Memorial Day Weekend

For the four day holiday that Michael and I had, we decided to go camping with a photographer friend of his named Jon. Jon also brought along his friend Matt. If you think camping is pulling your RV into a campsite and hooking up your electric and water, you'd be in for a big surprise. Along the Denali highway, you can camp at pretty much any pull off, and in Wrangel-St. Elias National Park it's pretty much the same way. You just find a fairly smooth spot to pitch your tent, and then make sure your camp fire and food is far enough away that the bears don't bother you in the middle of the night.

We didn't see any bears this trip, but we did see some other interesting wildlife. We saw about half a dozen porcupines, and Michael chased one several feet, trying to get a good picture.

We also saw two brand new baby moose, probably about one or two days old. Mama was right there nearby, though, so none of us tried to get TOO close.

This bull moose is the first one that Michael has been able to get a really good picture of his racks. It's too early in the season yet for him to have really big racks, though.

Inside the national park is a "ghost town". It's an old copper mine that even though the copper company abandoned it, the park service and tourists have taken over, so there aren't too many ghosts around. All the old buildings looked really cool, though, and if you go on about a two mile hike, you can touch (or climb on) a glacier.

It was a really fun trip, and we ended up with about a thousand pictures. Literally--Michael took around 800 with his camera and I took around 300. That's not counting the pictures Jon took. The computer is letting me add any more photos so I can't download a picture of Michael with his camera. Oh well. Maybe next time.

Moose

We just had a moose wander across our front yard! It's a female, probably about two years old. Rista Cat was outside when it came through and it really scared her.

Spring!!!

Spring has arrived in the North! On Saturday, the lakes and ponds were still somewhat frozen over, but by Monday evening, all the ice and snow was gone. Within the past week, new green leaves have exploded out everywhere. It went from barren leafless trees to vivid green overnight almost. The sun is up above the horizon for twenty hours of the day, and we have visible light for the whole twenty-four hours. Really dark curtains come in very handy this time of year.

This sunset was taken on Saturday around 11:30 at night. You can see the ice still covering most of the lake. When we drove past this lake on Monday, all the ice was gone.

Some green trees!!!

This picture was taken on a rainy day at Angel Rocks, a place about an hour's drive and then an hour's hike from where we live. Michael photographed a wedding up there. The bride had to endure rain, hail and mosquitos for her wedding.

First Signs of Spring

Yes, even though it has dumped about 6-8 inches of snow this week, Spring is almost here. The proof is in these tiny, cotton-wood buds. Spring has not forgotten about us in Alaska!

New Friend

We've had some very unusual weather up here in Alaska. It was snowing all morning, so we HAD to make this guy after work. Like his 'hair'?

What's so unusual about snow in Alaska, you may ask? This is a very wet, packing snow. Alaska doesn't get packing snow. We get dry fluffy stuff that you can stir up with just a little breath. Also, it's unusual to get six inches of snow in April. Or so the locals have been telling me. We only used a little bit of the snow in our yard. (And we have a small yard.) With all the fresh snow, we could have made a whole family of snowmen. One's enough, though.