a dog at a different checkpoint with a medical concern. On the third day, we received a forlorn-sounding email requesting that if we couldn’t fly them out, could we at least arrange to send in ‘a pre-cooked dinner protein, two sachets of oatmeal and a loaf of bread’, which seemed to be their way of delicately informing us that they were running out of food. I wrote back suggesting that they snowshoe to the luxury lodge on the other end of the lake and offer to wash dishes in exchange for their dinner... Someone else wrote back suggesting cannibalism. (FYI, they got out later that day.)<br />
<br />
Besides internal race communications, another thing that Comms is in charge of is mayonnaise. That's not a
typo. The reason for this is that mayo (unlike, apparently, mustard
and ketchup) will freeze at sub-zero temperatures, and the jar will
explode. Anything that can’t freeze, can’t go out with the pre-race
food drops. In many of the remote checkpoints, there is literally no warm place to store anything until after the checkpoint
volunteers arrive. So the mayo goes out with the Comms volunteers
instead. <br />
<br />
Comms is also the de facto lost and found department of the entire Iditarod trail. This covers everything from pre-shipped musher bags being sent to the wrong checkpoint, to beaver-skin mitts lost somewhere on the trail before Rohn, to SPOT trackers, iPod chargers and GoPro camera mounts being left in the checkpoint at Nikolai. <br />
<br />
The middle of the Alaskan wilderness is not the place where you would expect to find lots of cutting edge technology. However, the Iditarod (as the race is currently run) relies a great deal on remote communication, and not just in the checkpoints. Starting a couple of years ago, mushers began carrying GPS trackers on their sleds. For an operational standpoint, the trackers are a lifesaver, because HQ can (most of the time) actually see where the mushers are on the trail, and plan accordingly. For example, if you’re a checkpoint volunteer, it’s a lot easier to wait for your next incoming musher by hitting refresh on your web browser than by standing outside in minus thirty-degree temperatures squinting into the dark for a headlamp. Musher still twenty miles out? Great - set your alarm clock for two hours and get some much-needed sleep.<br />
<br />
Technology also makes things safer for the mushers if they run into serious trouble on the trail. In addition to the GPS trackers, mushers also carry SPOT trackers on their sleds, which come with an SOS button. Activation of the SOS button, even accidentally, means that the musher is automatically withdrawn from the race - but it means that the nearest checkpoint can be alerted very quickly if a musher is injured. Six mushers this year have used this option to end their race - some of them doing so after fairly major injuries - including one concussion and two broken legs. <br />
<br />
Finally, GPS also makes the race a little more accessible to spectators, both inside and outside of Alaska. For a subscription rate of only $34.99, you, too, can log into your home computer, access the tracker page, and watch the mushers race their way to Nome. Not all mushers are fans of the development, one Yukon Quest musher saying that the blips-on-the-screen makes the sport of dog mushing look too much like a video game. I have to say, as a spectator, that watching the blips on the screen is much more satisfying than waiting hours for the race stats leader board to be updated whenever the front-runners enter or leave a checkpoint.<br />
<br />
Before the advent of GPS, watching the Iditarod was kind of like sitting in a stadium watching a baseball game where the teams are playing their innings out in the parking lot. At intervals, the teams run into the stadium and the referee updates the scoreboard with the various points that were scored while the players were out of sight. The teams rest at the water cooler, and the spectators comment on how many burgers and powerade bottles the players are guzzling, as well as their overall condition. “Look at that mud stain on Bib 32’s pants! Do you think he slid into home base?’ Or ‘Bib 14 is on the bench? Does the team have another reliable pitcher if he has to sit out the rest of the game?’ And so forth. Then a few hours later, the teams run back into the parking lot and the whole thing repeats itself.<br />
<br />
Besides being able to ‘see’ the teams as they run, another change that the GPS trackers have made possible is that the statistics for the racing teams can be analyzed just as they are in most other sports. The GPS Tracker automatically shows the team’s position, as well as their current and average speeds, and whether the team is racing or resting (both of which happen a lot over the course of a two-week race). It’s also possible to calculate, for any given team, hours resting versus hours running, hours since last rest, and the hours ‘behind’ the leader for any given team. Some of the best commentary on the race comes from the handlers and relatives of Iditarod mushers, who generally blog, post, or tweet for their respective mushers during the race, and have the time and motivation to go through the GPS tracker information with a fine-toothed comb, comparing the analytics of their musher to those of his or her closest competitors.<br />
<br />
Basically, the blips on the screen makes the race accessible in a way that it wasn’t before GPS. And any piece of technology that can keep fans awake into the wee hours of the morning, refreshing their browsers to ‘watch’ Aily Zirkle and Jeff King running neck and neck during the forty mile run from Koyuk to Elim - well, in my mind, that’s a successful sporting event. Whether the fans can ‘see’ the competitors or not. It's also worth keeping in mind that many of the Iditarod's fans will not EVER have a chance to see any part of the race in person - yet some are still devoted to the race. Some come up from the Lower 48 every year to volunteer. Some send money to sponsor dogs at Alaskan kennels; some devote hours of their time sewing booties and dog coats for canine athletes they will never meet. In 2013, one race fan from Florida called up a pizza place in the village of Unalakleet and arranged to have a pizza delivered to the race checkpoint for 'her' musher, Matt Failor. The woman has since passed away; several of her friends chipped in this year to send him another pizza in her memory. (Unfortunately, he'd already left the checkpoint by the time it was delivered - it is a race, after all. And I have it on good authority that the pizza was heartily enjoyed by the mushers who were still there.) Point is, like every world-class sporting event, this race touches people. The GPS just helps it along.<br />
<br />
As I write this, the leading teams are on track to set a new record for the fastest time completing the race, the previous record being eight days and eighteen hours. It looks like the first FOUR teams into Nome will beat this time; this is an indication of not only how competitive the field is, but also how icy (and therefore fast) parts of the trail have been. Earlier in the race, musher Robert Sorlie, fresh from taking his mandatory 24-hour layover, set a new record for the fastest time from Takotna to Ophir. Conditions-wise, this year has been famous for the lack of snow - so little in the Alaska range that officials were at one point considering moving the race’s start to Fairbanks (which was done once before in 2003, also due to snow conditions). Well, this year, the start stayed in Anchorage, and the teams have been running on - well, not on snow. Due to the bad trail conditions, some have been referring to this years’ race as the iDIRTarod. Check out <a href="http://www.adn.com/2014/03/07/3362586/hold-tight-helmet-cam-footage.html" target="_blank">this video taken via GoPro by musher Jeff King</a> to see what the mushers are dealing with. Keep in mind, this is a champion sled dog driver, and he’s still getting walloped by the trail.<br />
<br />
The faster trail has set a lot of people’s schedules on end. Not only are the checkpoints seeing their first mushers about ten hours earlier than expected, the front-running mushers are likely going to beat some of their families to Nome - families who had planned on being at the finish line to greet them, and are now scrambling to rebook tickets, or get on standby flights. The fast trail times have also undoubtedly affected some of the mushers’ strategies. Dallas Seavey, for example, tends to plan out a very strict run/rest schedule in advance of the race. In previous years, if Dallas found himself ahead of schedule, say, by arriving in a checkpoint half an hour earlier than he planned, he would pay the time forward to his dogs, by allowing them a bonus half hour of rest. This year, that didn’t work so well. As he put it, he was at one point seven hours ahead of his own schedule, and still nine hours behind the fastest teams. Dallas is well known for running his team very conservatively until the last third of the race, where his dogs, often better rested than the leaders in front of him, are finally ‘let off the leash’ to overtake the teams in front.<br />
<br />
At the moment, Jeff King is looking to be this years’ winner, after having overtaken the lead from Aily Zirkle near Koyuk. King has won the Iditarod four times previously; Zirkle has been the second-place finisher two years in a row. All mushers in the race take a mandatory layover of at least 24 hours at one of the checkpoints. This is also when the start time differentials between mushers are evened out - so the musher who started first in Willow will have a slightly longer layover than the musher who started in Willow last. At what point in the race to take the layover is a key piece of most mushers’ strategies. Last year, Martin Buser set racing precedent completely on its head by running a team for nearly 24 straight hours with no major rest periods, all the way to Rohn, where he immediately declared his layover. Traditionally, mushers want to rest their dogs for as many hours as they run them - which means in theory, the best way to get the most advantage from a 24-hour layover is to precede it with a 24-hour run. Prior to 2013, no musher had ever tried this before. Buser’s move initially gave him a ten-hour lead over his nearest competitor, but he didn’t hang onto the lead. This year, Buser and Kelly Maxiner both repeated the early-layover strategy, and Buser, at least, is looking to finish 6th or 7th.<br />
<br />
Many mushers, including Zirkle and the Seaveys (both of whom are previous champions) take their 24 in Takotna, which is slightly before the midpoint of the race. One reason why Takotna is a popular layover spot is because the village’s hospitality is famous - providing a continuous stream of home-made pies and steaks to tired mushers. This year, Jeff King and Sonny Lindner elected to breeze through Takotna, running all the way to the checkpoint of Ruby before taking their layover. The advantage here is that the dogs were more rested later in the race when compared to teams like Busers’, who had taken their layover earlier. When Jeff King left Ruby, he was eight hours behind the leaders; slowly catching up with them over the course of two days.<br />
<br />
Another new race strategy this year is mushers, again including Jeff King and Sonny Lindner, leaving Willow with some of the largest sleds I’ve seen on an Iditarod team. Why so large? To give the sleds lots of cargo room for hauling dogs. King was apparently using this to rest his team’s speediest leaders at intervals while the team was running, by hauling as many as four dogs at a time, one in the sled bag, and three more in a specially-built kennel drug behind the musher like a tag sled. This, apparently, meant that the leaders, fresh from a nice nap while their teammates were running, were more likely to set a faster pace when they were returned to the front of the team. I don’t know that any mushers have done so this year, but driving a sled that can carry four dogs and be pulled by twelve means that a canny musher could, mathematically, give each dog two hours of rest in an eight hour run <i>without ever stopping the team for longer than it takes to switch the dogs around</i>. I’m not sure how workable this would be in practice, but I feel its likely that at at least a few teams in next years’ race will be playing around with this idea.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Interested? Consider keeping tabs on the race next year, or check out <a href="http://iditarod.com/" target="_blank">the official site </a>to check out the highlights from the last race, or to gear up for the next one. <a href="http://iditarod.com/author/sebastian-schnuelle/" target="_blank">Sebastian Schnuelle</a>, a former Iditarod musher, updates a blog during the race that makes for very interesting reading. Who knows, maybe next year you, too will be watching the GPS markers tear down the trail. Or be thinking about calling up a certain pizza place in Unalakleet, Alaska...<br />
<br />Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-13292422484829392632014-02-20T16:04:00.000-09:002014-02-20T16:04:37.155-09:00Adventures in Alaskan Car Ownership
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I am back in Alaska, after having been gone for most of the
winter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Alaska, the hussy that she is, welcomed me back with a nasty head cold, negative windchill, and a
broken-down car.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Missed you, too. Maybe I should have stayed away longer.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> <table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2iYO-X3qTmI_LE_r9c3sE4fI66FSS9vrpD7O7peuVeFOkobSaPeO2cSbRTKv-Pl9DCVVBwRzlgBXMiIkkryNEc-9JLbVmxtVjXgmjyToV_obNrywCz8M4zxJxUwBS8OBFPLmzA-FmDjnq/s1600/kenai+lake.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2iYO-X3qTmI_LE_r9c3sE4fI66FSS9vrpD7O7peuVeFOkobSaPeO2cSbRTKv-Pl9DCVVBwRzlgBXMiIkkryNEc-9JLbVmxtVjXgmjyToV_obNrywCz8M4zxJxUwBS8OBFPLmzA-FmDjnq/s1600/kenai+lake.jpg" height="197" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Looking north across the frozen Kenai Lake</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">I caught a ride down to my cousins on the local bus from Anchorage. These
rides tend to be very interesting from a people-watching perspective, and this trip
was no exception.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I ended up sitting a
row in front of a guy who was going to Seward to (a) work at the local fish
processing plant, and (b) recruit fellow workers at the plant to leave their
jobs there in April and go work for <i>his</i> fishing crew once the salmon season
starts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Apparently, the seafood
processing plant is OK with him doing this. But, the guy was also calling the plant
every time the bus went through patches of cell phone signal, as though the arrangement perhaps wasn't entirely settled. He also kept inviting everyone else on the bus (actually, it was mostly the women)
to come sit next to him, and was telling me a bunch of stories about his years
working on the Time Bandit, one of the boats featured on the TV show Deadliest Catch.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’d never seen any of the episodes he was referring to, but that only made him more eager to fill me in on what I’d
missed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> He never really got the picture that I wasn't looking for a glamorous job in the fishing industry. </span> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Even though
I’d heard about the weird winter, I was still surprised at how little snow was
on the ground. There was a tiny dusting, but I could still see through the snow to the
layer of leaves below it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Everything was
very solidly frozen and a little crunchy to walk on.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Even the unplowed parts of my cousins' Myriad
Network of Victor Creek Driveways were passable - even when driving my station wagon, the Penguin, which has less ground clearance than many species of reptile.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In a lot of ways Alaska looked like it was still
November, and I had never left.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The next day, I was able to jump-start the
Penguin, after being initially defeated by a frozen hood latch on the
car I was jumping from.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span> </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The following day, I took the car into town
to see my doctor, after getting sick with a really bad cold that I suspected was
the flu (it wasn't, thankfully, but the high fever and body aches were sort of pointing that direction).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I went to the doctor's office and then to the grocery store to get some throat drops.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>By this point the snow had shown up in a big
way, and on the way back up the road to my cousins’, the visibility started to
get really bad. I pulled over by the Bear Creek Fire Station to try and clear
off my windshield and wait it out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> The Penguin</span>
idled for about a minute, then a bunch of warning lights lit up dashboard, and
the car died.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When I tried to restart
it, the battery just made those no-hope clicking sounds.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Fortunately, I’d gotten a AAA policy for the
Penguin before I came back north, so I called their 800 number.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The rep I spoke with said that she’d arrange
a tow with the closest available operator, but she couldn’t tell me where the
tow truck would be coming from.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Knowing
the distances between towns in Alaska, this sort of raised a red flag, since if the tow truck were coming from anywhere other than Seward, it would be at least three hours away. The rep assured me, in answer to my questions, that the tow truck would definitely
be there within two hours, and the driver would call me when he was getting
close.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That sounded OK.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So I cowered in the doorway of the fire
station, and called a local taxi.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When
the driver came by, he already had a customer in his car (as well as a
girlfriend and a small dog), and had swung by to get me out of the kindness of
his heart when he heard that my car was dead.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Unfortunately, he was heading out to the end of Nash Road, (which is
about as far away as it is possible to drive in Seward) and told me it would be
at least 45 minutes to an hour before he could drop me off at the school, where
I was hoping to meet Kate and get a ride back to her house.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At this point I was still under the impression that the two truck would be arriving within the next 90 minutes. If the tow truck did arrive on time, and I wasn’t able to get back to my car to meet the driver, I was kind of screwed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So I asked the taxi to just drop me off
before he turned down Nash Road, and I’d walk from there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Not
the best call I’ve ever made.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Remember
how I said I’d come to town originally because I thought I had the flu?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Walking a half mile in blowing snow and negative windchill was
probably not what my doctor had in mind when he told me to rest and drink
fluids.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I made it about twenty yards
before my already-stressed throat just started closing up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">“You
want to breathe <i>this</i> air?” said my throat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“If I have to breathe <i>this</i> air, then maybe
I’m just not going to breathe <i>at all</i>…”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
I huddled with my back to the wind to try and keep from further pissing off my throat, and I called Kate.
She bravely came out in a whiteout and rescued me from the side of the
road.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She is my hero. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">When
people think of the stereotypical Alaskan person, a lot of people tend to think
of someone who’s a little bit like MacGuyver in Carhardts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The state likes to think that we’re all a
big bunch of rugged, highly capable individualists bravely soldiering our way
singlehandedly through the last great wilderness, effortlessly hiking through
mountain ranges, returning in the evening to hand-built cabins and feasting on
meat from the moose we killed with our bare hands back in October.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And yes, there are some people who are actually like this. However,
the Alaska I more typically see is more a population of
somewhat rugged, and mostly capable people who are ferociously interdependent
on each other for a lot of what we need to live here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve asked neighbors for (and been asked for
in return) everything from child care, to borrowing food, fishing equipment,
snowshoes and tire chains. Alaskans are each others' backup plans, and generally the whole system works pretty well. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>Though Alaska has never had a problem with
taking folks down a notch if she suspects you might be getting ideas about your
general competence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Like causing your
car to die in a whiteout on a day you're runing a 101 degree fever.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(At least the Penguin waited until <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">after</i> I’d seen the doctor before it went belly-up.)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Kate
had some work to finish up at the school, so I hung out in her classroom
and<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>waited for the Triple A driver to
call me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He didn’t.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At 5:15 I called Triple A back, and was again
told that the driver would be at the car by 5:30 at the latest. I was further informed that if I
wasn’t at the car by the time the driver arrived, the tow could be
cancelled.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> The rep</span> said she’d contact
dispatch about where the driver actually was, and would call back.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Five minutes later, Triple A calls back...
except it’s someone wanting me to rate the quality of my service call.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I ask him was he aware that I was still
waiting for the driver.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He said no, and
said he’d contact dispatch about where the driver was, and would call me back.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Slightly alarmed that I was going to miss
the driver and have the tow cancelled, Kate and I left the school as soon as we
could, and went back to the car.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No one
there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No one called me back.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My cell phone was getting low on juice, and
my golden-hearted cousin Kate wanted to get home before it got dark, (it was
still snowing) and the visibility went from bad to worse.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At 6pm, we put a note on the car and left.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I called Triple A again when we
got back to Kate’s house.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This time, I
was told that the new arrival time for the driver was 8:05pm; she apologized
that no one had called me to tell me this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>She again said the driver would call when he was 20 minutes away. 8pm
came and went.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I called Triple A a fourth
time, and was told that the driver would arrive within the hour.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(At least this time they weren’t trying to
make up an exact arrival.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Finally at
8:20 we got a call from the driver, and drove back down to Seward to meet him
at the car.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Penguin was sent on its
way to the auto shop, and we went back to the school so that Kate could pick up
a few more things to work on over the weekend.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Turns
out the dispatcher gave the tow to a company coming from… Anchorage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which is totally three hours away, even in good weather.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Kate told me that her family has had similar
issues in the past with Lower 48 dispatchers having no idea about the distances
between Alaska towns.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I found out
during one of the last phone calls with Triple A that I could have had the local
Seward tow truck get the car, and that I would have had to pay the
driver, and then the company would reimburse me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which I would have been<i> totally OK with</i>, had
I known I had that option.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They said
the original dispatcher should have made it clear I had that choice, and
actually suggested I follow up with a complaint.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But at least the car made it down to the shop OK. Happily, the electrical problem was traced to a loose belt, which the mechanic fixed for free.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The shop did find a rusting tie end that
needs to be replaced, (the part is on order from Anchorage) but it was all in
all a much cheaper repair bill that I had feared.</span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJhK6aG-N-8j5Q9gzsYdl7ZAkS8dZkyzFerJCezDXL8H4BtKNZD0Ib-7W2ALcwetK-L9exvahZqnwI8W6Q8US4y17OPIRQ71gaP_YkjvItCES64XQOkSZIh67UNWiy8tcP4fXl1srQ0DaC/s1600/train+tracks.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJhK6aG-N-8j5Q9gzsYdl7ZAkS8dZkyzFerJCezDXL8H4BtKNZD0Ib-7W2ALcwetK-L9exvahZqnwI8W6Q8US4y17OPIRQ71gaP_YkjvItCES64XQOkSZIh67UNWiy8tcP4fXl1srQ0DaC/s1600/train+tracks.jpg" height="320" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Snow-covered train tracks</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>In other car-related
news, my cousins’ new mailbox was taken out by the snowplow a few days ago.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is slightly ironic since they moved the
box to its new location specifically to try and keep it from being hit by cars.
The next morning, we effected repairs to her box (and her neighbors’ which had
also gotten demolished) by tying them to the sides of the railing they had been
mounted to.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Unfortunately, the post
office specifies how close the boxes need to be to the road, so moving the post
back isn’t really an option.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’ll just
hope that in the future the snowplow driver isn’t quite so diligent about
trying to clear the entire shoulder.</span></div>
Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-21144100561270181942014-01-12T18:02:00.004-09:002014-01-12T18:02:57.931-09:00The Wine Trenches
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>For most of
November and December of this winter, I’ve been in West Virginia, and back
working at the Wine Shop as a way to make some extra money while still staying
close enough to help out my mother recover from her hip replacement last
month.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So I’ve been spending a lot of
time in the wine trenches, which are actually pretty good trenches to be in.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For one thing, the customers are generally pretty happy when they're shopping in our store.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The wine
store I work at is part of a small boutique market of about half a dozen
vendors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The various stores makes the market a great place
to people-watch, since we have not only our own shop’s regular customers, but
also the regular customers of all of our neighboring vendors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Many of our regulars are food-obsessed. They look rapturous when talking about goat cheese, and can
remember what specific vintages of wine were served at their wedding
twenty-seven years ago.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These folks are
probably as close as West Virginia gets to having real foodies, and most of
them love our shop. By association, the foodies love everyone who works here,
too.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(And it’s mutual. Mostly.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, this means that taking lunch
breaks in the market’s public areas has its downsides.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Earlier in December, I went on break, and
sat down at a small table in the market’s public area to eat my lunch.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Even though I work at a gourmet food shop, I
am not a gourmet food person.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My lunch
was a two-day-old piece of stale pizza. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Two mouthfuls in, a guy who I vaguely
recognize as a Wine Shop regular comes over to my table, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>leans over the plate and takes a big sniff of
my cold, stale slice of pizza.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>“Is that
any good?” he asks.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I said yes
(though I’m not sure it was very intelligible since my mouth was still full of
pizza), and went back to eating.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He
wandered away with a puzzled look.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> I looked back at my stale pizza and wondered if I'd just outed myself as a food cretin.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I know that
as a wine salesperson, I talk to customers about food.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This usually does not extend to the food
that I bring in for my lunch break.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because
even if I were a real for-sure gourmet cook, no one who works in retail has the
time to make meals like that during December.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So please, Mr. Wine Spectator, do not be judgey about my lunch.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Especially when you lean into my personal
space bubble to sniff my food, and especially when I do not know who you
are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s creepy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>One
seasonal project involved mailing out eighty individual bottles of a particular
cabernet to an architectural firm’s clients.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The specific wine they chose comes in a non-standard-sized wine bottle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are only a handful of non-standard-sized wines in the store, but they had to go and pick one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And since the bottle is a weird shape, it
doesn’t fit in the wine shipping containers very well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So I spent the better part of three days finagling the bottles into the
shipping containers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It took a ton of tissue
paper to wedge the bottles so they didn’t rattle around.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The eighty bottles were all going to separate
addresses all over town, and the total cost of shipping the wine came to over twelve hundred
dollars.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The company would have done a
lot better to pay an intern to rent a van and hand-deliver the wine in person. I mean,<i> I</i> would have happily delivered
all that wine to their clients for a quarter of what FedEx is charging them.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>One fun
thing that happens during the holiday season is that we host a lot of wine
tastings in the store.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We hold the
tastings in an adjacent building, and generally we try six or seven wines, plus a little appetizer spread of fancy cheese, crackers, chocolates, or
whatever else we think would pair well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>One themed tasting we do every year is a blind tasting of red
wines.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Prior to the tasting, we wrap
all the bottles in brown bags so that the neither the servers nor the
tasters have any idea what wine they’re tasting until the very end.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is, according to many wine
experts, a better way to judge a wine, because the taster isn’t being
influenced by the wine’s price.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(People
generally perceive more expensive wines as tasting better.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The day before the blind tasting, our
manager had a strange phone conversation with one of our regular customers,
in which he had to explain that we do not actually blindfold people for the
blind tasting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(She was unsure about
attending because she ‘didn’t think her husband would be into that sort of
thing.’)</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The only
problem with the wine tastings is that we almost always run out of tickets<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>- they nearly always sell out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which means that the customers who know this
will call the shop as soon as we open on Sunday to reserve tickets.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The phone starts ringing at noon and
literally does not stop for fifteen minutes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After that, we get walk-in sales, and more phone calls, and eventually the tasting sells out. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We hit
this limit around 1:30pm and from then until the tasting begins at 2pm, it's the Half Hour of
Rage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is the one time where we
have to do what no sales person ever wants to do to a client.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We have to tell them ‘No’.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> This</span> pisses some people off to no end.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And I have to deal with a steady stream of
pissed or and/or disappointed customers, occasionally interspersed with the
arrival of someone who was bright enough to reserve a spot in advance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not all of the disappointed customers are
mad.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s usually a trajectory – from
confidence that their request will be offered, to a sudden dip into confusion
and disappointment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some customers
continue from there to either outrage (or plain old rage) or kicked-puppy-like
disappointment. </div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>In some
ways, the timing works out perfectly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>By
the time we deal with the last of the disgruntled customers, the tastings has already
started, and will be a growing pile of not-quite-empty bottles that need
emptying…</div>
Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-5967640316889881302013-10-13T19:53:00.001-08:002013-10-13T19:53:21.735-08:00Windblown in Aialik Bay
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>For boats equipped with sails, wind on the ocean can be a wonderful thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For boats that do not have sails, wind (especially a lot of it at once) can be one of the most tricky things we deal with.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This was brought home to me on a trip I
guided at the Iceberg Lodge this past June, which was the first of many interesting (and occasionally terrifying) scenarios that Alaska handed out to the Iceberg Lodge this summer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOBZbaE0d7Fsxo7XgJQnulMMVnCo93hmoMDMWRrf30Wld2-W1ZuRtP90lzGEVMKLj9Zawzm7fDz9w5B-Z58ZL1L_HlN73EIGTtB5fXvue-cwvOMEkpr0R1dDF9OiM4qHLux1VNda8NWDLz/s1600/aialik+bay+calm+day.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhOBZbaE0d7Fsxo7XgJQnulMMVnCo93hmoMDMWRrf30Wld2-W1ZuRtP90lzGEVMKLj9Zawzm7fDz9w5B-Z58ZL1L_HlN73EIGTtB5fXvue-cwvOMEkpr0R1dDF9OiM4qHLux1VNda8NWDLz/s400/aialik+bay+calm+day.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A lone kayak on Aialik Bay</td></tr>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>It was a
few days past the summer solstice, and I was out with another guide I’ll call
Jay and ten guests.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’d been scheduled
to do a trip across Aialik Bay to a cove on the far shore, but the guides who
went out to the beach to scout conditions and set up the kayaks reported wind
at our launch point.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We decided that
we’d be better off sticking to a route that kept us closer to shore, and
informed our clients of the change in plan.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>By the time we actually left the point with guests, the wind had died
down to almost nothing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Heading north along
the shores of the bay, we actually had pretty idyllic paddling conditions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After about a mile, the group came to the
southern tip of a small island, and we began working our way up its western
side, paddling in a wide, protected channel <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>between the island and the mainland.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mostly, the island drops down to the water as a series of 30-50 foot cliffs, which are covered with wildflowers and are very scenic to look at, but useless if you're looking for someplace to land. We checked out some puffins, watched a few
murrelets popping up and down. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>About
forty minutes later, we reached the north tip of the island, and spent a few
minutes photographing the glacier at the head of the bay.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then we started paddling back south,
continuing our loop around the island by paddling back along the eastern, more
exposed side of the island.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>After about
ten minutes, this began to look like a bad call.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Almost immediately after we started south, the
wind began picking up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Halfway down the
island, we reached a sort of marginal landing beach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This beach is easy to land on in calm
conditions, but with any sort of swell or waves, it becomes very tricky to land there safely.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’d hoped to be able to make
a pit stop here, but the swell was picking up enough that I didn’t think we’d
be able to land there without courting problems.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We kept paddling south.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And the wind kept blowing, and the swell
kept growing larger.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At one point, the
waves began coming in so rapidly that my first thought was that we were dealing
with a particularly weird boat wake.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of
course, it wasn’t a boat wake; there wasn’t a boat anywhere in the area that
could have created it. What we did have was the wind, and lots of it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have never in four years of paddling in
the bay seen the weather turn that much that quickly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When we passed middle beach, the conditions
were mildly choppy, and by the time we got to the south end, we were paddling
in whitecaps and gusts, and I was pretty thoroughly alarmed. After leaving the marginal beach, I was thinking that it was just going to be a
slog getting back to the launch point because we were going to be paddling in a
headwind the entire way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A few minutes
later, I was thinking that we needed to get back on the protected side of the
island (where there was a protected beach we could land on), and
re-evaluate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A few minutes after that,
I was thinking that we weren’t even going to make it that far.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>We went
from marginal paddling conditions straight into hazardous paddling conditions in the
space of about eight minutes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Fortunately,
there was one good thing about our current position.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There was a potential landing beach on the
south tip of the island, and we were very, very close to it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The bad thing about this beach was that it
faced south, which meant that it was getting pummeled by the
incoming waves.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Also, we were paddling
south, which meant that to get to the beach, we were going to have to turn
broadside to the waves.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Basically this
meant that instead paddling directly into the waves, and letting the bow cut
through the wave, we were going to have to turn so that the waves were hitting
the entire length of the kayak.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you
haven’t spend much time in a kayak, here’s a quick fact: kayaks are not very
stable when broadsides to waves. </div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>As soon as
we got within sight of the beach, I started yelling to the other boats that we
were making a landing on the south end of the island, told them to follow my
boat, and warned them that as we made our turn, the boats would feel less
stable until we got the waves back at our stern.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(This sounded more comforting than what I
was thinking, which was that as we made the turn, there was a good chance that
one or more of the boats might capsize.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The wind was loud enough at this point that I really did have to yell
just to try and be heard over it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Apparently
that wasn’t even enough, because Jay, faithfully tailing the back of the group,
went into loudspeaker mode and started repeating everything I just said for the
people at the back of the group.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(He
later told me that from the back, I was barely audible even when I was shouting.) And then we were
making our turn, and the waves were slapping the side of my boat, pushing the
left-hand side up into the air as the wave crested beneath me, and then
immediately sucking the left side into the water as the wave passed on.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There was perhaps a minute when I didn’t
dare turn around to look behind me because it was taking all of my balance and
attention to keep my own boat under control, never mind trying to<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>keep track of anyone else.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One good thing that the group had going for
us was that the clients were all in double kayaks, which are wider, heavier and
more stable than the single kayaks that Jay and I were paddling, which meant that
Jay and I were getting the rockiest ride. I still thought that one of the client
boats was going to biff it when they rounded the corner.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Another
stroke with the paddle, and my bow was finally pointed towards the beach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I could still hear Jay behind me hollering
instructions to the clients, which mostly consisted of trying to keep the boats
from bumping into each other as they made the turn.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The doubles have wide turning radiuses under
the best of circumstances, and the waves weren’t making it any easier for the
clients to control their boats.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Once I
felt that the waves were behind me, I paddled hard towards the beach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I hit the shore and jumped out of my
kayak.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As I stood up, the wind picked
up my heavy-duty, vinyl spray skirt and blew it straight out in front of
me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I pulled my kayak far enough out of
the water that the waves wouldn’t suck it back out to sea, and immediately
started landing boats.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was not a
textbook landing; I basically just grabbed the nearest bow and pulled it far enough up
the beach that the kayak grounded out, and then went right for the next boat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jay was doing his best to try and stagger
the clients coming in so that they weren’t all paddling in on top of each
other, but it was still quite a train wreck.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The good thing was that no one had flipped their kayak; I had been fully
expecting that Jay was going to have to pick up a couple of swimmers before
he’d be able to land.</div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>As soon as
everyone was on shore, Jay became my hero and immediately jumped into
client care mode – making sure that everyone had some granola bars or a couple
of fruit strips, passing out my bag of extra gloves and hats to anyone who was
cold.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The wind was still howling at this
point, and the wind chill, combined with the fact that the guests were no
longer creating their own heat by paddling, had made the apparent temperature
feel significantly colder than when we were on the water.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I got on the radio, passing on the
information about what had happened and where we were, talking at various
points to the Iceberg Lodge, to an area water taxi, and to another Lodge guide
who had run into the same weather event while paddling on the more protected
side of the island.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>While I was
managing the logistics of all this, Jay got all the clients huddled in a corner
of the beach that was slightly protected from the wind, and started leading
everyone in a rousing chorus of the Gilligan’s Island theme song – which seemed
appropriate since our three-hour tour had turned into the whole group getting
stranded on an island.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He also led a
discussion on what the concept of wilderness meant to the individual guests, lead everyone in
some staying-warm calisthenics, cleaned up some trash off the beach,
and started collecting driftwood to make some wilderness beach art.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In other words, he was a rock star, and kept
the clients busy enough that they didn’t have time to get bored, or worried, or
cold.</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>After about
an hour, we were picked up from the beach by our trusty local water taxi, the
Weather or Knot, and thanked the captain and crew profusely, especially since he’d never
actually landed on that beach before.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We loaded
up our kayaks and clients, and then immediately went over to another
beach on the mainland, to pick up the other Lodge guide and his clients.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Since this group had been paddling along the
western side of the island, they were much more protected from the swell than
we were, but they were paddling into a headwind so strong that the group was
having difficulty making any forward progress.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>We loaded everyone back up in the water taxi, and were dropped off at
the landing beach, somewhat windblown but otherwise in good shape. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We thanked the captain again, sent the
clients off to the Lodge to eat and warm up, and started unloading and putting
away our boats.</div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2paizjTOV5vTWxQ9nPmw-AVcPSj5t6cQAulmKpr9Bc6Z9XT2X0VA5jFhjGXB27SnIpxIc4Is28td3rFZK2RspEII9J08WWeFJCJKONI2apOvzGHcInZ0xIKKTR8AFmt9VDZnWQPz7gtmZ/s1600/grey+weather+in+gulf.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj2paizjTOV5vTWxQ9nPmw-AVcPSj5t6cQAulmKpr9Bc6Z9XT2X0VA5jFhjGXB27SnIpxIc4Is28td3rFZK2RspEII9J08WWeFJCJKONI2apOvzGHcInZ0xIKKTR8AFmt9VDZnWQPz7gtmZ/s400/grey+weather+in+gulf.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Grey weather in the Gulf of Alaska</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The
retrospective on this one is that, basically, we were <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">very</i> lucky that we were so close to a landing beach – any landing
beach – when the weather turned.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We
were also very lucky that the guides who had scouted the beach early in the
morning had seen wind and made the call to change our route.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Again, the conditions when we launched were
good, and there was nothing in the weather forecast that would indicate we were
in for rough weather.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Had the guides
not noticed the wind – or had Jay and I decided to paddle our original
open-water route when we launched in glassy conditions – the outcome of our
adventure could have been very different.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Had the wind caught us while we were out in the middle of the bay, our
only feasible option would have been to pull all the kayaks together in a big
raft (which is more stable) and hope that the wind blew us good places (like
the landing beach on the north end of the bay, or into the protected side of
the island) and not bad places (straight into an iceberg, or into a sea cliff,
or straight into the face of Aialik Glacier).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>We decided on a conservative route, and stuck with that decision even
when it looked like we could have changed it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>This was good.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Another
thing this has confirmed is my tendency to be somewhat of a packrat when it
comes to guiding trips.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In this
case, we had food and extra gloves and hats on hand to give to people who were
cold.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Had we been on the island for any
significant length of time (if the water taxi hadn’t been able to pick us up,
for example), or if any of the clients had actually capsized, having stuff at
hand would have been even more critical.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>(On a typical trip when I am out with clients, I have with me six pairs
of extra hats and gloves, an extra fleece top, an extra pair of socks, two
bivvy sacks, two sets of XL shirts and pants, two emergency blankets, half a
dozen granola bars, extra water and water purification tablets, a client care
kit with sunscreen, bug spray, hand cream, and feminine hygiene essentials, two
first aid kits (my own and my company’s) and my personal survival kit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And this is just for a day trip.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is why transporting gear on kayaks is
so much nicer than transporting gear by backpack - you can fit a ****ton of gear
into a kayak hatch.<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>So that was
another good thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One thing that didn’t
go so well was actually getting the kayaks onto the beach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Once the kayaks made their turn and felt the
waves behind their boats, many of the clients just stopped paddling, counting
on the waves to get the kayak the rest of the way into shore.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The clients were right to assume that the
waves would do this; they were wrong to assume that the waves would do this in
a way they’d appreciate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>If you’re
riding a wave but not paddling, you’re basically just letting the water do
whatever it wants with the boat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If the
wave is pushing your boat at a good angle, you get a free ride in
whatever direction the wave is taking you.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>If the wave is pushing at a bad angle, it can spin the boat sideways and
cause all sorts of nastiness, from a fairly straightforward drenching to the
sort of landing where you get slammed head-first into the beach with the boat on top of
you.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Fortunately, none of our clients
got surfed by the waves, and even our train wreck of a landing was enough to
get everyone on shore in one piece.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>However, if even one boat had turned sideways and rolled onto the beach,
it could have gone very differently – for one thing, as closely as everyone was
bunched up trying to land, if one boat had rolled or turned sideways, the other
kayaks might not have been able to stop before running over the boat ahead of
them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>We did a
few things right, we did a few things wrong.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The depressing take-away message is that I can’t really pinpoint a fatal
flaw – some one little thing that we ignored, or didn’t do, that would have
prevented us from getting caught in this weather event entirely.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Kind of hard to predict when even the
National Weather Service gets caught off guard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not only did the NWS not see this coming,
but it also took the local tour boat fleet by surprise as well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On the water, we customarily monitor the
local whale-watching chatter channel on our marine radios, and the entire
morning we were hearing snatches of transmissions from some of the tour boats
further out in the Gulf of Alaska.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>None
of what I was able to hear sounded good.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In retrospect, that broken radio chatter turned out to be out best
indication that the weather was about to get epic, and is something I will
definitely be paying more attention to in the future.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>As it turned
out, most of those boats Jay and I heard ended up going back to the harbor due to the
conditions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Even the lodge’s own boat
was forced to go back to town without dropping off any of their guests.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For a while, it was looking like the water
taxi<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>crew who’d rescued us were going to
be stuck in the bay overnight.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Fortunately, the weather settled down late in the day, and the water
taxi was able to get back to town, bringing all of its own day-trip guests, as
well as a few of our guests who were trying to get back to town.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>During all of the ensuing chaos, several of
the guests from the morning tour made a point of thanking Jay and I <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>for taking such good care of them, and for
being so careful of their safety.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(I
think they were mostly impressed that Jay and I got first a landing beach and
then a water taxi to seemingly materialize out of nowhere.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I am not really sure whether the clients
actually realized that we had crossed the line between perceived risk and
actual risk, but we were paddling in conditions on the wrong side of that line
for a lot longer than I would have liked.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Everyone was able to control their boat, no one capsized, and no one
freaked out, but had we continued paddling in those conditions, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think it would only have been a matter of
time before one or more of the above situations became a reality.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Once I got
back to the Lodge and was able to check the marine weather, the forecast up for
the following day was the information we should have gotten for the day we’d
just survived - wind calm becoming south twenty knots, seas building to four
feet.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Given that the weather out in the
Gulf had been bad that morning, I think that what we got caught up in wasn’t so
much a change in the wind speed as a change in the wind’s direction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If a strong wind changed direction in such a
way that it was able to suddenly blow unimpeded down the whole twenty-mile
length of Aialik Bay, it could possibly bring about the rapid change of
conditions that Jay and I experienced.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There are some narrow lakes that are famous for this, and these events
are considered very dangerous precisely because there is little to no warning
that the wind is increasing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>First, it’s
calm.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And then out of nowhere, the wind
goes haywire.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve never seen or heard
of this happening in Aialik, but its my best guess for what was going on that
day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Either that, or someone at the
celestial weather control board found the suck knob, and turned it up to
eleven.</div>
Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-36456722198887462082013-10-03T09:29:00.000-08:002013-10-03T14:50:39.532-08:00The Best of the Guest Comment Cards<style>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Like many
places, the Iceberg Lodge solicits comments from our guests concerning how they
enjoyed their stay, and whether they have any suggestions for how we can
improve in the future.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Generally, these
cards are filled with lots of thank yous to the staff, and recollections of
fond memories of their stay.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Very
occasionally, we get some interesting suggestions, often from guests who take
exception to some of our safety regulations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Here are a few of the more memorable ones. </div>
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<br /></div>
<ul>
<li><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We
would've liked was a little more independence. For example, checking out a
kayak and exploring on our own.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Even
if you make people do an extra safety briefing before checking out equipment,
it would be worth it</span></i><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">.</span></li>
</ul>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Even
the staff that work here go through several training sessions in the kayaks
before they are EVER allowed to take a kayak out by themselves.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> The main reason for this is the water temperature - it's</span> pretty cold.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You might
have figured that out because of all the glaciers and snow and icebergs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, unless you happened to pack
your own orange survival suit like the Coast Guard wear, if you capsize your
boat, hypothermia is pretty much a guarantee.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Do you want a safety briefing for that?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Here goes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">"Here’s your
kayak.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Don’t flip it over.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you do flip it over, make sure you’re really
close to shore, since you’ll only have about ten minutes before your muscles
get so cold that they stop working and you can’t swim.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As long as you are wearing your life jacket,
you won’t actually drown.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Instead, you’ll
slowly succumb to hypothermia over the next 30-60 minutes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you DO get to shore, be prepared to yell
and wave your arms a lot.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not only will
this increase your chances of someone hearing you and coming to your rescue,
but it will also help to keep the bears from bothering you in the
meantime."<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<ul>
<li><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">…
have the guides sit with the guests at dinner when they are not working.</span></i></li>
</ul>
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When guides aren’t working, I generally refrain from trying
to tell them what to do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just like your
boss probably doesn’t call you up at home to tell you where you ought to eat
dinner.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We could ask the staff to
interact with guests during their time off, but then we’d have to call it work. </div>
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<br /></div>
<ul>
<li><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">…I
would appreciate more honesty in your advertising.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Your brochures all show close up pictures of
bears, whales, seals, and glaciers, but national park rules prohibit getting
closer than 1/4 mile to glaciers or seals, or 300 yards from bears.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, unless I come with a 500-600 mm lens,
most visitors cannot get those pictures… </span></i><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"></span></li>
</ul>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>You’re
absolutely right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Every year, the
National Park Service tries to explain the rules and regulations governing proper
viewing distances between people and wildlife, but the bears and whales almost
never attend these meetings.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Seriously,
though, it is the goal of all land management agencies and all reputable guide
services to manage encounters with wildlife in a way that is (a) safe for the
humans and (b) not disruptive to the wildlife.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>What distance this translates into varies pretty considerably – most
parks and guided outfits have their own best practices.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And FYI, 300 yards is, as best I know, the
recommended safe viewing distance for grizzly bears in Denali – it is usually
possible to safely view black bears in the Iceberg Lodge's operating area at a much closer range. Since it's three days into the government shutdown as I'm writing this, it's a bad time to try and look up specifics.</span></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> However,</span>
let's assume that you're right, and that the regulations of the park you're visiting prohibit approaching within 300 yards of a bear. Even if we go out with the firm intention of abiding by this rule, the bears have no problem getting closer – sometimes MUCH closer – to
us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve had guests take amazing
full-screen action shots of bears by patiently scoping the animals with their
tripods from a few hundred yards away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve
also had guests take amazing full-screen action shots of bears without even
using the zoom feature on their point and shoot (generally while simultaneously
yelling hey bear and frantically backing away).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span> </span><br />
<br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What kind of encounter you get (if
you are lucky enough to get an encounter at all) is mostly a matter of luck, and timing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Time is really the key element here. The more time you
spend out looking for wildlife, the better your chances of finding it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The more trips you sign up for, the more before-breakfast-walks you drag yourself out of bed for, the longer you
spend scanning the shores of the lagoon with your binoculars, the better your chances of being there for the
once-in-a-lifetime moment when Mom Bear brings Junior down to the lagoon for his
first fishing lesson. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> And the better your chances of getting the moment on film. </span></span><br />
<br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Generally, the
best way to get great photos during a visit to Alaska is to bring a lot of
patience.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(A decent SLR and a tripod
wouldn’t go amiss, either.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The people
who leave the lodge most dissatisfied with their photo opportunities are the ones
who brought too much camera gear, and not enough patience.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Finally, just in case you're wondering, all of the pictures on our website
were taken on site, and many of the wildlife shots used a lot less zoom than
you might think.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<ul>
<li><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">…Expand
your trip options to include hiking up to the face of the glacier and walking
on the glacier.</span></i></li>
</ul>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>As you
might have noticed, none of our glacier trips actually go right up to the face
of the glacier.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is because we feel
that the need to bring all of our clients back to the lodge alive supersedes
the need to take pictures of you straddling a crevasse or licking an
iceberg.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Though admittedly those would
look really cool on Facebook.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No
matter how much they might look like it – glaciers are not actually big blue
rocks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They are made of ice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They are not easy to walk on.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They’re slippery.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They have crevasses. They melt, and bits fall off.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sometimes
the bits are beach-ball sized.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sometimes
the bits are the size of an office building.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><br />
<br />
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">Tidewater glaciers, like the ones we have near the Iceberg Lodge, are even more unstable than other types of glaciers because the water undercuts the glacier's face. Walking on top of </span>something that is that unstable
(even if it doesn’t look it) requires a huge amount of specialized expertise and climbing gear.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are a number of
companies in Alaska that offer commercial glacier trekking or ice climbing <a href="http://www.exitglacierguides.com/">–Exit Glacier Guides</a> and <a href="http://www.micaguides.com/">MICA Guides</a> are two that I can recommend – but I know of no
commercial companies, either in Alaska or out of it, that offer guided trekking
on tidewater glaciers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is
probably a reason for that.</div>
Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-92039877558594662072013-04-04T19:11:00.000-08:002013-04-04T19:16:37.354-08:00Alaskan Signs of Spring<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">Sp<span style="font-size: large;">ring in Alaska<span style="font-size: large;"> is...</span></span></span></span><br />
<ul>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day of the vernal equinox. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day the first rock sandpiper arrives in town. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day that your
favorite restaurant opens for the season.
</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day the sun rises in the east
and sets in the west, instead of whatever weird alternate schedule it’s been
following since November. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The first day
when you can actually see grass in your yard.
</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The first day that the grass actually looks green. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day you drain the
antifreeze out of the water system on your boat/RV/vacation home. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> The day the humpback whales return from
Hawaii. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day your neighbor returns
from Hawaii. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day you can smell the
dog poop melting out of snow on the waterfront. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> The day you take the studded tires off of
the car. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day when ice is no longer
filling in all the potholes on the road to the dump. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day you can see the yellow parking lines
in the Safeway parking lot. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> The day a
motorhome camps at the campground. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The
day a tent camper camps at the campground.
</span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The first day that the bears raid trash cans on Dora Way. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day the first cruise ship arrives in
port. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The first day of salmon-fishing season. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> The day you realize its been a
week since you had to scrape ice off of your car. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"> The day you walk outside without a coat and
don’t regret the decision. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day you
want to eat ice cream. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day you run
into a seasonal worker who’s gotten back into town. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day you spot your first group of
tourists. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day you see a leaf
sprouting on a cottonwood tree. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day
you decide that the skis should probably go back in the garage. </span></span></li>
<li><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">The day you grill outside. </span></span></li>
</ul>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBQPXPpHCXJvKHtZ85CQdEMP5TqJcOs680i8udlAY7QIC6da9YX9kwA5Mvt7XUMeXzA8RRa2SFudAz1bn8Q7SE3Vh5VRJ82doXggHvJnhU_Hpne1_kyv8_SxYDSpiMx6tkcs_hTikLb9GW/s1600/humpback+whale+2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="195" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhBQPXPpHCXJvKHtZ85CQdEMP5TqJcOs680i8udlAY7QIC6da9YX9kwA5Mvt7XUMeXzA8RRa2SFudAz1bn8Q7SE3Vh5VRJ82doXggHvJnhU_Hpne1_kyv8_SxYDSpiMx6tkcs_hTikLb9GW/s320/humpback+whale+2.jpg" width="320" /></a></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">
</span></span>Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-38611410980511227292013-03-14T21:11:00.001-08:002013-03-14T21:52:32.727-08:00Turn Left for Reality Bypass<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Here in Seward, we've had six or eight inches of new snow today, right after the guy across the street spent all day snowplowing his yard. No, not his driveway - his entire yard. There is a man who is fed up with winter. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">I overheard a very interesting conversation today at a local coffee shop,
touching on everything from General Allenby’s military
tactics in the Middle East during WWI , to the Illuminati – who apparently have an
ambiguously nefarious plan to reduce the world’s population by 8% by 2022. (Apparently, the Illuminati are less
effectiv</span><span style="font-size: small;">e in their nefariousness than they are popularly portrayed, since the
US Census Bureau estimates that the world population will add another billion
by 2030.) Also, I learned that under the
affordable care act, by 2017 we are all going to have microchips injected into the
backs of our necks, apparently part of some sort of nefarious plan to revisit the highlights of the
6<sup>th</sup> season of the X-Files. Or perhaps to drum up some extra business for America's veterinarians.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">I love political conversations in rural areas – nowhere
outside of a ComicCon convention can you <span style="font-size: small;">spend an hour having </span>a conversatio<span style="font-size: small;">n</span> that
bypasses reality on so many different levels.
Like an evening on a farm in rural Scotland where a drunk goat farmer
spent an hour telling me about how George Bush (senior) was actually an alien
reptile who came from deep inside the Earth – which is hollow, apparently – with
these little UFOs that flew in and out through a giant hole in the North
Pole. Which wouldn’t make him an alien reptile,
come to think of it, just a regular ol’ Earth-based saucer-flying reptile. What the farmer was still trying to figure
out was whether that made George W. Bush (the president at the time) <span style="font-size: small;">some sort of</span> hybrid half-reptile alien. He seemed to think that W’s paternity had some
bearing on him being a legitimate president; I kept having to remind him that
the US presidency wasn’t an inherited title. But we were both drunk at the time, so I
might be misremembering some of the details.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">It makes me want to go back in time and see what the conspiracy theorists back in the 1980s and 1990s were predicting would have happened by 2013, and see how those predictions have worked out. My guess is, not <span style="font-size: small;">very accurately...</span></span></span> </div>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><br /></span>
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Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-32593786003018864542013-03-01T20:47:00.002-09:002013-03-14T21:26:53.034-08:00So You Want To Work in Alaska?<style>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>So, for
whatever reason, you’ve decided that you want to spend a summer working in
Alaska.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe it’s for the adventure,
for the wildlife, or for the fact that a job up here fits in really well with
your school’s academic calendar.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Good
for you.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Working up here can be both a
one-off summer adventure, or a first step into full-time job, or a brand-new career completely different from anything you ever thought you'd realistically be doing with your life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(If that sounds like an
enticement, great.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If that sounds like
a warning, that’s because it is.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Alaska is an amazing place, although if you’re reading this, I’m
assuming you’ve already figured that out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And the summer is the best time of the year (some people would say the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">only</i> good time of year) to visit the
state.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now here’s the reality check
–the jobs up here are about as competitive as anywhere else these days.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Probably even more competitive since the
Lower 48 reality-TV film industry has discovered the state, and has set to work
chronicling everything from the fishing industry to the highway patrol to the
efforts of Alaska-grown amateur gold prospectors, cattle ranchers, and
survivalists.</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The folks
who come up to Alaska to work tend to fall into one of two broad categories –
the wilderness people, and the wildlife people.</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Wilderness
people get an REI dividend check that is larger than some people’s weekly pay. You have a home ski mountain, and have climbed all of the major 5.10 routes in
a three state area.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Most of your
clothing wicks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> You</span> need a roof rack
or small trailer to <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>fit all of their outdoor
gear in their car.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> You</span> leave your
house at 4AM on a Saturday in order to start your backpacking trip as soon as
the sun comes up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> You</span> can talk
knowledgably about varying models of camp stoves, and have strong opinions
about the advisability of bringing down sleeping bags into the backcountry. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1ziYeJv4Xy6HNXs6IZouixc1RLCXTK9araiEExaevSSpp7Way7LvBrjEqYAOvhI_99qwFVCCxxq3AH_mS3_04pfCgnQtEpd0chFkOQ_x6r69h5DZ7-Zd6Xrm7K5USnHjcf0Hh6RLE6N_b/s1600/wilderness.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh1ziYeJv4Xy6HNXs6IZouixc1RLCXTK9araiEExaevSSpp7Way7LvBrjEqYAOvhI_99qwFVCCxxq3AH_mS3_04pfCgnQtEpd0chFkOQ_x6r69h5DZ7-Zd6Xrm7K5USnHjcf0Hh6RLE6N_b/s320/wilderness.jpg" width="240" /></a></td></tr>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The other
large contingent of Alaskan seasonal workers are the wildlife people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If your first reaction when you see an
animal is to make high-pitched cooing sounds, you are probably a wildlife person.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Other signs of a potential wildlife person
include ownership of high-grade camera equipment, a library containing an
inordinate number of natural history books, and framed pictures of penguins hanging
on your wall.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you have ever
purchased a field guide to a region you have no immediate intention of
visiting, just to learn more about the indigenous animals, you are a wildlife
person.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You’ll be in good company up
here – many Alaskan tourists, to one degree or another, are wildlife people – and
the bigger, cuter, and furrier the wildlife is, the better.</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>So once you
get up here, you’ll have plenty of company.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But first, you need to get a job, or at the very least, come up here
with enough skills, experience, and determination to be able to find a job
after you arrive.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To that end, here are
a few suggestions for what <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> to put
in your cover letter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmxRU4Bay5exBu0dI_4UhgDbzfTDiPcG8qEtFn-ihzT_5xRasoJh66qM4E6ZDFVNlZqjatCbdjnSlVwl68PD2ikT3GJ0dt7RHVWT5eeG93O5mFGgUbNmSazssRv2WeFXG_eElf94pzFx1h/s1600/bear+outer+bay.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmxRU4Bay5exBu0dI_4UhgDbzfTDiPcG8qEtFn-ihzT_5xRasoJh66qM4E6ZDFVNlZqjatCbdjnSlVwl68PD2ikT3GJ0dt7RHVWT5eeG93O5mFGgUbNmSazssRv2WeFXG_eElf94pzFx1h/s320/bear+outer+bay.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Don’t tell
us about how you want to come up here to experience Nature.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Trust us, we already know.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you are applying from Ohio to work as a
housekeeper for the Middle-of-Nowhere Lodge, or at a gift shop at the Denali
National Park entrance area, we already know that the only reason you’re
interested in the job is because of its proximity to an iconic Alaskan National
Park.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But you’d look like a better
employment prospect if you keep this knowledge to yourself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because it’s pretty clear that no one comes
to Alaska because of the appealing climate, or the cultural opportunities, or
really, any reason other than better access to giant wilderness areas, and
really cool wildlife.</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Second,
don’t necessarily be so keen to talk about how you spend all your free time
hiking or mountain biking or extreme zorbing or whatever it is you like to do
outside.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Is it relevant to the job
you’re applying for?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Are you coming to
Alaska to be a zorb guide?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If not,
perhaps leave that out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you have
legitimate outdoor or sports credentials – a wilderness first aid course, or a
summer working at a climbing wall, or you earned your Eagle Scout award by building
a handicap-accessible nature trail for your local city park, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">and</i> you can make these accomplishments vaguely
relevant to the job you are applying for, then by all means mention them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But don’t talk about how you want to come to
Alaska to hike and fish and take pictures of wildlife from unsafe
distances.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s why the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">tourists</i> come to Alaska.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Instead, tell us what you can do that will
facilitate the tourists having those experiences.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Once you get up here, you, too will have
the opportunity to hike, fish, and piss off (excuse me, photograph) the local
wildlife.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But before you can do all
that, first you have to convince someone in Alaska to actually give you a
job.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Also, it’s
probably not a great idea to talk about how bad-ass of an outdoor person you
are, unless it’s relevant to the job you’re applying for, and you have the
experience or certifications to back it up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Because the person who is reading your cover letter is very probably a long-term
resident, or sourdough, Alaskan.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They shoot
their own meat, go skijoring with their dogs at minus twenty degrees, and club
salmon on the head with sticks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This
person has been in the state long enough to get a year-round position with the company
that’s hiring you, and could very well be the manger or owner.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This person is probably more of an outdoor guru
than you are, and probably has a number of highly skilled outdoor guides
working for them already.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These are the
folks who watch the Discovery Channel, and talk about how Bear Grylls is doing
it all wrong.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Don’t try to out-outdoors
them, because it probably won’t work.</div>
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.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>So what are
Alaskan employers looking for?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Generally
the same things as employers everywhere – experience, reliability, and a good
attitude.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That being said, here are a
few suggestions for prospective Alaskan summer workers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is especially tailored to anyone who is
looking to get a job as a guide or outdoor instructor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(I’d like to point out that these are my own
personal opinions, not those of any company I work for, nor am I involved in
hiring decisions for any company I work for.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And if you ask me about how to get a summer job in Alaska, I will tell
you what I tell everybody – look on coolworks.com.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>If you are
interested in working as a guide, have you taken a wilderness first aid
course?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If the outdoor recreation field
has anything like an industry-standard basic qualification, the wilderness
first responder, or WFR, is definitely it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In some ways, it is more valuable to a prospective guide than a college
degree.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(I’ve worked with guides that
have masters’ degrees in wildlife management, and with others that dropped out
of college in their second semester.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Some veteran guides have a list of outdoor certifications as long as
your arm, but generally for a guide starting out, the single most helpful
credential you can have would be a WFR.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It’s a ten-day course, offered by the National Outdoor Leadership School as well as a number of other regional outdoor training or recreation companies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Expect
to pay around $700-800 for the course, and if you want to stay certified you’ll
need to take a 3-day refresher course every two years.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Even for
people who have no intention of ever working as a guide, or ever setting foot
in the wilderness, I’d recommend taking this course simply for the life skills
it imparts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s sort of like the Red Cross
first aid course as taught by MacGuyver.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Plus, even if you never mean to put yourself in a wilderness situation,
a wilderness situation could show up nonetheless – such as a friend who came
very close to delivering his wife’s baby in their living room when she went
into labor during a blizzard that had shut down most of the roads in their
county.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I am not the kind of person
that tends to throw around the word ‘empowering’ very often, but in this
instance I think the term applies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Aside from
wilderness medical skills, the other two most important qualities we’re looking
for are both hard to put in a resume – people skills, and good judgment, or what
I’d like to call advanced common sense.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>By and large, beginning guides
don’t need to be wildlife experts, or botanists, or know the latin name for
sphagnum moss.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, beginning
guides <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">do</i> need to be able to learn basic
information about the local plants and animals, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">and</i> also find a way to convey that information to guests in an
engaging manner – all the while cracking jokes, being friendly, and putting clients
at ease in what is for most people a very unfamiliar environment. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s where the people skills come in.</div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNA-FBJpWPsDjXJb7aybyTFBzKNDi9J98ZONDJJqdo0NXs1spOKoJkur9ehcOWljtO1w6mAMxCla2SEHqQfdOK-_coMo1uYHmickR9knuuRq9QOkDN79M1aYcnkNbgiWCsvTi-xnku0rnh/s1600/tourists+and+bear.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNA-FBJpWPsDjXJb7aybyTFBzKNDi9J98ZONDJJqdo0NXs1spOKoJkur9ehcOWljtO1w6mAMxCla2SEHqQfdOK-_coMo1uYHmickR9knuuRq9QOkDN79M1aYcnkNbgiWCsvTi-xnku0rnh/s320/tourists+and+bear.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Generally
speaking, tourists to Alaska don’t need the Verna Pratt Field Guide to Alaskan
Wildflowers thrown at them on their first day in the state.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pointing out the really bright and colorful
flowers, such as lupine, fireweed, and monkeyflower, will be enough to satisfy
most non-plant people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>People who are seeing
a bear in the wild for the first time do not actually care about the flowers
growing next to the bear.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But the tourists both need and appreciate
having someone with them in the field who acts as a host – sharing their
knowledge and enthusiasm, lending someone bug spray when they forgot theirs
back at their cabin, or asking how their pictures of that bear turned out when
you see them at the bar that evening.</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>People
skills are also very relevant to group safety.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>As a guide, you will at times be the sole person in charge of a group of
people who may never have been in a backcountry area before this trip.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You need to be able to constantly assess both
the clients and the environment around you for possible hazards.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You need to know not only your own
abilities, but you need to be able to accurately assess the abilities and
comfort level of your clients, some of whom you will have known for less than a
day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This requires both leadership
skills as well as tactful group management – advanced people skills, so to
speak.</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>If you are
reasonably outdoorsy person applying to work as a kayak guide, your company can
and will teach you how to be a good sea kayaker.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They will teach you things like how to
rescue clients that have flipped their kayak, or how to tow an exhausted
paddler back to shore.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They will teach
you skills.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They will teach you
technical expertise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The thing to keep
in mind is that technical expertise is NOT the same thing as good
judgment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Good judgment is about when
and how to use those skills – and more importantly, it is about being able to
run your trips conservatively enough so that you DO NOT HAVE TO CALL UPON your awesome
rescue skills.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is something that’s
harder to teach, if it can be taught at all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Mostly I think it’s equal parts common sense and experience.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For most beginning guides, myself included,
it’s a happy combination of common sense and plain luck that carries us (and
our clients) through our first few months on the job.</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Even after
you’ve gained some experience, not every trip you lead will go according to
plan.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, I can just about
guarantee that something will go spectacularly wrong on at least one or two
trips a season, and you will be the person who will, for better or worse, be
dealing with it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Your choices will
decide whether the trip ends badly, or ends as a story that everybody has a
good laugh about later that night at the bar.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>One of the
best ways to learn from trip catastrophes is to talk about them with other
guides.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Be prepared to share mistakes
or near-misses, or things that just didn’t go as well as they might have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Be prepared to listen to other guides’
mistakes – we all have a few, trust me – and try to learn from them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Your</i>
mistakes are going to teach you more than you could ever learn from anyone else
– however, it will speed up your learning curve (and would probably be a lot
better for your clients) if you tried to learn as much as you can from <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">other</i> guides’ mistakes as well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>For
example, after leading canoe trips in Pedersen Lagoon for three years, I now
know where all of the sandbars and barely-submerged rocks in the lagoon
are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I did not learn this from studying
a map, or scouring the coastline with binoculars at a low tide.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mostly, I learned where all the rocks are by
smacking into them with my canoe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Once
you’ve hit a submerged rock with a canoe full of guests (and their usual
reaction when the boat hits a submerged object is to peer at the water like
they suspect that crocodiles are going to pluck them from the boat at any
moment), you’ll remember the location of that particular rock for the rest of
your natural life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And you’ll swear
that you’re never again going to do anything so stupid as get a canoe full of
guests hung up on a sandbar, in full view of some guy with a tripod taking
pictures from the dock.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which will be
true until you find another sandbar at the other side of the lagoon next week...</div>
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Still interested in working up here? Then I wish you the best of luck. (And if you're still looking for a job in Alaska, be sure to check out coolworks.com - they have a pretty comprehensive list of seasonal Alaskan employers...) </div>
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Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-50649264458630322352012-12-10T20:12:00.001-09:002012-12-11T19:26:16.691-09:00Things They Don't Tell You About Winter in Alaska<style>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">You already knew about the months of limited daylight, the sub-zero windchill, and the 8-10 feet of snow. Here's what they don't tell you about winter in the 49th state. </span></div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeCmjCZj5IbHOktg609iBQ0GfE7apq8hGIt2j8_yPRfksgA-mBlsJqgnS6GHa2oXSBMshVb2d1QHOsxT4UgCiQ8QltzsH-r5I_Mfex5q0jFaNmIuv7D55rmGdkPwx20WcsN_-fnMUt08xo/s1600/seward+winter.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="187" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgeCmjCZj5IbHOktg609iBQ0GfE7apq8hGIt2j8_yPRfksgA-mBlsJqgnS6GHa2oXSBMshVb2d1QHOsxT4UgCiQ8QltzsH-r5I_Mfex5q0jFaNmIuv7D55rmGdkPwx20WcsN_-fnMUt08xo/s400/seward+winter.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Resurrection Bay, Seward</td></tr>
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<ul>
<li>If a piece of metal gets cold enough, your hand will stick to it. Kind of like the kid licking the flagpole, except you don't even need to use a particularly wet body part - your index finger and an iced-over gate latch will demonstrate this effect just fine.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>In the winter, you will give electric
shocks of static electricity to everything you touch.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Doorknobs, pets, children, iPods…<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If it can carry a charge, you will give it
one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> Constantly.</span></li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Most city streets get temporary winter-season dividers between the oncoming lanes, in the form of giant piles of snow that have been plowed into the middle of the road and left until spring. Intersections between streets are usually left clear - but don't plan on being able to turn left into someone's driveway, because that side of the street is probably barricaded. </li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>Your car needs winter gear, too - except gear for the car is more expensive. Getting a set of studded tires, an engine block heater, and an auto-start will set you back about $600 or so. It makes that Patagonia 800-fill goose down parka with the detachable faux-fur hood look cheap in comparison </li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Christmas is sot of a big deal in Alaska, partially because in the middle of a cold, dark time of the year, it’s
good to be able to look forward to a time where a family can gather together
and enjoy a respite from the daily challenges of winter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For most Alaskans, this means a vacation to
Hawaii.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For the rest of us, Christmas
dinner will do in a pinch.</span> <span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"> </span></li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li>The dead animals get festive - because
nothing says ‘Alaskan holidays’ quite like a string of Christmas lights
decorating a caribou head.</li>
</ul>
<ul>
</ul>
<ul>
</ul>
<ul>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The weather becomes even more a topic
of conversation than it does in the summer, perhaps because there isn’t much
else going on.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve found that Alaskans
are more creative in discussing the weather than people in the Lower 48.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For one, the weather here is a little more
intense – we routinely measure snow in feet, not inches, and wind speed in
Beaufort storm scales, not miles per hour.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Another popular climactic pastime is comparing the current weather to
whatever the weather was doing at the same time last year, or the year before.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(If nothing else, you can always say that no
matter how bad the weather is this week/month/season, it is better than the same
week/month/season in 2008.)</span></li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">A subset about talking about weather is
talking about earthquakes – how long it lasted, what shook and for how long,
under what sort of object you took shelter, and what you did immediately
afterwards to make sure a tsunami wasn’t on its way to obliterate coastal towns in your area.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></li>
</ul>
<ul>
<li><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">When traveling outside of the state,
most non-Alaskans you meet will be fascinated by your local weather - even if
it isn’t all that fascinating to you.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Prepare
for these inevitable conversations by making sure that you know the current average
temperature, hours of daylight, and inches/feet of snow on the ground for your
area before leaving the state.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>People
you have never met before will, on learning you are from Alaska, want to know
your local weather, and how many feet of snow is sitting in your yard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They will want to know how you personally
can stand living somewhere that dark and cold.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you would rather not spend your entire
vacation discussing seasonal affective disorder, consider just telling people
you live ‘out west’.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is a good
strategy for dodging weather conversations entirely.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No one wants to hear about your weather if
there is even a remote chance that you live in southern California.</span></li>
</ul>
<br />
<br />Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-7384126424177725332012-10-19T11:12:00.001-08:002012-10-19T11:12:31.555-08:00Fall Update
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Seward has
gotten its first official snowfall of the winter, and in a bit of impeccable
timing, I managed to be out of town when it happened.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I am currently in West Virginia, visiting
family there for a few weeks, before returning to Alaska for six months of
winter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Perhaps this is only fair,
since I missed out on winter entirely last year (I was in New Zealand, so I got
three summers back-to-back).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4g3JgUu78sob4WfPvjCrVr5dZkjgWsdt-Uc480apBQzSkKpZ__rL-cInJ2st37Zhwe9pAfKGwOmKqk9UvwCAs8stwTNgceygCM8mWlfoxvQE-nFeriUV8wA5y3p-tJtZ9e-MPGC82uWGN/s1600/IMG_2435.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj4g3JgUu78sob4WfPvjCrVr5dZkjgWsdt-Uc480apBQzSkKpZ__rL-cInJ2st37Zhwe9pAfKGwOmKqk9UvwCAs8stwTNgceygCM8mWlfoxvQE-nFeriUV8wA5y3p-tJtZ9e-MPGC82uWGN/s400/IMG_2435.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Iceberg Lodge girls</td></tr>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The Iceberg
Lodge is all closed up for the winter, and ready to slumber under the snow
until next spring.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I spent the end of
September helping a local dog kennel clean up after a flood.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With this particular flood, it wasn’t so
much the water we were cleaning up as it was the gravel and rocks that the
flood left behind.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The stream that
flooded contained a lot of glacier debris – silt and rocks, mostly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And a lot of those silt and rocks got washed
into the buildings from the force of the water.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I spent a lot of time shoveling rocks out of
the building, with the help of a few small bulldozers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some of the rocks were pretty large – I found
it amazing that water could move something that I had trouble lifting with a
shovel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sometimes, the work felt a little bit like
excavating Pompeii.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Or what might
happen if you pissed off someone who works at the Metco gravel lot. </div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Fortunately,
my car survived the flood just fine – we were concerned about our cars when we
saw on the internet flooded-out pictures of the building across the street from
where we had parked them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Fortunately,
the water didn’t get high enough to damage anything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Comparatively
speaking, the Iceberg Lodge did very well during the flood because the water
didn’t actually threaten any of our buildings.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>(A few of them leak, but we've known that for a while.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And the plant life around here can deal with
the weather just fine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Our forest’s moss
carpet will take the worst rain and ask for more.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We have puddles and mud holes on our roads, (basically,
wherever we have build and cleared things), but the forest itself never looks
like it’s gone through any hard rain.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The moss just
soaks it in like a green organic sponge.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The little pools in the forest get bigger, and creeks get wilder, but the plants still seem pretty happy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I think the rain must be rough on
the bears.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I didn’t see any bears at all during
the Iceberg Lodge's closedown period, which is unusual.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However, we did get a bear ceremonially seeing
us off at the Point on the day we left, as well as the day-of-departure
rainbow.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Both of these are becoming
Iceberg Lodge traditions.</span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmE8rTqzbypZvdKL0fPJkiBLs9UPfdXfyl5m55NxscyLrKmsgtwOH3Ti-juQanE-q1oK26hV3u-5as81jMEpjlntYqGJVKB72wxR6kW2Q8kwI152zqkRZRjDoDkUDpjUgIsczkxRZjR3pE/s1600/IMG_2391.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjmE8rTqzbypZvdKL0fPJkiBLs9UPfdXfyl5m55NxscyLrKmsgtwOH3Ti-juQanE-q1oK26hV3u-5as81jMEpjlntYqGJVKB72wxR6kW2Q8kwI152zqkRZRjDoDkUDpjUgIsczkxRZjR3pE/s400/IMG_2391.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">A rainbow over Pedersen Lagoon</td></tr>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The
other interesting thing about the shutdown week is that there has been a huge
increase in the amount of trash that washed up on our beach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think the tsunami debris is beginning to
arrive in a big way; if this continue over the winter, the beaches are going to
be pretty coated by the time we get back in the spring.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mostly, the trash on the beaches is a big
pain to clean up, but there is also always the opportunity to find cool stuff
mixed in with all the Styrofoam flecks and empty plastic bottles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I found a few small fishing buoys this year,
and every year I find at least two ball caps over the course of the
summer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The prize for the best sea
debris this year definitely goes to our maintenance guy, who found a bag of
Zodiac emergency gear carefully tied off to a tree, which had been uprooted and
washed up on our beach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There was a
flashlight in there, with extra batteries, pumps, blige spones, and some things
that looked like part of a boat repair kit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>We hope that whoever lost their gear, they didn’t actually need any of
it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-32979954313951349622012-08-31T20:33:00.003-08:002012-08-31T20:33:17.612-08:00 Misapprehensions About Bears
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Last
week I ended up going to Seward to get a tooth looked at, which fortunately
turned out to be fine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was in town
for just over 16 hours, and went back to the Iceberg Lodge a day early because
of the atrocious marine forecast for the following day. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The night I got back, the wind started
blowing hard enough that the lodge’s broken roof cap (damaged by the heavy
snowfall earlier in the season)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>was
flapping in the wind like a thunder sheet, lending a dinner theatre ‘dark and
stormy night’ sort of atmosphere to the evening.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(At times, it also sounded like someone
racking up a dozen of the world’s largest pool balls.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Apparently, one of the maintenance men
climbed up on the roof sometime after midnight and screwed down the flapping
roof bit to keep it from breaking itself or anything else it was banging
against.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In other news, the tarp over
our kayaks is apparently shredded beyond all hope of repair, (and this was the
assessment of someone who makes a habit of keeping around a lot of ratty,
useless tarps).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I haven’t looked at it
myself, since the beach was something of a no-go zone for most of the morning,
due to the high winds.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There were
sustained winds in the 40 mph range, gusting up to 70mph, which made it
difficult even to walk around.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Also,
those winds speeds are enough to turn ordinary beach sand into weaponized
projectiles; the guys who were out scouting the beach were wearing ski
goggles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Fortunately, the wind died
down enough for the boat to make it out here the following day, although they
had a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">very</i> rough ride coming
out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now we have only 19 guests in
camp, down from 38 the previous day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That
day was the last full house of the season, and it would have been very Iceberg-Lodge-typical
if the last full house stretched into another night because we couldn’t get the
departing guests back to Seward.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Sometimes, it seems like this place enjoys finding ways to screw us over
– massive snow, epic rain, week-long gales, marauding wildlife, exploding
septic systems, etc….<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Now
that we’re back to very small numbers of guests, my job has gotten a whole lot
easier.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve had two great days of
guiding, despite the fact that it’s been raining constantly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Such as, nature hikes with only two people,
and kayak trips with only one guest.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>One of the guests was from Kenya, and a birder, who was talking about
lions walking through his property last month…<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Later that afternoon, I went out with just
one guest, M, who is also in the tourism business.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We took a double kayak to the upper lagoon,
and paddled as much open water as we could find.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The icebergs are close to being as melted
out as they are going to get this season, so we were able to explore in a lot
of nooks and corners.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There were also
50-60 seals in the water, and it was a really fun trip.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Then
today, M and I went to Aialik Glacier, again as a solo trip.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was a great trip for several reasons –
trips with only one guest in no way resemble actual work, because all of the
crowd control and group management issues magically vanish.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You just get to go out and paddle, and talk
about seals, which is sort of what I do on my days off, anyway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We were also able to get to a part of the
glacier’s moraine that I haven’t been able to get to for nearly a month, thanks
to a change in the glacier’s melt-water route, which has cut a new river right
down the middle of our old landing beach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>(How that happened is a story worthy of its own blog post.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Today, M and I were able to paddle around the
melt-water and land on a sketchy, boulder-heavy part of the beach, which was
manageable only because I only had one boat to worry about. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I dragged the kayak across the boulders and
tied it off to a rock above the storm shelf.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>From there, we were able to walk out along the moraine to a bluff
overlooking the glacier, and up to the side of the glacier itself.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The glacier has been advancing along that
side all summer, and is pushing a pile of rocks ahead of it like a bulldozer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In
June, there was a big quartz rock about thirty feet from the ice that we used as
a ‘do not pass’ barrier.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That rock is now
totally covered by ice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I estimate the
glacier has come forward by about 60-80 feet in the past three months.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s around 8 inches a day or something in
that range.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The rubble pile in front of the ice is close
to seven feet tall now, and it’s starting to plow through a small stand of alders,
which are being slowly uprooted and buried.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It’s like watching a slow-motion bulldozer. Not having seen that section
of the glacier for nearly a month makes the speed of the ice’s advance even
more apparent.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Also, walking around and
exploring on the moraine was good because it gave us something to do on land,
as opposed to spending the whole tour sitting in a kayak, in the pouring rain.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Also
at the Aialik moraine, we saw a calving event large enough to produce a wave
high enough to prove my point about the danger of glacier-caused tsunami waves
- but not high enough to actually wipe us from the face of the earth, which is
nice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(About one tour in a hundred ends
up <s>running for their lives </s>rapidly evacuating to higher ground somewhere
on the Aialik moraine.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Also
a bonus, there was a bear in the meadow all day today.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We saw him when we went out to set up the
boats, where he appeared to vaguely pay attention to our ATVs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Walking out with M at the beginning of our
tour, the bear sat up long enough to give us a blank stare, and then lay back
down even before M could take a picture.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Walking back to the lodge five hours later, he was still in the same
place, grazing on grass in the rain.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Usually,
guests here are afraid of bears up until the moment they actually see one.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Our bears are freakishly tolerant of people,
and they spend a lot of time eating grass.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>They are sort like cows, except with way better PR.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s hard to be mortally terrified of an
animal that won’t even bother to sit up when you walk by.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not to say that the bears aren’t dangerous,
because they can be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you surprise a
bear, or get between a bear and food, or a bear and cubs, then all bets are
off.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But mostly, the bears aren’t
interested in being predatory.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They’re
just here for the salmon.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The
closest I’ve gotten to a bear this year was hiking a section of trail near
Pedersen Glacier that we don’t normally use.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The bear heard us coming, and decided to climb up a spruce tree and wait
us out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which was very sensible of the
bear.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Unfortunately, the tree the bear
picked was (a) not very tall, and (b) right next to the trail we were hiking
down.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I didn’t see the bear until we
were under the tree.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The bear let out
a howl, probably because he thought we were deliberately going after him, and
scrambled a few feet further up the trunk.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Instant chaos for about thirty seconds, as me and the line of guests
behind me abruptly reverse direction and beat a hasty retreat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We watched the bear for about two minutes
from further down the trail, which was long enough for the guests to all take
pictures, and for the bear to start making noises complaining about when we
were going to back off and let him get out of the damn tree.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We bushwhacked through the alders for about
thirty yards to detour around the bear at a safe distance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The two young boys on the trip thought the
bear encounter was the coolest thing ever, and were pestering me for bear stories
for the rest of the hike.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then back at
the lodge, they were telling their very own bear story to anyone who would
listen.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The
bears are one thing that makes living out here very interesting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The bears are our neighbors, and they wander
through camp like they own the place sometimes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Also, bears are one of the big things that people
from Outside associate with Alaska.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It
came up a lot in New Zealand when I told people where I was from.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“Hi, my name is Mareth; I’m from Alaska.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Allow me to correct your misapprehensions
about bears.”</span></div>
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<br /></div>
Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-63487715542040498712012-08-12T17:56:00.003-08:002012-08-12T17:56:47.168-08:00Ermine Invasions<style>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>My
most recent tour to the Upper Lagoon was an exercise in snatching partial
victory from the jaws of defeat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On
trips to the Upper Lagoon, we paddle through a tidally-influenced channel that
only permits travel up to Pedersen Glacier around certain high tides.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Usually, the channel carries the glacier’s
meltwater downstream to the bay.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But on
some high tides, the level of the sea rises enough that the stream actually
reverses directions – instead of fresh water flowing downstream, it’s salt
water flowing uphill.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This particular
tide height was only 7.6, (we like to run at 8 feet or higher), so it was sort
of a marginal high tide to begin with.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Additionally, we only had two people sign up for the trip, which is a
good thing in some respects (guiding trips become progressively easier the fewer
clients there are), but it meant that we needed to paddle up in kayaks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Three people (myself and the clients) are
simply not enough people to effectively paddle an eight-person canoe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Unfortunately, tours in kayaks require a lot
more time at the beginning of the trip to get everyone dressed in their spray
skirts and cover the safety points about the boats.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, that was two strikes against the trip
going as planned.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The third strike came
in the form of one of the slowest client paddling speeds that I have yet seen
this summer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Some beginning kayakers
do not immediately make the connection that in order to propel a boat through
the water, you need to actually encounter some resistance against your paddle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some clients get their paddle wet, and not
much else.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The combination of a
marginal tide, a late start, and a slow paddling speed made an unfortunate
trifecta; by the time we reached the tidal channel, it was already a half an
hour past the posted high tide.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For
reasons I don’t fully understand, the tides in the lagoon can be delayed up to
two hours from the posted Seward tides - however, this wasn’t a high enough
tide for the water to stack up like that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>By the tie we got to the channel, the current had already reversed, and
was flowing downstream, opposite the way we wanted to go.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I
pulled out my tow rope, clipped my clients’ boat onto a ten-foot tether and
started paddling for all I was worth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>With the weight of the double kayak, plus the fact that the current was
heading the other direction, it was definitely a workout.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We inched our way into the channel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After a few minute, we pulled far enough
ahead of a low take-out on the opposite bank where we could potentially land
the kayaks on shore.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I hollered to my
clients that we probably weren’t going to be able to make it much further in
(mostly because I knew that I was going to run out of steam eventually, and
also that I didn’t know how great a tour experience my clients would have if
the whole tour was just inch-by-inch progress up the channel…)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They seemed good with the change in plan, so
we turned and ferried across the channel to the opposite bank.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>One
confession: I didn’t quite know how landing two kayaks in current, and with a
boat on a tow, would actually work.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had visions of getting my kayak into shore, then
having to stop paddling to get out of my boat, and subsequently being dragged
back into the water by the weight of the boat I was towing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So I asked my people to paddle hard into
shore and try to beach their boats as much as they could; which they did pretty
well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There was slack on the rope as I
was getting out; then I pulled their kayak further up the bank and helped them
climb out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not nearly as dramatic as I
had expected.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Once
we were on shore, we walked about 70 yards up the bank to a<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>place where we could see the upper lagoon,
and get views of all the grounded icebergs at the front of Pedersen
Glacier.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I felt very sorry for one of
the clients, who had problems with her feet, and was having trouble walking in
the rubber boots.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On the plus side,
since it was just the three of us, we were really able to tailor the trip
around what they were interested in doing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>So we walked out to the shore, took some pictures, and walked back.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is another reason why tours with just a
few clients are wonderful; its much easier to manage unexpected situations when
there are fewer people to keep track of.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The
next day was good; it was a five-bear day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The first bear was grazing in the meadow as we were setting up boats for
our morning trips.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The second and third
bears were seen distantly as we were paddling across the lagoon for the morning
canoe and hiking tour.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The third and
fourth bears were a double feature for the afternoon canoe trip.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>There
is one bear around the lodge that we can recognize by sight, thanks to a large
brown saddle mark on his rear end.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This
brown spot has earned the bear the name Cinnamon Bun.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Cinnamon Bun has occasionally been seen
hanging out with another bear; we wonder if the bears are litter-mates, as they
don’t seem to act much like a male/female pair.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Anyway,
Cinnamon Bun and the other bear were both on the shore of the lagoon, vacuuming
up the plantago that grows near the high-tide line.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was very clear from watching them who was
the dominant bear.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Cinnamon Bun was
just mowing the grass; he didn’t seem to care what the other bear was
doing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The little bear, on the other
hand, was paying very close attention to Cinnamon Bun.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Every
time Cinnamon Bun moved closer, the little bear would stop eating and take a
few steps further away, and stare at Cinnamon Bun for a few seconds before
going back to eating.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Eventually,
Cinnamon Bun started moving purposefully along the beach in the direction of
the other bear; the little guy<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>got
spooked.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He loped up the beach and
disappeared into the greenery, while Cinnamon Bun continued walking along and
cropping plants.</span></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> The next day, strangely</span>,
none of our guests wanted to go on any trips in the afternoon.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This turned out to be a good thing, as the best wildlife
sightings of the day all took place inside the guest cabins.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The
guests in cabin eight had gone back to their room after lunch, and were taking
a nap.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They woke up in a hurry when a
squirrel jumped in bed with them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Within
the hour, ermine were reported breaking into two other cabins (apparently
they’d been taking clues from the squirrels).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The ermine look like tiny brown ferrets; they might appear cute, but they
are also carnivorous murderers. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One of the ermine had drug a dead vole into
the cabin with it; it apparently wanted to stockpile some food in their
bed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>From the refuge of some high furniture, the
clients took photos with their iPad of the ermine ransacking
their room.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At the bar that night,
everyone was sharing pictures they’d taken of ermine and squirrels climbing bedframes,
chewing gloves, and scurrying in and out of cracks in the walls.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Two of the lodge staff were kept busy for a
couple of hours chasing the wildlife out of the cabins, and crawling under the
buildings with cans of spray-foam insulation, trying to identify and plug up their
access routes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The lodge manager comp’ed
a bottle of wine to everyone who had had their room infested, and everyone
seemed pretty happy with their up-close-and-personal Alaska wildlife encounter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In other animal news, the camp porcupine got
into the maintenance shed last week and chewed up a tube of silicone gel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The porcupine was seen waddling out of camp
with orange goo smeared all over his face.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We suspect he was probably high as a kite on glue fumes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The maintenance staff are now talking about
trying to live-trap and relocate the porcupine to the other side of the lagoon,
to save our silicone gels from further destruction, and possibly to save the
porcupine from ingesting more chemicals than are good for him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I
saw the porcupine a few days later on the ridge; we walked behind him for about
seventy-five yards taking pictures.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He
knew we were behind him, but the brush was so thick that he couldn’t get off
the trail, or didn’t want to bother.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Instead, he’d turn around, give us a dirty look, and waddle faster down
the trail.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Eventually, he dove into the
bushes, shaking his quills ominously as we passed.</span></div>Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-34642505655774515022012-07-17T21:20:00.000-08:002012-07-17T21:40:37.451-08:00Floating Zombie River Otters<style>
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The same
day that the river otter researchers were due to come to the Iceberg lodge to give a
presentation on their research, we found a dead river otter floating in the
lagoon. It was floating intestines up; we went over to it because at first I thought we were looking at the back
of a seal’s head. Turns out, not so
much. River otters are a little like
big, streamlined brown ferrets; they are so adorable that they even look moderately cute when
floating head-down in salt water. My clients in the canoe were clucking and making how sad
noises. So, we looked at the dead
otter, and I made the mistake of telling my clients that this was
the third dead otter we’d found in the lagoon in a month, and that,
coincidentally, a team of river otter researchers from the University of
Wisconsin would be coming over to give a presentation on their research in just
a few hours. Immediately, a few people
in the boat asked if we ought to bring the dead otter back to the lodge, so
that the researchers could do an otter autopsy and try to find out why the
otter had died. I wasn’t totally sure
if the otter team’s research goals included playing CSI: Aialik Bay – as my
clients very obviously wanted to do - but I figured they would probably be
interested in the otter. I asked if
everyone was OK with having a dead otter sitting in the back of the canoe for
the rest of the tour. Surprisingly,
everyone was. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
So we
turned the canoe around, and after a few minutes of searching, resighted the
otter. Now that I knew that I had to
pick the thing out of the water, it suddenly looked a lot less cute and
pathetic, and a lot more dead. But the
coat seemed to be in good shape, and it seemed to be pretty much intact and
un-decayed. At least, as undecayed as a
zombie floating dead river otter can look.
I maneuvered us as close to the otter as I could, which was complicated
by the fact that all of the clients on the boat were looking over their
shoulders to try and watch their guide do something gross in the name of
science. I reached into the water,
trying not to picture what would happen if the otter suddenly woke up and sank
its zombie teeth into my hand. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
I grabbed
the zombie otter by the tail and pulled.
The first thing I noticed was that a waterlogged river otter is actually
quite heavy. The second thing I noticed
was the vibration as the tail vertebrae dislocated from the spine. The third thing I noticed was that this
otter was definitely a male. I pulled,
and the otter slid up the side of the canoe, its big rat-like feet dangling
over the gunnel. The otter felt even
heavier. Then the otter’s pelt started
to split open along the back like someone undoing a zipper. The smell hit us like the world’s worst
port-a-pottie, and I immediately dropped the otter back into the lagoon. The smell, unfortunately, stayed around
(albeit in a much diluted form) for the rest of the canoe tour, probably
because I had managed to liberally spritz my clothing with otter juice in the
process of hauling him into my canoe. I
used the boat pump (normally used to pump rain water out of the canoes) to pump
a few quarts of lagoon water into the boat to try and dilute the smell, which
sort of worked. The clients coped
admirably – fishing him out was <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">their</i>
idea, after all – and we finished the rest of the tour without incident. I left one of the other guides to put my
boat away, and immediately went to shower and wash my clothes. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The
researchers were, indeed, interested that we’d found so many dead otters in
such a short span of time, although they said that from what they’d seen of the
otters, they all seemed to be pretty healthy.
They did not, however, seem terribly interested in haring off into the
lagoon to relocate the dead otter after hearing my clients’ description of its
condition. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One of the
maintenance men, however, did go haring off into the lagoon after the otter,
and returned with it floating in a five-gallon bucket. (The trick to keeping the smell at bay is to
keep them submerged at all times. Going
forward, if any guests want to bring back dead animals they find in the lagoon,
I will lasso them with the canoe’s bowline and drag them behind the boat like a
sea anchor.) He plans to drop the otter
into a crab pot for a few weeks, to let the crabs (and any other sea creatures
with indiscriminate gustatory habits) strip the meat away from the
carcass. We’d be left with a jumble of
bones which he could theoretically glue and wire back into shape, sort of like
a very complicated tinkertoy project. I
would like the skull for the interpretive corner at the guide desk, which is
already liberally covered with various parts and pieces of dead animals (seal
and otter pelts, snail shells, urchin tests, bird feathers, and a bear
skull). Ultimately, the zombie otter
stayed in the bucket for over two weeks, and every day it looked a little more
like a giant floating mass of hair that someone had pulled out of a shower
drain. It disappeared from the bucket
shortly before the maintenance man left to visit his wife. I am hoping that M did not show up at home
after being gone for two weeks with a decayed otter in tow…</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A few days
later, I got the fright of my life when the canoe’s drain plug got knocked
loose during a tour, instantly unleashing a torrent of salt water flooding into
our boat. Fortunately, we were in the
mouth of Addison creek, which is a great place to have a canoe emergency
because the water is only four feet deep.
Even though hearing the water rushing into the canoe was quite alarming,
I also realized right off the bat that this was a situation everyone would be
walking away from – since if the canoe sank out from under us, this is pretty
much what we would do. I shouted at my
clients to paddle, got the boat to shore, hopped out in knee deep water and
spent a few minutes wresting the drain plug back into place. (When used correctly, the drain plugs have a
lever that allows them to expand once they’ve been inserted into the draining
hole. In this case, someone had expanded
the drain plug before inserting it, so the plug didn’t fit securely in the
drain, and got jostled out.) Once the
flooding stopped, I unloaded everyone on the creek bank, and pumped the water
out of the canoe. We paddled back to
the lodge, while I tried to pretend that I hadn’t just had the fright of my
life. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
</div>
<span style="font-family: Cambria; font-size: 12pt;"> Two
things I have learned about canoeing this summer already: (a) check the
snugness of the drain plugs, and (b) do not haul a dead otter into a canoe by his
tail. </span>Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-1050084455904083012012-06-16T19:31:00.000-08:002012-06-16T19:31:02.089-08:00Pissed-Off Loons and Porcupine Renovations<style>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>It’s the
middle of June, only a week until the solstice, and we are still running our
main glacier hiking trip as a snowshoeing outing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After many hours of shoveling, we’ve gotten
parts of our nature trail whipped into shape, but most of the mile-long trail
out to Pedersen Glacier is still under two to four feet of snow.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’re more or less creating an ad hoc
snowshoe trail out of some snow-covered creek drainages.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I went out a few days ago with some loppers
and a hand saw to take down some of the alders that have been springing up near
the snowshoe route.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not springing up as
in growing really fast, but springing up as in, the snow-flattened branches are
melting out of the snow and suddenly leaping up a couple of feet as the weight
of the snow is melting off. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The snowshoeing
has proven quite popular with the guests, I think because it’s such a novel
thing to be doing in summer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Plus,
standing in front of a glacier wearing snowshoes makes for a neat family
Christmas card photo.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Eventually,
however, the snowshoe trail is going to melt out, which will be good news, and
also bad news.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I am anticipating a
bleak period where the snow is too slushy and half-melted to run snowshoeing
trips, but our hiking trails still have enough snow on them to be
impassable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A few days ago, I went out
to scout a new snow-free route to Pedersen Glacier, by walking along a
tidally-influenced channel during a low tide.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>(The route looks good, but at high tide we start to lose the beach we
walk on.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Paddling back in a kayak, I
heard a rustle off in the bushes, and stopped paddling, trying to see if there
was a bear hanging around in the alders.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Two seconds later, a river otter jumped into the water in front of the
kayak, close enough that if I had still been moving forward, the otter would have face
planted onto the bow of my boat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He
obviously hadn’t seen me before he jumped in – but the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">other</i>
half dozen river otters behind him <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">did</i>
see me, and were scrambling back up the bank to get further away from my
boat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Even though the otters didn’t
want to get in the water with my kayak so close, they weren’t acting
particularly afraid of me, either.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Another
lodge staff member was out paddling and had brought a camera; after I called
him over, he got some great pictures of the otters peering down at us from the
top of the embankment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, the
otters seemed comfortable enough with our proximity that I radioed another
guide who brought her canoe tour over to take a look at the otters.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thankfully, the otters were still in sight
after the canoe arrived, although they had moved further into the alders.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There were no great photographic
opportunities, but all of the guests got to see them scrambling around in the
bushes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(The rest of the evening, the
guests were all showing me their pictures of otter noses poking our from the
greenery.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This was a great sighting –
not only were there a lot of otters all together, but it’s actually rare for us
to see river otters on tours.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They’re
around, but they tend to not be as visible as the seals, who frequently follow
our boats around on tours.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, the
guests were totally right to be proud of their photos – very few guests
actually see river otters here, and usually not so close.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The
Red-Throated Loons are back on the Pedersen moraine, although the pond where
they’ve bred for the last five years still hasn’t melted out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Most days I can hear the loons flying over
the pond, always making their ‘quack quack quack’ flight call.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They’ll loop over the frozen pond, ascertain
that it is still frozen, then bank left and land in the open water in the upper
lagoon.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Once they’re on the water, you
can hear them calling back and forth and complaining to each other about their
lack of a pond.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The loons must be even
more fed up with the late spring than the lodge staff are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For the loons, having that pond frozen is
like them being locked out of their house. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It almost sounds like their ‘quack quack
quack’ call is another word that contains the letters u, c, and k.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>It’s been a
rough winter for the birds; we keep finding dead ones melting out of the snow
on the beaches and around camp.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There
were a bunch of dead gulls on the beach, dead crows in the woods, and dead
murres on the Aialik moraine.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And a
few days ago, a bird melted out of the snow next to the generator shed, which
is either another dead murre, or one of the juvenile red-throated loon chicks
from last summer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m sort of hoping
it’s a murre (it’s manky enough that the subtle variations of plumage are lost,
but it’s a large, heavy-boned bird, brown on top and white on the breast, with
webbed feet set back pretty far on the body, and a dark, pointed bill).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Coming back to the lodge from a boat trip to
the glacier, my guests and I had a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">North
by Northwest</i> sort of encounter with a red and white Supercub that was
buzzing us on the beach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was driving
our ATV-style golf cart back along the Lodge’s beach road with a guest, A, and
three other staff.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Two minutes down the
road, I screeched the ATV to a halt because it looked like the plane might
actually be trying to touch down on the road in front of me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A said that she thought the plane was trying
to make an emergency landing on the beach.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I found out later that A is a pilot – this lends some credence to the
notion that this plane was flying much closer to the ground than is
normal.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just after disappearing out of
sight over the rim of the beach, the plane pulled up and went into a steep
ascent, heading back to Seward over the Icefield. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, no one had to run through any cornfields
to escape the bad guys, but the whole event was a little alarming.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If I had been thinking, I would have tried
to get the numbers off of the tail, and one of the managers could have looked
him up and had a little chat about being respectful of other people’s immediate
airspace.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I
am happy to report that several humpback whales have remained in the bay, and
our kayak tours have been seeing them, from a distance where the guests are impressed
and get good pictures, but far enough away that none of them are fearing for
their lives.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In other wildlife news,
the camp porcupine is searching for a new home, and has apparently singled out
my triplex room as a potential den.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>This is the guy who was living in the maintenance shed over the winter,
and chewed up the seats on our ATVs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>With the maintenance shed now back to being a hive of activity, and with
the porcupine’s old den (under the generator shed) being ground zero for a
construction project to expand the lodge drying room, the porcupine has
apparently decided it’s time to look elsewhere for a nice, quiet building to
chew up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve woken up in the morning a
few times to porcupine scat on my steps, and chew marks on the door frame.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(This is not the first time he has done
this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Two years ago, this same porcupine
chewed on our door so loudly that my roommate and I were briefly convinced that
a bear was trying to break in to our room.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I don’t think he has much of a chance of breaking down the door, but
I’ve been careful about making sure that the door latches at night.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Otherwise, I’m convinced that he would
stroll right in and start nesting in my bookshelf.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-2679508456909569522012-06-01T19:00:00.001-08:002012-06-01T19:00:49.438-08:00Attacked by Whales<style>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>First of
all, it was probably not the whale’s fault.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I was taking a day off, and was going out paddling with Geoff, the lodge
manager, and Mike and Lindsey, two new staff who were very keen to try some sea
kayaking.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We packed our lunch, launched
our kayaks, and began making our way up the bay towards Aialik Glacier, five
miles away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Shortly after leaving the lagoon, we saw the
first whale, which spouted, unusually loudly, maybe a half mile away from us.
She appeared at the surface a few times, and then dove.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We got a pretty good look at her.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then, the second whale turned up – and this
whale was both closer to us, and also in the general direction that we were
heading.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Geoff took off in a beeline
right towards the whale, which was still a few hundred yards away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I followed, along with the two new
staff.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I figured this was one of my
only opportunities this summer to do somewhat irresponsible things on the water
that I absolutely would not be able to do with guests – like chasing a whale.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Also, I didn’t think that we had any real
chance of catching up with this whale.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But, I did hope that we might get close enough to get a better look at
the guy, and maybe get some pictures.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span> </span>Famous last words.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>To my
surprise, the whale was continuing to hang out in about the same place in the
water, and we were able to get close enough that, when he next came to the
surface, we got great views – you could hear his blow, and make out the little
whiskery bumps on his chin.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He looked
small, for a whale.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He surface again,
slighty behind our boats, and I could see his back arch as he started on a
deeper dive. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>About
thirty seconds later, a gigantic sea-monster of a whale surfaces right in front
of my kayak, bellowing this loud, Tyrannosaurous-style roaring exhale.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is the loudest sound I have ever heard a
whale make, and the whale in question is only about forty feet in front of my
boat, and heading straight towards me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I start backing my boat away, then decide that maybe I shouldn’t get any
closer to the whale behind me, and stop paddling.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think I remember yelling ‘Hey whale’, as
though it were a bear, and slapping the sides of my kayak.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The big whale dipped back underwater, but
she was so close to the surface that I could see the water being displaced as
she swam.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Junior Whale is still behind
me, but at the moment, I am far more concerned with the bigger one heading
towards my boat.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It felt like we were
being herded, like the whales had maybe decided that their preferred hunting
strategy - cooperatively driving small fish into a tight cluster that could be
easily dispatched in a couple of mouthfuls - would work just as well on kayaks
as on krill.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The whale
came up again, between my boat and the tandem kayak with the new staff, still
roaring through her blowhole like she was a charging rhino.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She was close enough that I could have
touched her with my paddle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She dove,
deeper this time, and suddenly we were all scanning the water, trying to figure
out where the whales were going to come up next – and all desperately hoping
that the whale wouldn’t<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>decide to
surface underneath any of our boats.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The big
whale came up again, on the other side of my kayak, and rolled in the water,
almost as though she were trying to get a good look at us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At this point, I started paddling left, a
direction I was pretty sure would take me further away from both of the
whales.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mike and Lindsey were right
behind me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Geoff stayed where he was -
blithely reminding us that the whales were really only dangerous to people if
they decided to breach on top of our boats – but I figured at this point the
whales were making it very clear that they did not want us this close.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And the big whale was still making that
shrieking exhale whenever she surfaced.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Moments
after reminding us of the relative harmlessness of humpback whales, Geoff yells
“Oh shit, she’s under my boat!:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He
started paddling his kayak out of there faster that I have ever seen him paddle
before.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now that all three of the
kayaks were in full retreat, the whales appeared to back off as well, nuzzling
against each other’s flanks as they surfaced.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>If I hadn’t figured it out before, this was the final clue – this pair
was a mother and a calf, and Mom Whale had apparently not been happy with the
interest we were taking in her youngster.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>From the
relative safety of 50 yards away, we regrouped, and took some pictures, all of
us having been too busy fearing for our lives to do so earlier.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We watched the pair for the next twenty
minutes as we continued paddling towards the glacier.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Strangely, Mom Whale almost invariably made
the same loud, high-pitched exhalation when she came to the surface.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>From a distance, the noise seemed less like
an angry bellow, and more like some sort of weird breathing condition.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It almost sounded like something was
constricting her airway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We also
noticed that she would occasionally remain motionless at the surface for
upwards of a minute, which is unusual for whales.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Our boat crew had also reported seeing a
whale elsewhere in the Bay that was spending an inordinate amount of time at
the surface.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think this must have
been the same animal.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At any rate, it
was a little reassuring to think<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>that
the whale wasn’t intentionally roaring at us when she popped up so close to our
boats.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On the other hand, I felt guilty
that we’d caused a potentially ill whale to rush over to check on her calf just
because we’d wanted a closer look at her baby.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWvkqg37q3qGBDpvQ-OTsnNecM3eZy3D1Eg_Yt98srKtmDV7BGl3wuc4Y8o3LeD8cLRHM3kzHfG-26cU95HtCmpiA2S6-A4XvjNnhAoYa1uR7snTDzVuGiaR39dYrmYUcE8QUOBBp2hsY9/s1600/asthmatic+whale.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjWvkqg37q3qGBDpvQ-OTsnNecM3eZy3D1Eg_Yt98srKtmDV7BGl3wuc4Y8o3LeD8cLRHM3kzHfG-26cU95HtCmpiA2S6-A4XvjNnhAoYa1uR7snTDzVuGiaR39dYrmYUcE8QUOBBp2hsY9/s320/asthmatic+whale.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The humpback whale pair in Aialik Bay</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Was this an
asthmatic whale?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Is this what happens
when a whale gets a head cold?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We
haven’t seen, or heard, from this whale since, so I am assuming she and her
calf have moved off to other, fish-filled waters elsewhere in the Gulf of
Alaska.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Another, more<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>kayak-tolerant whale is feeding in the Bay at
the moment; we ended up following about fifty yards behind him for around a
mile on one of our guide training trips.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>(We weren’t chasing this one; we just both happened to be travelling
along the same bit of shoreline).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>From
what I’ve seen in previous seasons, the humpback whales tend to leave the bay
by late June – but kayaking with whales in the bay is always a fine line
between magical and terrifying.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-15116289232906161842012-05-24T18:54:00.001-08:002012-05-24T18:59:49.617-08:00Shoveling out the Snow<style>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
It is a
month since my last blog update, and I am now settled back into my summer home
at the Iceberg Lodge. Since leaving New
Zealand, I spent five days in West Virginia visiting family, and a hectic week
doing pre-season training all over the Kenai Peninsula and the Mat-Su Valley, getting
my sea kayak and wilderness first responder certifications renewed before my guiding
job started. My first week back in the
US, I was in seven different airports and four different time zones; it was a
little exhausting. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
(The flight
attendant on the flight up to Anchorage asked us to kindly turn off and stow
our personable electronic devices in preparation for landing. Does that mean that if my electronic device
is introverted and unfriendly, I can keep it turned on for longer?)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Once I got
down to the Kenai Peninsula, I was able
to see for myself the epic, record-breaking amounts of snow that have been
blanketing the state of Alaska over the winter. On May 5, my Subaru was still buried in snow
up to the level of the hood. It took three
hours, four people, and a plow truck to extricate my car, (including the time
it took to dig out the plow truck when <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">it</i>
got stuck trying to clear a path to my car).
There are a bunch of new scratches on the hood from the snow shovel, and
the roof is now dented from the weight of the snow, but it’s running fine. In other words, it’s all ready to sit in the
Seward seafood truck lot for another four months until the end of my guiding
contract. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The first
part of my Alaska training week was three days of kayak training on Kenai Lake,
getting dumped out of kayaks and practicing how to get back in them, and how to
get other people back into them. It
went OK, but I am always a little worried that when we practice this stuff, we
are practicing on other kayak guides, who are sort of ideal victims –
reasonably athletic and coordinated, who know how to balance on the boats when
we’re clambering around them trying to get people back in their seats. Also, they do as they’re told – something
that actual, panicked, cold guests may not do. It was very cold, even though we were wearing
drysuits, and it was sort of a constant battle to stay warm, and to stay
focused on what we were doing, and try to ignore the fact that I couldn’t feel
my toes. At the end of the day, my
hands looked like they had been beaten with meat tenderizers – all red and
swollen. The day after the boat
training finished, I woke up at 4AM to drive up to Palmer for my medical
recertification. It was snowing on both
of the high passes, and it was cold enough that the snow was sticking to the
road – I was passing snowplows on Turnagin Pass, which was a little surreal for
May. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Fortunately,
there was no snow in Palmer itself, which was good since I was camping
out. Unfortunately, the campsite was
very exposed to the wind, and I went to sleep every night to the sound of my
rainfly flapping against the tent wall like some sort of deranged bird. It felt like the tent was going to carry me
to Oz. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
After the
kayak training, the medical recertification actually felt like a break, since
although we were outside quite a bit, we were dry the whole time, so I was
pretty happy.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Two days
later I left for the Iceberg Lodge.
Like the rest of Alaska, the Lodge got slammed with snow this
winter. I had always wanted to see the
Lodge in winter, as I have never been out to Aialik Bay any later than
September, or any earlier than April.
Now having seen the Lodge covered in eight feet of snow, I feel that my
winter bay-visiting ambitions been satisfied. A lot of the first week was spent digging
out things – water tanks, cabins, boardwalks, and access to maintenance
buildings. It’s amazing how long it
takes to set up our essential systems (power, water, septic, kitchens) when
everything you want to work on has to first be dug out of eight feet of
snow. The weight of the snow actually
crumpled a few of our boardwalks, and messed up the siding on a couple of
window frames, but, fortunately, there was no structural damage to any of the
buildings themselves. Also, part of
our septic system froze. It was a
challenge to figure ut where some of the stuff we needed to dig up eve
was. When we first arrived at the lodge
site, we hadn’t finished plowing the road out to the beach, so we loaded up our
gear and groceries into sleds and snowshoed in, dragging the sleds behind us,
kind of like those pictures of ill-fated Antarctic expeditions back in the
1900s. Our maintenance team was snowblowing
the road with a Bobcat from about 4am until 2am, working in shifts. Thank goodness for lots of Alaskan summer
daylight… </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKmcYJa4kJ_H-E5vcgWW6g9f3oHliEcJuw6nu-9yXVMB4FPk_p7TlerSzkLjXWwqxrZwEbdHeTfZPLVudlqQjtZ2VoYIbmd8p3mxbjGKlSa5ivRw8ffJi0sFRpimGzGaNUZppEixxIbGHy/s1600/snowblowing.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgKmcYJa4kJ_H-E5vcgWW6g9f3oHliEcJuw6nu-9yXVMB4FPk_p7TlerSzkLjXWwqxrZwEbdHeTfZPLVudlqQjtZ2VoYIbmd8p3mxbjGKlSa5ivRw8ffJi0sFRpimGzGaNUZppEixxIbGHy/s400/snowblowing.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Snowblowing the boardwalks in front of the lodge</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br />
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Currently, we can drive
vehicles out to the boat directly – no snowshoeing involved – although we are
detouring onto the beach for the last half-mile, which we normally don’t
do. Depending on where the tide is,
there isn’t always a lot of room to turn the ATVs around on the beach – and one
of the ATVs doesn’t go in reverse anymore, so once you start turning, you are kind
of committed. Turning them always involves an unsettling moment
where I am driving downhill directly towards the ocean, but so far, no one’s
drowned any equipment. We have been
breaking equipment left and right (mostly snowblowers), but our maintenance
guys have so far been able to resuscitate them in a day or two. Also, the snowpack has been melting out –
the little snag tree in front of the lodge is slowly being uncovered, and
judging by how much is visible now compared to last week, I estimate we’ve lost
about two feet of height since we got here.
When we were first plowing the road, the snow canyon was so high that
you couldn’t see over it – there were concerns that an ATV could inadvertently
run into a pedestrian – or worse, a bear – because you couldn’t see around any
of the bends. It’s also nice to be able
to see out the windows, instead of facing an imposing wall of snow. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Now that
we’ve cleared the road and the boardwalks, the bears, recognizing a good thing
when they see it, are back to wandering through camp. There’s not a lot of food out there for them
right now. We’ve had one bear on a
nearby beach, who seems to be methodically shearing off every single sprouting
plant on the entire shore, probably for lack of anything else he can get
to. Also, the half-tame porcupine who
lives under our generator shed apparently moved into the vehicle garage over
the winter, and chewed up the upholstery on our ATV seats. D, one of the maintenance guys, has declared
that the porcupine’s days are numbered; the rest of the staff have been trying
to keep the porcupine away from D, as the critter is probably the closest thing
we have to a pet out here. One staff
member successfully kept the porcupine hidden under a workbench for about half
an hour before D left and the porcupine could be safely shooed off. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The company
president was out here for over a week.
He flew by helicopter, and brought with him a replacement hose for a
busted hydraulic on our ASV, which is possibly the fastest broken part
turnaround in the history of the Iceberg Lodge. He stayed out for a week, running the snow
blower, and assessing the damage. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
A few days
later, a group of our company’s tour escorts arrived for their pre-season
orientation trip. We put them to work
shoveling out some of the site – they had to shovel paths to the cabins they
were staying in – and also did some training with them on how to steer our
canoes. We still have over a week
before the first guests arrive, and I think we are actually on track to be
ready for that deadline. When we first
got out here, it didn’t seem like we <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">would</i>
be able to open on time. It helps that
for my particular department, all of the staff are returning, so we don’t have
to spend time training anyone from scratch.
Now that the road to the beach is open, more or less, we’ve even been
able to snowblow paths in the staff area, so that we can get around <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">our</i> half of camp without having to use
snowshoes. I even get a day off
tomorrow; life is looking good.</div>Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2587715856617653897.post-70505283564662896412012-04-26T01:22:00.000-08:002012-04-26T01:27:42.934-08:00Designed to Separate Tourists from their Money<style>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
On my way
over to Christchurch, I spent a few days in Queenstown, which is possibly the
one town in the South Island that is guaranteed to inspire strong feelings in
the people who visit it. Not
necessarily good feelings, but strong ones.
Before coming to New Zealand, I had heard about the town from two
different people. A friend of my
father’s told me ‘It’s like a big resort – you should go there!’ An Iceberg Lodge coworker told me ‘It’s like
a big resort – you should stay away!’ I
certainly have to agree with the resort part.
Queenstown does seem like a big resort – sort of like a ski town without
the skiing. There’s even a
chairlift/gondola going up the side of the mountain near town. There are also ton of outdoor shops, restaurants,
pubs, cafes, and booking offices for adventure activities. Queenstown also
reminds me of Glasgow, in the fact that there is a lively commercial district,
with lots of shops and pubs, and also the prominent lack of old buildings
in the downtown. With over a million visitors a year, Queenstown can afford to have a commercial district that feels like it belongs to a much larger city. The town also feels strangely international,
since there are a huge amount of tourists, so its possible to hear three or
four different languages being spoken all within earshot of one street-side bench. Unlike Glasgow, the town is
incredibly expensive, and Queenstown doesn’t even have the excuse of a bad
exchange rate. And by expensive, I mean
that I bought a brand-name merino wool baselayer at 60% off, and it still cost
well over a hundred dollars. Worth it,
definitely, but still a little ridiculous.
All together, there are a ton of things to do in Queenstown – but none
of them are very cheap. Also, there
are two casinos just in the downtown.
It’s like Queenstown was designed specifically to separate tourists from
their money.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
One thing turned out to be cheap. On the
invitation of my hostel’s manager, I went down to the local Irish pub and
jammed with a guitarist there for a few hours, for which the bar comp’ed my
drinks. That was pretty awesome,
despite the fact that none of the bar partons appeared to be paying us any
attention. Some gigs just go that way,
and it was the first opportunity I’d had to play with another musician since I
went to Haast, and it was a lot of fun.
I am also happy that I’m visiting Queenstown in the comparative lull
between the end of summer and the start of the ski season. The hostel I stayed at – Alpine Lodge – was
very nice, and came complete with its own resident cat, named Greg. Greg had his own chair in the lounge; humans
could use it, but if the cat wanted to lie down, the human had better be
prepared to make his or her lap available.
Also at the hostel were half a dozen people on working holiday permits,
staying at the hostel while they looked for work and/or accommodation elsewhere
in town. From what I understand, the
job market going into the off-season wasn’t looking so good – this is partially
based on the fact that most of the job-seekers had, in desperation, applied to
work at a nearby call centre that sells funeral packages. In that light, working as a housekeeper in
Haast seems a positively scintillating life choice. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeNrroaOXNxEx1dKlWVxoZpsCzT3tE9nYrAKaLG4WlXwh1w-JcuTegHBSyuI0px_W4B8zkbqD1zbNfTyckZ3r2g-_fNUcjSpket3OxhR3W958weSGsqBLkrjsSGCVoUer9FmQlhBgJZ2s2/s1600/queenstown.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjeNrroaOXNxEx1dKlWVxoZpsCzT3tE9nYrAKaLG4WlXwh1w-JcuTegHBSyuI0px_W4B8zkbqD1zbNfTyckZ3r2g-_fNUcjSpket3OxhR3W958weSGsqBLkrjsSGCVoUer9FmQlhBgJZ2s2/s400/queenstown.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Queenstown</td></tr>
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There seem
to be more than the usual number of Asian tourists in Queenstown – I’m not
quite sure why. The retail shops here seems to be more
motivated than most in their efforts to specifically cater to this market –
especially in their selection of cosmetics and health supplements. As in, most of the gift shops stock hand
creams with prominently listed ingredients like placenta, and colostrum (both
from sheep, according to the label). As
far as I am concerned, those are two words that shouldn’t be used outside of a
hospital, or a birthing class. I am
also not clear on what the purported health benefits would be for smearing
something like that onto your skin, and I’m a little afraid to ask. </div>
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Also in
Queenstown, are a huge number of local booking offices for tourism
companies. In the age of internet
bookings, the offices seem to be deserted an awful lot of the time – every time
I passed one, it seemed like the customer service reps were disconsolately
staring out of their door. There are an
unlikely large number of bungee jump and skydive operators in town; I am not
sure whey anyone would want to pay money for this sort of thing, which probably
means that I don’t quite understand the sport anyway.</div>
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I did get
to see someone else bungee jumping, which was interesting. This was during a raft trip on the Kawarau
River, and our route took us under the AJ Hackett Kawarau Bridge Bungee Jump,
which is supposedly the oldest commercial bungee-jumping operation anywhere in
New Zealand. The platform looks to be
maybe 60 or 70 meters above the river. Alerted by the bungee operators, our group of rafts pulled over into an eddy to
watch the next jump. The bungee-er did
a very graceful swan dive off the platform, free-falling for maybe two seconds
before the elastic of the bungee started to slow his fall. He bounced up and down on the end of the
tether a couple of times, and then was lowered headfirst into a yellow
inflatable raft, where the bungee operaters began untying the bungee rope from
his legs. It actually looked more graceful,
and potentially more fun, than I had expected.
However, at $180 per 3-second jump,
bungee-jumping is undoubtedly one of the most efficient ways to spent money in Queenstown.</div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/37/Kawarau_River_bungy.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/37/Kawarau_River_bungy.JPG" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Kawarau Bungee, photo courtesy Wikipedia</td></tr>
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The most
scenic part of the Kawarau river that we rafted was a canyon early on, which
was filmed as the River Anduin in the Lord of the Rings movie. For a film sequence that is not terribly
lengthy, the film crew were apparently shooting
in a lot of locations – this is now the fourth river I have come across
that is purported to be the River Anduin.
For my money, the Kawarau has a pretty good claim – the canyon is where
the Argonath statues were digitally inserted; that’s pretty definitive. The Argonath canyon is a lot smaller than as
portrayed by Peter Jackson, and it’s a little less impressive to think of that
film sequence now that I know that the AJ Hackett bungee jump platform is
lurking just out of the frame. </div>
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The raft
trip was about three hours, and very nice.
The canyons were pretty; we saw a lot of Paradise shelducks, and the
rapids weren’t too bumpy. We did end up
with a backseat driver in my boat, who didn’t seem to have a very high level of
confidence that our guide could actually steer the raft without help. One of the nicest thigns about this rafting
company was that they had a sauna waiting for us when we got back and changed
out of our wetsuits. It felt a lot like
visiting the Iceberg lodge’s drying room, except without heaps and heaps of wet
gear dangling all over the place. </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiInKrkfQvDwt9Q03JIpMSOYpE42GTAhAQPuCilfQuEPIfmx42DT78tflwfgMsWL56Oy-ucwrOEWFFlBSFxbtX3Yb9kP4KZZDXmn9x3fINLaaU8DE0mkJMw4lX2K6duPsLWO2RkfFsQ6oN4/s1600/chch+tree.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiInKrkfQvDwt9Q03JIpMSOYpE42GTAhAQPuCilfQuEPIfmx42DT78tflwfgMsWL56Oy-ucwrOEWFFlBSFxbtX3Yb9kP4KZZDXmn9x3fINLaaU8DE0mkJMw4lX2K6duPsLWO2RkfFsQ6oN4/s400/chch+tree.jpg" width="300" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Christchurch Botanic Gardens</td></tr>
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Earlier today in Christchurch I went
to the Botanic Gardens and rented a kayak to paddle up and down the Avon
river. Even for a public park, there
were a surprisingly large number of Mallard ducks on the river, all of whom
seemed abjectly terrified of my eight-foot plastic boat. This seems strange, since the ducks have had
all of the tourist season to get used to the boats paddling around. The ducks were still suspicious; they would
take off in noisy, panicked groups, fly twenty or thirty meters ahead, and drop
back onto the river, only to take off again in a hurry as I paddled
closer. </div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjB10Bv_VVZcorvB_i0uV0_CFcP51p1Knm3VX0l43Q9qzuuYlWzOztHOPoYJkh-8R-nMHPShW42VoNRgxxYGIysfOYeH-8xtqIQDLwgiyD1R7B0brS4n3gqUMLnrqFXFEQ5QZVq0eXJt_Oa/s1600/avon.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjB10Bv_VVZcorvB_i0uV0_CFcP51p1Knm3VX0l43Q9qzuuYlWzOztHOPoYJkh-8R-nMHPShW42VoNRgxxYGIysfOYeH-8xtqIQDLwgiyD1R7B0brS4n3gqUMLnrqFXFEQ5QZVq0eXJt_Oa/s400/avon.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Herding ducks on the Avon</td></tr>
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After
returning the boat, I spent some time walking around Christchurch, or the parts
of it that aren’t still cordoned off.
Being a pedestrian in the city can be difficult due to the number of
construction and demolition sites, most of which have quite understandably
sprawled across the sidewalks and parking lanes surrounding their building. Walking west from my hostel, the sideways on
both sides of the street are blocked off, necessitating a significant detour
onto the side streets if you want to get
anywhere. The older, historic buildings
have suffered particularly; most are in the process of being rebuilt or
demolished, along with most of the downtown’s skyscrapers. This includes not only Christchurch
Cathedral, but many of the city’s old churches, as well as the Canterbury
Museum, the Christchurch Performing Arts Center, and the Christchurch art
gallery. At one of the gates into the
red zone, two men in construction hats were chatting with a man in a
Gandalf-style robe and pointy hat. I’m
not quite sure what he was doing there - but considering what the city’s been
through, I think a little wizardly aid would come in very handy.</div>
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One thing
that has sprung up in Christchurch in the wake of the earthquakes are all sorts
of temporary structures, based out of garden sheds, shipping containers,
converted camper-vans, large tents, and two large geodesic domes that look like
Tievak versions of the Epcot golf ball (this is the current performing arts
space.) I got dinner tonight from a
Thai restaurant run out of a shipping container that is parked on the concrete
pad from what used to be their restaurant.
In fact, is has become so common for displaced restaurants to move into
shipping containers that it seems to permeate the Christchurch vocabulary. As in ‘Then you turn left at the second
container on Beally Avenue’, or ‘It’s a big place; they have six or seven
containers.’</div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNv0jh0y_aKTCee6LAhlkQR5jjtyNV-l0e1WTyAPvLRn_3plaX7hlM94KiNOIfhrdVMshJBayin9hSmKo-_WzU8brtOAUutIyps7yNP62ymj20U6myVXgmi1dYuULhrl0B5dvNLguukBMr/s1600/butterfly.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNv0jh0y_aKTCee6LAhlkQR5jjtyNV-l0e1WTyAPvLRn_3plaX7hlM94KiNOIfhrdVMshJBayin9hSmKo-_WzU8brtOAUutIyps7yNP62ymj20U6myVXgmi1dYuULhrl0B5dvNLguukBMr/s400/butterfly.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Butterfly, Botanic Gardens</td></tr>
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So, a quick
life update before I finish this post: I am flying out of New Zealand tomorrow,
and will be spending a few days in West Virginia visiting family and friends
before getting back to Alaska late next week.
I’ll be in the Seward/Moose Pass/Cooper Landing area visiting Alaska
friends and family, before heading out to the Iceberg Lodge sometime in
mid-May. My car is still buried in
snow, though my cousin reports that the car’s roof is now visible for the first time in several months, so I guess
there’s progress. </div>Marethhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06918503299185599541noreply@blogger.com0