The O-Zone

Ten days to the Autumnal Equinox, fall weather feels like it has already arrived.  It has been rainy and foggy all day.  Tomorrow we are supposed to have warmer and drier weather, a good forecast since we intend to paint the exterior of the sunroom tomorrow and Tuesday.  Yesterday we spent hours sealing the edges of the siding with many tubes of silicone.

Trees on the hilldside across from us are indistinct, shrouded in mist. The fog ebbs and flows around the hillside, and trees emerge, only to disappear again.

Local Red Squirrels are actively harvesting cones from conifers.  One such squirrel made what it considered a tragic tactical error; he dropped his large prize cone on the deck next to the sunroom door.  And then, the unthinkable happened.

Mishkin hopped onto the windowsill on the window next to the sunroom door.  And cat and squirrel were eye-to-eye across the cone.  The squirrel yelled at the cat; the cat chirped at the squirrel.  The squirrel ducked down on the step below the deck and peeked up over the edge of the deck.  OMG the cat was still there!  More yelling and more chirping.  This situation went on for quite some time, noisily, until the squirrel got brave enough to snatch his cone from the jaws of defeat.  He scamped down the sidewalk, tail and cone held high.

Quiet resumed.  Once again, Mishkin had lost face with one of the local rodent populous.

We were amused.

I spent the day editing the first eight chapters of my book, and uploading the edited version of chapter 1.  My revisions and rewrites are through chapter 3.  But who knows, I may re-write again tomorrow.   I’m somewhat entertained.  We are considering re-activating our own domain website and if so, I’ll post any additional chapters there, along with some pictures of my watercolors and pencil drawings that have been requested be posted.

I started writing a book a little while ago, and time does tend to get away from us quickly.  I’ve not gotten very far on my writing.  Life interferes to some extent, and we have a nice car to go driving!   Who knows, I might even get this published someday, if I’m good enough at writing, and if I finish it.  This is a project I’ve wanted to do for many years now.

Here is the first chapter.

WRONG LAKE

Chapter 1: The Beginnings of an Adventure

Mid-winter in Anchorage, the sun peeks over the horizon mid morning and disappears again in early afternoon. Lead gray skies over head, the threatened snow arrived, tiny flakes that filled the sky and streaked past the windshield, reflected in the headlights as streams of light as we drove home from work… warp speed ahead! We had planning to do.

We had decided to spend the summer in the Alaskan Bush, and we were looking at maps of wilderness 250 air-miles due west of the largest city in Alaska. Across the Alaska Range was to be our destination. Homesteading opportunities in Alaska were over at the end of 1976, but there was nothing to stop us from a lengthy camping trip on what was to be my first backpacking adventure. The concept was exciting, but would the reality of the experience match expectations – that remained to be seen. I had never tried anything remotely similar. Dan had; he had been to the Bush already, spending a year building a wilderness cabin on a homestead. I had been looking at pictures and hearing stories for the last 18 months.

Standing in a campground near Cook Inlet, shortly after we first met.

I was almost 19 years old when I first met Dan, and had never been outside of a city except for brief car-camping trips in established campgrounds. The next year, the call of adventure was strong, andafter six months of planning we were ready to go.

Planning for an extended trip was exciting; we would have to take everything we would need to survive for three months. There was no “going to the store” to get forgotten items, and so we checked and rechecked our lists. Our financial abilities were also very limited. Fancy backpacking packaged meals, while weight-saving, were extremely expensive and out of our budget, except for very small quantities of things intended as “goodies.

We categorized the supplies we would need to take with us into basic needs that would need to be met over three months time. Clothing. Food. Cooking. Building/hardware. Housing. Traveling was an important item as we planned on back packing. Entertainment. Protection from wild animals. Miscellaneous. Then we started making lists under these categories.

Food.

The largest category was food. We decided our best option was to go with bulk foods, less expensive and more suitable for preparing a variety of meals. We included basics ingredients – dried beans and lentils, whole brown rice, whole wheat flour, corn meal, dried milk, dried eggs, white sugar, brown sugar and honey, black tea, dried fruits, and spices. Goodies were things like cheddar cheese, crackers, peanut butter, canned tomato sauce, chocolate, oils and margarine, jam, maple syrup, and dehydrated potatoes. With these ingredients and some good recipes based on them, we figured we would not get too bored.

A lot of math was involved. We needed to calculate our own calorie requirements for strenuous activity, which we anticipated having, multiplied by the number of days we would be out in the Bush. A rough outline of meals was planned for each day. We calculated the calorie content for our ingredients based on recipes for those meals, to see if we were meeting our daily calorie needs, and then adjusting the meal plan if it was too high or too low. Once we had those figures, then we could calculate the quantity for each ingredient we would need to take with us. Planning a menu for three months was necessary, utilizing these calculations. And once we had those numbers, we could estimate the total weight of our food supplies. Because we were flying out to the Bush in a small plane, weight limitations were a large consideration, and food supplies were only part of our calculations.

Cooking.

Our cooking gear consisted of utensils for back packing and utensils that would remain in our base camp, notably a cast iron pan and a dutch oven for baking. A heavy metal rack for campfires would stay in base camp and a light weight rack would be for back packing. We took lightweight plastic bowls and dishes, ceramic mugs for tea, silverware, and tea pots. Sierra cups would travel with us. And we took a plastic container for our sourdough starter to live in over the summer, since it would be a staple for baking and pancakes. Water jugs for hauling water and storing it.

Clothing.

Summer weather in Alaska can be anything from snow showers in higher elevations, rain, thunderstorms, windy, hot, drizzle, or merely overcast and cool, and any combination during the day. We needed to bring along sufficient clothing to meet those conditions. In addition to clothing, we also needed head-nets, a cloth hat with mosquito netting suspended below. Mosquitoes in the Alaskan Bush are legendary. We also had to take some real winter gear, down coats, warm gloves and hats, hiking boots, hip waders, and lightweight shoes for around the camp.

Travel.

Because we would be based on a small lake we had picked out on a map, we took a small inflatable raft, and fishing equipment. The fishing pole and lures would also be useful once we were on the river which was our planned destination for exploration. We each had a back pack, and a small day pack for short trips around our base camp.

Housing.

A three-man tent, sleeping pads, sleeping bags, a ground cloth to protect the tent from punctures. We also took along a good supply of matches, a small amount of first aide supplies (aspirin, a prescription of penicillin and another of a stronger pain killer, bandages), toilet paper, towels and wash cloths, and shampoo and soaps, dish washing soap, and some laundry soap, and a metal basin for bathing and washing ourselves and clothing. Personal care items – combs, brushes, a metal mirror in a small cloth bag, toothbrush, toothpaste, etc.

Building/hardware/protection from wild animals.

We had a double-bit axe for firewood and any building projects we might need to do, We took several rifles, pistols and ammunition, heavy knives, and rope. Mustn’t forget the rope! Tarps for building shelters, and plastic for the same purpose were also put on the list. A folding shovel was a necessary part of our hardware.

Entertainment and Miscellaneous.

Both of us are avid readers, and that meant taking along a whole box of books. We were concerned it wouldn’t last a whole three months and so we were careful in our selection. Field guides to birds and plants were required. We took along a couple of notebooks and pens in the book box, and a small thermometer to record temperatures.  A deck of playing cards, and a cribbage board tucked into a small empty space.  A couple of typographical maps would help us figure out where we were and possible routes to travel.

We included a small portable radio, though it was doubtful any signals would be heard, and a plane location beacon for use in an absolute emergency. While illegal to use such a beacon without a plane to go with it, it was comforting to have such a device along with us. We figured we would deal with any consequences of having to use it if they arose, if it meant saving our lives.

We took camera equipment and film, a small tripod for backpacking, and a larger tripod for use in our main camp. Binoculars, a flashlight and extra batteries were also necessary.

In addition to space limitations, a float plane has weight limitations based on the distance to be traveled and the amount of fuel required for the round trip. Our plane needed to be completely full of fuel to make the round trip from Anchorage through Merrill Pass, and then return. We choose to take a de Havilland Beaver as they had the best payload for small single engine float planes, and shortest takeoff and landing requirements among the small float planes with enough range and weight carrying capacity to make the trip.

We weighed everything we intended to take with us, and packed it into small boxes which could be stowed into the floats on the plane, and behind the seats. And we double-checked with the float plane company to make sure we weren’t exceeding any weight limitations. The rest of our belongings were put into a small storage unit in Anchorage. We took a set of plat maps with us, and an extra map on which we intended to mark the location of the lake we ultimately landed on, to send back to friends in town so that the float plane service would know where to come pick us up at the beginning of September.

Finally, at the end of May we were ready to begin our adventure. We quit our jobs, sighted in the rifle by shooting our alarm clock, an exercise with great symbolic meaning to us, and camped out at a friend’s house while we waited for the weather to cooperate.

Leaving Anchorage was a matter of waiting for the weather to clear enough to allow a safe trip through the Alaska Range and for the pilot to be sure that ice had gone off the lakes in the Interior. On the morning of June 7^th the day dawned bright and clear, the forecast was for sunny skies on the Anchorage side of the mountains, and the Alaska Range wasn’t building clouds. We collected our belongings and headed to the float plane base in Anchorage to begin the three hour flight across Cook Inlet, through the mountains, and then to find the lake we planned to stay for three months.

There is no sound in the world comparable to the thrilling sound a de Havilland Beaver makes while taking off from a lake, except perhaps a Formula One race car. The Beaver had so much power, it pushed us back in our seats as it took off from Lake Hood, and a stream of water cascaded off the floats and fell back into the lake like crystal pearls and diamonds. A profound sense of freedom and adventure flooded our spirits as we became airborne, followed closely by intense butterflies in my stomach. I felt like dancing, but had no room to move even my feet, I was so surrounded by our supplies and packed into the back seat of the plane. Dan turned around from his seat in the front of the aircraft, and we grinned at each other.

Then we settled down to watch the world go by while we traveled back in time to an era where the world was new and untraveled by other people.

Flying through Merrill Pass is an adventure all by itself. This pass through the Alaska Range was first discovered in 1927, and the mountains have claimed many small airplanes over the years. There are specific turns which must be taken, and one wrong turn will put a plane into a narrow mountain valley that terminates into a solid wall of mountains on three sides, that go straight up, with no room to turn around. The scenery is absolutely spectacular, dark rock protruding through ice fields and snow banks up high where we flew past. The glacier fed rivers were far below us, silver-blue ribbons braided in rocky sandbars, reflecting light and dark from the surrounding mountains. It was an alien and forbidding landscape, so beautiful it made my throat ache.

As we emerged from the Alaska Range next to the Revelation Mountains, the pilot dropped altitude from 10,000 feet cruising height, down to only a couple of thousand feet above the ground, so we could see more details. We were both very cold and our ears were tired of the roar from the engine.

Finding a lake on a plat map is easy to do. You simply point your finger at it, show it to the pilot and say, “We want to go there.” Actually finding that exact lake from the air, at an elevation of 1,500′ above the ground while traveling near 100 miles per hour, well, that was a little harder. A three hour flight to get to the area where the lake was located meant, obviously, a three hour return trip for the pilot, giving us less than an hour to locate the lake.

Initially a lot of the lakes we crossed over near to the western edge of the Alaska Range were all still frozen, becoming only partially frozen the farther west we ventured from the mountains. After circling around for around a half an hour, the pilot was getting antsy to drop us off. A small lake which seemed to be the one we had picked out was off the right hand side of the plane and Dan made the decision to set down on it. The pilot flew over the lake at low elevation a couple of times, looking for depth of water and any obstacles within it. Finally, he pronounced it acceptable for landing and he swung the plane around, and prepared to land.

Moments later, we were down and headed towards the outlet creek side of the lake, where some Black Spruce grew on the banks. We had arrived!

Sometimes Mishkin looks so innocent and peaceful.

See? He looks innocent here, not doing a thing but watching me working on the computer.

Not only is he innocent looking, but he’s fast.  What you didn’t see was a little gray paw sneaking out and knocking my computer mouse on the floor.  His theory, apparently, was that if I didn’t have a mouse handy, then I wasn’t working, and I could pay attention to him.

It’s a good theory.  I picked up the mouse, and he went back to looking innocent.

This takes a very specific set of circumstances to occur, simultaneously.

First, Mishkin must be reclining on Dan’s lap, upside down with his eyes closed, luxuriating in getting pets.

Second, Dan and Mishkin must be watching TV and not paying attention to anything outside.

Third, Terry must be paying attention to what is happening outside, and because she is always paying attention, this is a certainty.

Fourth, a bear must make an appearance in the yard.  This is the cat-alyst, if you pardon the pun.

At that point several things occur in very rapid succession.  Terry notices the bear, and a split second later she provides the rest of her sleepy flock with the warning cry that civilization as we know it is going to cease to exist because there is a BEAR in the yard.

Another split second later, Mishkin is up the stairs, not having seen the bear but having heard the warning about impending doom.

Another split second later, Dan is cussing and complaining about his racing strips, which are a direct result of Mish using Dan’s leg as something to provide propulsion to his feet.

This is a very small bear, a cub from last year most likely. Innocently going about his business which, for a bear, means looking for something to eat. And since parrots are aware that this is a predator, alarms must be raised when a bear is spotted.

This was a very pretty chocolate brown bear.  Cute in my opinion.  A couple of days later a much larger bear arrived next to the driveway, closer to the house, roughly four times the size of this one.  Unfortunately for Dan, Mish was again reclining in his lap… and you can guess the rest of the story.

My comment was, “Poor kitty!”  and Dan was a little indignant since he was the one bleeding and the cat had still never actually seen a bear.

Last Friday the weather forecast was excellent, and so we set off on a mini-adventure.  A picnic.  We drove west up into the larger mountains – destination:  North Cascades National Park.   We always migrate towards mountains, given an option.  In addition to a picnic lunch, we also planned on a walk high in the mountains.  That didn’t work out because we didn’t exactly know where we were going.  That’s half the fun of an adventure!

Since our walk turned into a fact-finding mission, we headed further west, out of the mountains, to the national park headquarters and visitor center. The fact we didn’t want to stop driving our new car was certainly a factor!  We picked up a map which described the trail head for the high mountain walk we want to take someday, and learned that the direction we had planned on going would have been extremely steep.  Now we know that the other direction will be necessary.

And while we were at the headquarters, we set off on a River Loop walk which started and ended at the visitor center.

Under the clouds lives an ice field, high at the top of the mountain range. Most of the glaciers have disappeared in this park like they have in so many places around the world.

Heading down the hill, we entered a shaded world lushly carpeted with green in every shade.

Tall conifers make the canopy of shade. Breaks in the canopy make pockets of light. And everywhere, moss carpets the ground, rocks, downed trees. It is like viewing the world from inside an Emerald.

The trail follows the contour of a hillside, high above the forest floor. Hidden beneath the moss, two large boulders with small trees starting to grow.

Looking back up the trail, the trees seem to go on forever. Would that it were so. This type of woods is highly endangered on the entire west coast. This particular woods has been logged in the past.

Lacy vine maples are part of the understory growth in this grove of trees.

These large conifers have shallow root systems.

Large sword ferns occupy almost all open spaces between the trees. Some of these large ferns were over four feet tall and nine feet in diameter.

A mile into our walk, I asked Dan, “Are we going to have a river on our River Loop?”  He laughed.  We had watched “Jurassic Park” the night before.

The sound of water grew louder and we emerged onto the banks of the Skagit River.

A gravel bar on our side of the river was submerged by a foot of rushing water. At the edge of the gravel bar, deeper water is the color of cold icy gray glaciers.

Above our heads, deciduous line the banks of the river, and their branches stretched out over the water.

A tripod of branches withstand the rushing water.

Downriver the river continues its journey to the Pacific.

All in all, it was a splendid day for a picnic.  And it was interesting how much easier it was to walk at 500′ elevation instead of the usual 3,000′ or higher we walk when at home.

There is one potential problem lurking in our future, my future in particular.  Speeding tickets.  Our car goes too fast.  It’s not my fault.  Really.

I wonder if anybody has ever done a study on the instinctive behavior, “peek-a-boo.”  While this is something that people teach their babies, all other creatures seem to come by the game naturally.  I wonder if I can get a government grant to study this subject.  Cats, in particular, adore this game,  but only when they aren’t being aloof and dignified.

Take, for instance, Lewis’s Woodpeckers.  These birds fly like a crow, act like a flycatcher, but are actually a woodpecker that plays peek-a-boo.

Perched atop a telephone pole, in silhouette against the sky, the large beak is a clue to this species type. The faintest hint of red on top of the head, gleaming in the bright sunshine - no other colors are visible... "Hmmm, what a drab bird," you say to yourself.

Let the game begin!

"Hark, humans at 6 o'clock" Viola, the drab woodpecker shows it's colors while sizing up the competition for the new game.

A dark head, iridescent deep green, white chin fading into a pale rose pink which darkens to a deep rose, and then bright green coverts under the tail.  The only person who thinks this is a drab woodpecker is somebody who hasn’t actually looked at one.

Score one for the bird! Clever use of a tree branch in round one of the game.

Rats, the human changed trajectory, and scores! Tie game.

Round two begins.

Fast swap around the back side of the branch, and peek - score two for the bird!

Human moves, but bird counters. Another branch is called into play. Another score for the bird!

Obviously a pro at work, here.  What technique!  What finesse!

The final play of the match, head over shoulder and peeking far right around tree branch. Double points awarded for flexibility and style. Final Score: Bird 5 Human 1

Bird watching is definitely a sport, and everybody enjoys the challenge.

We went for a walk this morning on the road which parallels the river. We walk all the way to the curve by the rock outcrop on the left side, and then return to the car.

Heading back to the car, it is an almost 3 mile loop and as long as we go early in the day, it isn't too hot.

The grass is all shading into brown now, baked by the hot sun.  Pretty soon fall colors will begin to color the upper hillsides.  We are ready for some cool, rainy, fall weather!

We just got home from a nice drive in my birthday present.

Subaru Legacy GT Limited, 6-speed manual with a turbo, all decked out

I’m spoiled, I admit it.  This is the car Dan really, really wanted, and he will drive me around in it while I admire the scenery and play with my half of the dual climate controls.  I’ll drive it too sometimes.  I have to re-learn how to drive a manual transmission; it’s been about 17 years since we last had a car that wasn’t an automatic.  I have to start driving it before we go on any longer drives, which we won’t be doing for a while.

Today the air is clear. The other evening it was anything but clear. It does make for some spectacular sunsets.

We will wait until the fire danger is no longer ‘high’ before we go very  far from home, no overnight trips at all until the fall rains come.

One of several fawns which hangs around near our house. This one was hanging out by the flower bed next to the front door, and Dan was talking to him through the window, telling him not to eat our flowers. He took a picture so we can identify the culprit if anything goes 'missing.'

Mish is being very spoiled by the various channels on Kitty-TV.  He is going to be bummed when all the summer birds are gone, the deer aren’t hanging around, and the chipmunks are all snoozing.

Ok, I admit it.  I post a lot of weather and sky pictures.  But that is only because not much else is going on except weather phenomenon.  At least I didn’t post any food or cat pictures this time (just for you, Diana).

Like, for instance, over the weekend when we had rock and roll thunderstorms crashing around our heads, and torrential rains to go along with the pyrotechnics.

These clouds looked and felt threatening, and when the sun went down, they delivered on their promise. And how!

Some lightning strikes were accompanied by the corresponding thunder less than a second later.   It was astoundingly loud.  We covered our ears and just waited for the next one.  It lasted for hours.

The next morning we checked for damage and took a saw along on our drive down the hill to the mailbox.  Our preventative tree removal project had been successful and we didn’t have to hack our way out of our driveway, like has occurred on occasion.

The rains we had that night were by far the heaviest we’ve seen in our four plus years living here.  We talked to a neighbor who has lived up here since the mid 1970’s and he said it was the heaviest he’s seen as well.  He had six empty five gallon buckets in the back of his truck and all of them had 3-4 inches of water.  The road reflected this amount of runoff, with a rock slide completely covers the lower roadway, along a particularly steep hillside.  On the upper part of the road, deep gullies are opening into the road.  The county may have to break down and do some repairs before fall.

After the storms passed, the fires which were a result of the heavy lightning strikes have put a lot of smoke into the air.

An erie glow in an otherwise clear sky, and an orange sun.

Only the closest hillsides are visible in the thick smoke.

More storms are coming tonight.  We are completely surrounded today by towering thunderstorms, already making rumbling noises to the north and west.

Hopefully, they will produce rain to go with the lightning;  it will clear the air of all the smoke.  The fires are not close to us, and there is not much smell of smoke in the air, but it is very thick.   This time of year is always a bit disconcerting and I guess we won’t be taking any long day trips until the fall rains return.

Summer time gives us more sunsets, especially if there are clouds in the area.  We seem to get two sorts of sunsets, ones with oranges and greens in the sky, or those that are red and blues.  It all depends on where the clouds are when the sun goes down.

Sun rays shooting up from a golden ball of light.

A molten orange glow shading into raspberry, and purple haze.

This last one in particular was pretty amazing.  That night there were multiple thunderstorms to the west and south of us.  While the sun was setting, bright orange bolts of lightning were criss-crossing the sky through the dark purple clouds.  I wasn’t so lucky as to catch one on the camera, so I merely watched the storm marching northward.  It was so hot and muggy.

Again today it is very hot.  The weather forecasters have promised cooling temperatures tomorrow and Sunday, but the cost is going to be thunderstorms.  We are in the height of fire season now.  The weather is very muggy today and the air feels heavy.

Furniture we bought early this week was delivered today, seats for the sunroom, and a small table which is the perfect height for my laptop.  It is going to be a great space for working and watching the world go by, from morning until things get too hot, and again after the sun goes down and cool air flows down the mountain and swirls around and into the sunroom windows.

Mishkin found the new chairs and table quite interesting momentarily, but then it was time for his afternoon siesta and off he went to steal Dan's computer chair. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

I’m looking forward to watching the sunset this evening from my new chair!  I hope there is one.

Sun rays remind me of classic landscape paintings from the Renaissance period, when it is filtering through the clouds and illuminating hillsides.

I can almost imagine a 14th century castle on the hillside.

The quality of the light and the colors can change from minute to minute.

A cloud drifted slightly and the sunlight intensified and brightened the world.

Sunsets continue to amaze us with their variety.

Nothing really spectacular but I love the contrast between the bright raspberry clouds and the pale blue of the sky far above.

Zoom lenses are fun to play with! The same sunset changes character entirely with a twist of the variable focus lense.

Speaking of changing things, this was really pretty before I took it out of the pan.  An experiment – apricot upside down cake which didn’t cook in the middle properly due to the fact I didn’t adjust the moisture content of the cake batter, or the baking time, to compensate for the fresh apricots.  I learned something though, and the next one will be better.

I managed to get it back into the oven to complete baking, and then we ate the evidence.

This was absolutely delicious, with a hint of cinnamon and nutmeg to go with the intensely and totally ripe apricots.

Last night I made an apricot/peach crisp with the remainder of the fruit we got from the fruit stand.  Another trip will be in our immediate future as the only thing we have left is one small seedless watermelon.

Other than working and playing with our computers, not up to much of anything.  We have watched the first two “Toy Story” movies and it was funny just how interesting Mishkin found them.  I think they are his favorite movies.  He loves the little green toy soldiers, and his attention is completely focused on them when they are on the screen.  I’ve never met a cat that watched TV before, he continues to amaze us.