From the sublime to the...

The odyssey is over; I've returned to Ithaca. Or maybe this is my travel place and Denali National Park is my Ithaca. It's all a jumble.

There are the myriad pictures to remind me of the summer, the memories of voices, the sound of nothing but air, the feel of air crisped by a morning frost, the sight of Sandhill Cranes circling, soaring, and finally winging up to continue their flight south.

But running through my mind at odd points on the drive home were all those details that waited for me in Milwaukee: get the tire leak seen to, new muffler and windshield (each trip to Alaska in the car costs you a windshield), call the cable people, grocery shop, where did I leave the bag of tools. Oh, yes, eye doctor (ouch, new glasses). The serenity of a Mesa Verde sunset and moonrise made me stop...and put all the lists on paper. It worked. I thoroughly enjoyed those last several days of the trip--Balloon Fiesta in Albuquerque, dipping into Michelle and Bob's lives for a couple of days, breakfast in Santa Fe, climbing through the Raton Pass, and then the endless flat of eastern Colorado and Nebraska, the endless oscillation in Iowa, and--about 35th Street in Milwaukee, the smell in the air of nearby water. A summer spent in 24% humidity magnifies such scents.

As my Milwaukee life resumes, different details fall into place. The nested glass bowls live under the counter to the left of the sink; the hair dryer plugs into the outlet in the over-bathroom-mirror light fixture; the plants are down in the laundry room. Gradually what needs doing here will override the immediacy of what I just lived through. When you divide your life between two places, you have to create room in each to process what happened in the other. The day-to-day living doesn't offer transition time; that time you have to carve out...or simply delay the moment at which you sit down and put the past into place.

So with more calls to make, more items on the list to see to, I'll sign off for the moment. At some point the last six months will acquire more form. Hindsight, they say, is 20-20. Insight takes longer, and is nowhere near as quantifiable.

"You are now leaving the 9-1-1 calling area...."

One of the many little voices accompanying me on this road trip says, "Pfff. We don't need no stinkin' cell phone." And I swung onto the Cassiar Highway just west of Watson Lake, Yukon Territory. All my voices had an argument in Whitehorse when we awoke to a low overcast and grimly damp streets.

"OK. No Cassiar Highway. Alaska Highway all the way."

"Well, then you have to cancel the hotels in Dease Lake and Smithers...."

"OK, if the rain stops by Watson Lake, I'll take the Cassiar." N.B.: The rain stopped. But there was a sign: BC 37 CLOSED. For further information....

"Well, there. No Cassiar."
N.B.: Checked with gas station attendant, and road is open with Pilot Car.

So, I turned onto the Cassiar Highway. By now you're wondering what the big deal is. Well, the Cassiar Highway comes with warnings. Bears, road closings, signs like '141 km to the next gas,' no services (well, precious few). At dinner one evening at Camp Denali, a guest listened to my plan to drive "out" via the Cassiar. He then asked if I had a GPS. "No, and there's only one road, and you're on it." Then came the dire warnings about logging trucks speeding at you, kicking up rocks that break windshields. "And make sure to take a tire pump, the kind you plug into the cigarette lighter." I'd heard most of his conversation before; indeed, mostly what you hear is why others would NOT take that road.

Still, it's a numbered, year-round route maintained by the Province of British Columbia. And, still, this would likely be the last chance I had to drive this road. Even with this tentative resolve under my belt, my misgivings filled the car. What if I DID get a rock through the windshield? What if I had to drive 400 miles on the Tonka tire after a flat? How far is the next gas? Where are the logging trucks concentrated.

At its far northern end, the "Highway" is little more than an unshouldered, crowned, paved causeway through muskeg and old forest burns. Turning left here, right there, around little ponds, steeply up little hills, and then steeply down the other side. Maximum speed limit: 80 kph. I thought, "This is gonna take a l-o-n-g time."

After a while the road widened, and at about mile 125, the road climbed up the side of a huge ridge, and the view in the photo above presented itself. The trees flamed brightly against the spruce; whitecaps dotted the lake. The motel in Dease Lake was clean, comfy, and quiet, and in the morning, I set out about 7:00 in order to make the 10:00 pilot car about 2-1/2 hours south. I arrived in plenty of time, snaked through some VERY dramatic areas of spring mudslide and flooding.

It was sort of like driving through that snowstorm in the Yukon Territory back in April. You go until you can't. And so does everyone else. I ended the day richer by six black bear sightings (three were a sow and two little cubs--tiny after my summer's exposure to Denali's grizzlies), a Bald Eagle, and assorted ravens.

And richer by the knowledge that now that I've driven the Cassiar Highway, I know what everyone is talking about. It's narrower than the Alaska Highway, the scenery is more spectacular--because it's much closer to you, and it's 130 miles closer to Prince George if you take it. It's difficult to remember how large British Columbia is, how broad its valleys, how much its mountains bulk up the horizon. It's as big as Texas and most of Wyoming together! I think of the ease with which the plan was made to drive it--again, as I pointed out back in April, plans made with the Atlas in your lap and your seat cushioned by the couch often end up being questioned in the execution! The mind wrestles with the why and the how of the drive, conflicted by the assumption that you will be able to handle what comes along and by the fear that you won't. The drive becomes less about touring and more about just getting there.

But when you do get there, you get to smile inside even as you hold tightly to the milestone the drive represents. I may have gripped the steering wheel a bit hard in places, but I have now driven the Cassiar Highway.

Segue

The summer job is over. Last Thursday afternoon I drove to Anchorage for a couple of days' worth of rest before resuming--tomorrow morning--the Drive Out.

As much as I dislike the word 'transition' (hence the title "Segue"), the three days here at Gail's in Anchorage have been restful and refreshing, and have provided a wonderful bridge from my fatigue to the eagerness to be on the road again. The bulk, and weight, of much of my stuff will find its way to Wisconsin via UPS starting Tuesday; MSCARLT's burden has been dramatically lightened--as has my anxiety at what a fully loaded car does to its tires, let alone the reduction in gas mileage. Yesterday we drove down to Summit Lake on the Kenai Peninsula to gawk at leaves (not yet at their peak), fresh snow (not yet anything serious), and stop in Girdwood at the Bake Shop (not yet overcrowded with snowy skiers) for some delicious Minestrone. I will admit to catching catnaps as Gail drove.

Mostly what I've done for the last couple of days is process the summer's experience. About halfway through the summer I'd come to the conclusion that I'd accomplished what I set out to do in committing two summers to working at Camp Denali/North Face Lodge. This would wrap it up. I was done. As August went on, my resolve weakened. The rain let up and the sun shone, the tundra came alive with the most spectacular display of autumnal color I've ever seen--and I'm from New England!

Then the first wing of migrating Sandhill Cranes flew over. If there is a signature moment that says to me, "It's Autumn," it's the rattly gobble of the cranes overhead. While waiting for the guests' arrival on a Friday evening, we watched a huge flock rise from the nearby tundra, their cluster enlarging, tightening, winging up, circling ever higher--we were transported as we watched. It's not something you can capture in a photograph, or record; it is an experience. And it simply fills you up.

And being full of the experience, I started to think: what are the things arguing for ending my stint here after two summers. Blasted mosquitoes. Those mornings when the room is freezing. Walking up that hill. Walking back down that hill with the knee that doesn't like descents. The more I thought, the more I realized that my dark spells came when I recognized that I'd performed at less than my best in the job. Hmmm. We're getting somewhere here.

Then came the morning that the last guests left. I checked in with the breakfast servers and kitchen staff to congratulate them on the summer being over, and I realized just how hard they'd all worked, and how well they'd done. Double hmmm.

Two days later, staff were boarding Happy Bus for the trip out of the park. Engines revved, gears meshed, wheels turned. We waved them out of the yard even as we wiped tears that kept falling...and they were gone. Then I put the last couple of things in the car and began my own cycle of departure hugs. And the awareness hit me again--as it did last summer: we really are like a family. We live in the same small community, we work side-by-side for several months, we grow to know each other so well we can laugh heartily as all our foibles and frustrations appear in the staff spoofletter.

That's when it hit me. All the reasons I cited for this being the end were just annoyances. Do the mosquitoes drive me nuts? Yes. But can I live with them? Yeah, most likely. That's why there's insect repellent. Is it cold in the mornings? Yes. Does it warm up? Yes. Well, kind of. But can I live without that nighttime view of stars peeking through the aurora? The company of laughing co-workers watching the display from the roof, all wrapped in down garments and blankets? The golden glow of the leaves flaming above brilliant red bearberry and orange dwarf birch? The friendships, the shared work and purpose? Most likely not. These are the important parts. They're what I remembered from last year;they're what will warm me through the winter.

So it took me a couple of months, but I finally got it into words. You can live with the annoying parts. But you can't live without what's important. Something not to forget.

Small World

We have staff children this year. Danika and Silas are the third generation of family on the ridge; Oliver and Lilly from Tasmania, and who, with their parents, are with us; Maggie is the daughter of a woman who has been a naturalist guide here for years. The youngsters spend a lot of time together here in organized kidcare, and staff members recognize them as their own family members, too.

Working in the office, I get a clear view out the window of the lawn in front of Potlatch and just east of the lodge--the log structure that Woody built back in the early 50s. On Wednesday, Jack, a first year staff member, had stopped washing the outside windows for a moment, and Dan, whose father has been one of our visiting naturalist-lecturers for years, took a moment from his trash-emptying rounds. All of them were cavorting! Kicking a soccer ball, waving a stick, showing handfuls of Australian coins, practicing handstands.

We are really lucky here to be such a small world, to be a community where the youngest has something to offer the oldest, where we can all play together with spontaneity, and where we all look out for each other. Especially the kids. If we're lucky enough to return for a second year, we see the growth in the kids--even Silas now toddles up to Jack, slaps hands in a two-year-old high five and says, clearly, "Hi, Jack!" Danika (4) stands up at staff meeting with an announcement about and invitation to her kids party that will last "until there's no light," and everyone pays attention. Lilly charms us all with her pink mini-wellies and play clothes over which she sports a tutu and fairy wings.

And Maggie, at 9, is an accomplished fiddler. She played with the other musicians at FallFest, serious face, tapping toe keeping the meter. If we see paper airplanes and artwork hanging in the "Smithsonian" staff room at North Face Lodge, we know that Maggie has been holding court with her crafts. While waiting for the incoming guests last Monday, we test-flew the various models in the upper lot. Anya and Jonathan helped pitch the planes, Jack and Tate (on the roof) helped gather them in. And Maggie ran circles around the lot of us.

Yesterday after a half day in the dish pit at Camp, I returned to my room bent on taking a nap. I'd been up since 5:00 in the morning, my feet were killing me, and I was looking forward to lying down. A note was taped to my door, from Maggie and her mother, Maria, asking me over to their cabin to talk beads and have tea. Suddenly I realized how much I wanted to do that, so I packed up my bead supplies, put on my jacket (early Fall here, and it's chilly), and tapped on their door.

Maria put another log in the stove, heated some water for tea, and the three of us showed each other our beading projects, talked about different patterns and techniques. I taught them how to make a star, and Maria showed me an Athabascan-style snowflake pattern that I'll work on this winter. Then as I started gathering stuff to head back to my room, Maria suggested that she and Maggie play the song Maggie wrote, the January Moonlight Song. Maria played melody on her violin; Maggie played the harmony she also composed on hers. I could see in my mind animals and people swirling and pirouetting in the January night as the tunes filled the 60-year old log cabin. Then Maggie played a couple of French Canadian songs--jigs or reels, I forget which. Lively, spirited, and outside the leaves danced on the wind.

And then I thought...in that head-shaking, how-could-I-have-missed-this way...it's not just a privilege to live here in the National Park all summer. It is a privilege to live within this small world, this place where we can leave i-pods and headphones behind, this community where age and youth are equal, where earth--not pavement--supports your feet, and where you rely on your talents and caring to create your joy, where you all--together--are part of this incredible string of once and future generations.

FallFest

The sun has definitely heeled over into autumn, and mornings here at North Face Lodge have started to get routinely frosty. Staff members start to think of what the next season holds--employment, return to school, on to graduate school, back to the winter job. To celebrate the summer and the staff and the place we throw a party for all staff.

The celebration used to be called Christmas. There would be a tree, carols, cookies, and a gift exchange. Staff would draw names earlier in the summer, and make--yes, make--a gift for that person. The recipient's identities would be about the best kept secret in the place next to who writes Ptarmigan Pturds, the staff spoofletter. In an attempt to be a bit more inclusive and to defuse some of the religious significance, we've made a shift from Christmas to Festivus to, finally, FallFest. No tree, different sorts of music, but we've retained the moose-shaped iced cookies, the lingonberries scattered down the center of the table, and the gift exchange.

Last night was the night, and because the job falls to someone on the offie staff, I was the appointed coordinator. We'd had some sun during the day, so we hoped that the rain would stay away. So when we gathered to take the staff photograph, the sun shone, but the rain fell, resulting in another spectacular rainbow. With the group photo taken, we moved back into Potlatch's dining hall decorated with construction paper cutouts of Sandhill Cranes, local berries, and colored leaves. And a few assorted snowflakes.

There was music, too. Three violin/fiddles, two recorders, one flute, three guitars, a cello, and a washtub bass. The musicians ranged in age from 9 to 87 and included a mother and daughter from Fairbanks, one of the founders of Camp Denali, and a cook from Tucson. This group set the tone for the evening, playing simple reels and jigs (after one rehearsal), some of the tunes set out from memory by the fiddlers. Toes tapped, staff children danced, Jack even played the spoons.

But the gift exchange, like last year's, was the highlight of the evening for me. The creativity and resourcefulness shown by the giftmakers, the attention to who is receiving the gift blows me away. The thoughtfulness, the painstaking searching for ideas, the humor shown.... There were metalwork candle boxes, an outhouse bank with seeds for Alaskan wildflowers, hand-painted tee-shirts, a huge exquisite quilt, appliqued pillow, caribou antler bracelets, jewelery boxes, picture frames, jams, an iron pot rack, even a porcupine hat for one of the guides.

The laughter moved easily to the close of the evening. Musicians played the dance tune Simple Gifts--so fitting for what we all gathered to share--and staff stood to sing through to the end of the song. While we cleaned up Potlatch and returned it to dining room status for guests' breakfast, the musicians continued to play. Silas toddled up to watch Jack play the spoons, four-year old Oliver hugged his father's neck while drowsing. Brian, the washboard bassist, picked up Anya's cello and added a deeper thrum to the melodies, Marshall--on someone's shoulders--pulled down the snowflakes we'd hung on the highest beam earlier in the day. All joined in, all made the evening complete.

About 11:30 I slipped out the door to start the walk down the hill. It was cool out, some clouds silhouetted against the silver sky, and over above Cranberry Ridge the moon was out. First moon we've seen since April. As I walked, I hummed the tunes we'd listened to, added a few of my own, and enjoyed the fresh air, the almost-dark night, and the joy of a rousing evening with folks I didn't know in June but who have become treasured friends.

Occasions like this change you. Those uncomplicated moments we've forgotten to notice once again gain importance, and things like presents, loosely assembled musicians, rainbows, moonlight and kindness remind us again of the blessing of simple gifts.

Cuppa Java

There's something about a cup of coffee first thing in the morning--the aroma, the warmth, the steam, the rich flavor. Even the mug...the thick white diner cups, that hand-thrown mug you found at a thrift shop, or the souvenir mug from Amish country. Whatever that cup of coffee is, in Alaska it seems to be obligatory.

Yes, we have tea drinkers, here at Camp Denali/North Face Lodge although I find tea in the morning lacks...well...a lot. Being from Boston, where drinking tea smacks of Royalism, I find I mostly drink tea in private, in the afternoon, in the winter. But coffee? The morning doesn't start without coffee. The drive doesn't start without coffee. Judging from the stream of guests entering the lodge before breakfast, their day doesn't start without coffee.

I shoehorned a trip to Anchorage into my last two days off. Not a particularly relaxing pair of days, but the trip was productive. The list for Wednesday left little time to spare--battery for MJ's watch, contact lens solution for Sarah, thread and fabric for a FallFest gift, meet Carley (for coffee) and pick up some stuff to bring back to Camp, stop by the bead store for supplies, run by Nordstrom for skin care products, swing into Starbucks for some Pike Place Blend--Decaf, and be done in time for dinner with friends. The next morning at 7:00, I was in the car (with a travel mug of coffee) and on the way back north.

But on the drive I was impressed by the sheer number of small coffee shacks one sees here in Alaska. These are little more than ice-fishing structures, taller than they are wide, with a door on one side for the proprietor, and a window on the other side where you drive up and communicate your order. Some sport hand-made signs, others blink brightly with neon. Nenana Coffee is, predictably, in Nenana. Right by the side of the road on the south side of town, and the only decent coffee between Healey and Fairbanks--roughly two and a half hours of driving.

Driving south to Anchorage that morning from the entrance to Denali National Park (withOUT a cup of coffee because nothing--that is, the Chevron station in Cantwell--was open at 4:45 a.m.), I was distracted first by the beauty of the drive, even on a rainy morning, but second, by the presence, every so often, of coffee shacks. At Trapper Creek, there is a huge building where you can get everything from a shower to liquor to propane to coffee; at the Talkeetna turn-off, there is a Subway that carries Seattle's Best Coffee (yes, I did, it's a four and a half hour drive). Then in Houston I saw a vehicle license plate: XPR-SSO. Then a sign for Aroma Borealis. In Anchorage there are Common Grounds, Terra Bella Coffee, Kaladi Brothers Coffee, Kobuk Coffee, and (I'm not sure why) Bustin' Ass Coffee. Walking through the Town Park in Anchorage, you almost can't hear conversations for the sound of milk steamers chorrrrrrffshshs-ing.

Maybe this is one of the reasons I love Alaska--pretty good coffee no matter where you look. Maybe the puns tickle the English major in me. Perhaps it's the entreprenurial spirit that resonates--Eklutna Coffee even has an E-Z return to expressway sign. Zip off the highway, swing through to get your coffee, back on the road again. You can set up business for the cost of a commercial-grade espresso machine. Demand and supply. Add a clever name? You've got cash flow.

Next time I drive south, though--in September after my last work day here--I will stop at Aroma Borealis. The name draws me in as surely as the olfactory promise.

Why the Tarmagain, I mean Parmesan, um Chicken...

...crossed the road.

Last week on my day off--and when the sun was shining brilliantly, I decided to go for my favorite walk. After breakfast I packed my lunch, got into my hiking boots, spritzed on some insect repellent, and set off.

I can't help but take pictures of the wildflowers. I have about skadey-eight shots of Fireweed in various phases of bloom, but when another stalk backlit by the sun glows in front of me, I stop, turn on the camera, and snap another picture.

After one such photo op, being bent double trying to get the best angle for the picture, I heard a very strange noise. I think noises are stranger when you're bent double out here in the wilds of the park, but maybe that's just me. Anyway, I straightened slowly, turned more slowly, heard the noise again, and looked.... Zip. Nothing. I moved and heard said noise again. This time there was a rustle in the underbrush; the noise maker could probably hear my heart beating at this point.

Long story short, there at the side of the road, under the grasses and shrubby willows, was a Ptarmigan! With the unknown noise resolved, I felt much braver, and turned the camera toward the State Bird. Then there was more rustling, more of that strange muffled raspy cluck, and.... Chicks! First there were two, then across the road there were more little cheepy whistles, and more chicks, four...five. Seven in all. As I've related before, these are not the brightest of our avian friends. They cluster in times of peril (thus maximizing their chances of dispatch), and at other times, they scatter will-nilly in as many directions as there are birds in the brood. And sometimes, they just plain stand still and look at you.

Back about a mile I'd passed road work. Large Park Service maintenance vehicles busily dumped gravel, and while the grader spread it out, the dump truck--a huge dump truck (my head came about to the floorboard of the cab)--would zoom off for another load down at the south end of Wonder Lake. As I stood there watching the mama Willow Ptarmigan stand there in the road, I could hear the truck returning. As it came around the curve it slowed (they have a no-dust policy when encountering pedestrians), and then slowed some more, and came to a halt just as one of the chicks toddled onto the road to see what was going on. Talk about winning a game of Chicken! A natural world Ptarmiganimen Square.

The ptarmigans stood there and looked at the truck. The driver and I sat/stood there and looked at the birds. This went on for the better part of ten minutes. Finally, the female ptarmigan shooed her chick over to the other side of the road, I walked on, the truck slowly passed by.

Huge truck. Tiny birds.

That's what I like about things here in the Park. It's about the animals, not the humans. Large trucks and women out for a walk stop and let the locals move freely--it's where they live. We give way to them.

And that's why the Ptarmigan crossed the road: to move her chick to safety--at her own pace, without having to dodge anything.

Halfway

Last week marked the halfway point in my time away from Milwaukee. Not halfway through the guest season yet--about three more weeks for that--but I've been away from my apartment, friends, books for about fourteen weeks.

Today I took another of my walks to Wonder Lake and found a fireworks explosion of cotton grass. It was a wonderful sight as, because of the 24 hours of light in the summer, we won't see real pyrotechnics until September and the end of the guest season after our Thanksgiving dinner.

This season finds me doing much the same in the way of time on the job and time off the job. The difference lies in the comparison. I'm not a greenhorn any more, the hill up to camp is not the endless climb it used to be. My responsibilities demand less of me physically and so I'm not losing weight the way I did last summer; those responsibilities demand that more of me be involved in what's going on around me, have my mind concentrated more on the larger picture. Because of this I'm not as ready to add posts to this blog as before. Everything was new before and made for reasonably interesting readin; now not so much. And the new parts I do have this year are personnel related and not as easily written about.

Hmmm. A blog post about not writing....

Still, my mind is actively thinking through what I'm doing, my body is just now feeling a few aches and oofs (I scheduled myself for a physical shift of breakfast service and a day of cleaning/puttering in the lodge, with a one-mile walk to start and end the day). If I examined the tone of last summer's writings, I am pretty certain I would unearth about the same emotions as I'm feeling now; namely the following:

a. I'm slightly homesick,

b. It's a l-o-n-g way to September, and

c. I'm starting to get the hang of things.

Just as I tell my guests each Monday morning before they board the bus taking them back to the remainder of their vacations, this is a wonderful place to be, it's a privilege to live here for the summer, and those 10 days of rain just past may come again, but right now the sun is shining, the flowers are blooming (yes, the fireweed blossoms fluff out the lower third of each stalk), and life is pretty good.

Neither Elegy nor Eulogy

On my day off today I walked to Wonder Lake, climbed Blueberry Hill, and ate my lunch. Fair weather cumulus and sun filled the sky, moderate breezes kept the the bugs away. Buses passed (both VTS and Denali Back Country Lodge), so I waved; brief snippets of conversation and laughter from the two canoers on the lake added to the background. Over there to the southwest, Denali hid behind a cloud layer--we'll see it on another day

Everywhere wildflowers bloomed--yellow Arnica, pink plume, white shaggy-headed cotton grass, the purples of early Larkspur and lupine--but it was the Chiming Bluebells lining the road that caught my eye and my heart. They're tiny flowers, but their color is brilliant. I don't know why, but they reminded me of Nancy. Maybe because they were plentiful and she was full in my mind. But they rang for her, all those little bells.

Nancy died last Saturday. She had struggled for years, fighting bout after bout with cancer. But like the Chiming Bluebells fighting out the Alaskan winter, she never gave up; she kept showing up. Her body gave out on her in the end, but not the parts of her we remember.

We met as students at Bates College, finally rooming together as juniors. If I were back home in Milwaukee, I'd rummage through the old photo albums to find snapshots. But they're in my mind as are the sounds of us talking and laughing with others. Singing, too. We used to sing along to Pete Seeger's "Bells of Rhymney"--maybe that's why the bluebells resonated.

Who we are at 19 is not who we become. But it is a time of testing. Testing our intelligence in class, talking about family dynamics, visiting each other's homes, trying on defiance, finding new ways of defining our worlds. Part of my test was to leave Bates, to try life. It meant leaving Nancy, too, that nice corner room in Frye House now hers alone for the last month or so of the semester.

We stayed in touch for a while, stood as bridesmaids to Corky and Al, but then we didn't contact each other that much, and we lost touch. Then when I was in Atlanta for my last summer of graduate school, I received a round-about message that Nancy was in the city, too, for an NEA conference. We met, had dinner, talked and laughed, laughed and talked as if the years hadn't passed. She and John were getting married, and she wanted me to be there. And I was. Her happiness was palpable. It was a treat to see her siblings again, and a treat to see other Bates friends with whom I'd lost touch.

Because of Nancy, really, I stepped hesitantly back into that circle of friends.

So what I remember of Nancy--beyond the twinkling smile and the throaty voice in which she sang "Scotch and Soda"--is the connection, the link to others that she offered. Bless that connection.

And bless her. She will be missed.

Season Opener

The preparation is over; the formal training/orientation is complete; and the first guests have come and gone. We're still working out the kinks in scheduling, in new jobs with new staff members even as we explore life together here at the end of the dirt road.

When we arrived for office opening at the end of May, there was still a fair amount of snow patching the Kantishna hills, and in upper Camp, frost heaves and soft spots still dampened the drive outside Potlatch. Early Openers, having flown in at the beginning of May, found much more snow than we did. But as we prepared for the arrival of staff, the air was warm, smiles brightened the landscape, and people darted back and forth about their jobs.

A couple of weeks in, we're all starting to find jobs familiar. New housekeeping staff have located the battery supply for the guest alarm clocks, the greenhouse is supplying herbs for the kitchen, edible flowers for garnish--and working that compost bin! Cooks have shown their mettle with the indredible meals prepared (fresh Alaskan cod, apricot/pistachio-stuffed lamb, roasted vegetables, cinnamon bread French toast, and homemade breads and desserts you wouldn't believe possible)--you can see what my focus is!

Outdoors, along the roadside and across the tundra, flowers spring to life as winter recedes and the short summer overlays the land. Blue chiming bells, yellow Arnica, white Canadian dogwood, pink prickly rose, all these bloom next to tiny low-bush cranberry and blueberry flowers. Birds trill, ducks dip and dive in the kettle ponds. Animals move freely along the road--on Opening Day we had a moose cow and new calf in Nugget Pond (see the blog at www.campdenali.com) --we've spotted a lynx across from North Face Lodge, caribou dot the tundra, ground squirrels whistle and dive into burrows even as bears dig wildly in those burrows to snag a snack.

Of course, the mosquitos are back, too. The first hatch is big, slow, and stupid, and you can usually catch them out of the air with your fist. Following those are the smaller, quicker, hungrier ones. Those are harder to capture, and their bites itchier. It's fun to sit in the office doing my work, and in the quiet I hear a slap--pause--and a whispered jubilant "Yes!" as another of them is taken out of the pool. The good that they do, though, is often forgotten. Mosquitoes are pollinators. When I look at the flowers and scratch those itchy places, I need to remember that! It is also satisfying to know that fish eat them. The mosquitoes, not the flowers.

You'll figure from the preceding that I am happy to be here. I can't think of a stronger understatement. As much as I need time in the city, visits with my daughters, trips to see friends, and weekly church services, I find more and more that this unique National Park is home. The connection to seasonal rhythms with no televison or newspapers to "keep me current" but with an unbelieveable variety of flora and fauna and landscape to observe--this connection grounds me more thoroughly than I can describe.

What a privilege to live here for four months of the year!

Dinner

About a week and a half ago, certain business matters required that I be at the office between 1:30 a.m. and 3:30 a.m. Stuff happens on the east coast that doesn't recognize the imposition on folks four time zones away. Anyway, I could either be awake at the house and, if necessary, get dressed and race to the office to fax necessary information or answer questions on the phone...or I could simply stay overnight at the office. This is not difficult. There is a kitchen, food, comfy couch for spreading a sleeping bag on, and I had my alarm clock to wake me for the time I needed to be alert.

I prepared a cup of tea, cranked up my computer, read a book after I read e-mails, and--at sleepy time, donned my pjs, fluffed out the sleeping bag, punched up the pillow, and snestled down on the couch ready for sleep. Ahh. After a certain amount of scrunching and turning, I found the right combination of soft spot and support, and, yawning, I settled in for the first half of the night's sleep.

It's often difficult to sleep in a strange place, especially when it's a large room. Unfamiliar creaks signal that the heat has kicked in, a couple of clunking sighs indicate the refrigerator motor has cut off. Outside the wind clicks branches together, lights across the river resolve into reflections on the window of the microwave clock. It's not the small cozy bedroom you're used to...but, hey, it's indoors, it's warm, it's fine.

It was fine until, just beneath my ear, I heard a tiny rustling noise. Nah, outside. Another turn. Dang, another rustly scrabbling. I bolted to a sitting position, heard no further noise, called myself silly names, and turned around so my head was at the other end of the couch. I scooched and shifted, settled down on my pillow, closed my eyes, and damned if it didn't happen again. I realized that I shared the couch with a small guest. Now I'm not fearful of little quadrupeds, but I sure don't like trying to sleep with one channeling from one end of the couch innards to the other!

"OK, little dude, you can have the couch," I conceded, and moved the hassock over to the armchair, set up there, and managed to achieve a slouching doze for about an hour. I heard no further rustlings, saw no evidence of wee sleekit beasties, and when 3:30 came, I packed all my gear in the car and drove back to the house for the remainder of the night.

Two mornings later, in the kitchen just before the start of work, as we were making coffee and tea, chatting about the day to come, the older of the two staff dogs suddenly stomped over to the corner next to the sink. If ever a sled dog was en pointe, it was Tusker. And there scuttling along the base of the cabinet was my couch companion: a little vole. It raced across the room, heading, no doubt, for the safety of the couch.

Jan noted that it was probably time to haul out the traps. After some discussion of names for the interloper, we agreed that it was a bad idea to name something we planned to kill. Then MJ, laughing, suggested we call it Dinner. And it stuck. We laughed our way upstairs to our desks, one ear open for the trap snap announcing Dinner's dispatching.

The first day the trap remained poised and waiting, the cheese radiating fragrance. The next morning, the cheese was gone! No Dinner in the trap. This time Jan wedged a peanut into the trap ensuring our quarry would have to do some substantial prying, resulting in...well, you can figure it out.

It's been a week, now. Several times a day we check the trap line, and each time the tempting morsel is gone, the trap unsprung. We've tried raisins, bits of cheese with peanut butter in addition to the plain cheese and peanuts. Each time the quick, crafty little critter makes off with the bait. Maybe the laugh is on us for having thought we could outwit the vole who managed come in from the Alaskan winter.

Regardless, Dinner has dined quite well this week.

Groceries, Goldeneyes, and Graupel

It's clear that the picture is neither groceries, nor a goldeneye, so it's fair to say it must be graupel. And what--you ask--is graupel? Google it! I did.

It's another of those phenomena that seem commonplace here at this time of year, but I've managed to live close to 69 years without knowing there was such a thing. So the other evening, during an especially heavy graupelshower, I went outside and aimed the camera at the ground. Voila.

There is much about this place that I continue to find new. I've lived in Alaska before, but Anchorage provides an urban setting with Starbucks, high-rise buildings, and suburban sprawl. Living there is pretty much like living in any city, just with a longer and darker winter and moose out the kitchen window. Last summer I enjoyed complete off the grid living--heat the cabin with a woodstove, walk down the hill to the showers, walk up the hill to the outhouse. But with upscale food that I didn't have to prepare and a view off my porch of the tallest peak on the North American continent.

But living here at the east end of Denali National Park, at mile 227.5 of the George Parks Highway is different. The community is invisible from the road although the road can be heard from the invisible homes. The community center serves myriad purposes: large meeting room for group gatherings and the knitting group, training room upstairs for the volunteer fire persons, garage for the vehicle beneath the room. It's where you can get drinking water--bring your own 5-gallon plastic jugs--and it's where the CSA distributes produce. Day care and dance, they both meet here.

While last summer I experienced isolated group living, this is more isolated solitary living. And I have to prepare my own food. I came up from Anchorage a month ago with a plastic bin full of groceries: some went in the freezer, some in the refrigerator, but most is of the sort that needs neither. My shopping list was lengthy, and the cart filled up fast with pasta and sauce, applesauce for when the fresh apples ran out, flour and yeast for bread, tea, coffee, peanut butter and rice cakes, milk and sandwich cheese, squash for soup, quarts of chicken stock, and more containers of yogurt than I've ever purchased at once. With the nearest [limited and expensive] shopping in Healey (20 miles north at $4.999 per gallon to get there), you don't do a lot of zipping out to get what you forgot! You make what you've got work--from the planning of the list to the figuring out what to use first. Cabbage may not be what I want, but that's what's wilting, so I've got to use it.

The weekends are full of housework as I tend this beautiful home I've been allowed to occupy. Saturdays I do chores: sweep, vacuum, scrub down, neaten up. On Sundays, laundry sloshes and fluffs, soups steam, bread rises, as I cook and bake for the week. I've been to Fairbanks once (2.5 hours to get there), and this weekend I head to Anchorage for the last weekend before the summer. I'll drive one of the company vehicles down so it's in town for arriving staff; I'll come back on the bus that another staff member drove down today for staff and supply pickup.

And I'll come back to this lovely location on one of several small ponds (they're lakes here). I've watched the ice go out and the birds come back. Last weekend I heard a strange noise, looked out the window, and there were two pairs of Trumpeter Swans flapping and swimming about, dipping their long necks beneath the water to feed. But there were just a whole slew of ducks! I'd visited the bookstore at Denali National Park on opening day to get a bird book (I'd forgotten to bring mine from Milwaukee), so I dug it out of the bag and started trying to identify all the ducks. I recognized the Mallards...kind of the 'Smith' of ducks, and after much page turning and binocular peering I realized I was seeing Barrow's Goldeneyes! [much more page-flipping and peering] And Wigeons! I knew the word, but I'd never seen one. Unlike goldeneyes, Wigeons float along on top of the water like Little Toot. It's a hoot to watch them all up-ended and waggle-tailed as they forage beneath the surface.

I'm learning so much here. Old skills come back to me, but what's most fascinating is the amount of completely new things I'm bumping up against. I can feel the gratitude building, like it did last summer, as I meet wonderfully generous and gracious people, appreciate new artwork, savor the fresh air blowing from the south and the snow flurries blowing from the north, discover birds I'd only known in books, and as I learn a new job, answer new questions.

And I smile--no, grin--that I'm only a couple of months away from my 69th birthday, and I'm still eagerly seeing and doing things for the first time. Dieu soit beni.

Rural Alaska Living. Ha!

Well, I'm here. My month at the East End of Denali National Park started last Monday night, and my job training for the [second] summer's work at Camp Denali/North Face Lodge started Tuesday morning. The learning curve is steeper some days than others, but I like it--it makes me feel as if I'm contributing again and solves one of my problems with this whole 'retired' thing. The main problem. Chiefly, how do I still feel productive on a more-than-personal scale when I no longer have paid employment? You can only knit so many scarves.

Perhaps it's going to be this way for a while...as long as I pursue this summer-in-Alaska-winter-in-Milwaukee plan. Summers of work, winters of sloth. Maybe I need to quit thinking of it as sloth!

Anyway, here I am, living and sort of house-sitting in the lap of luxury. Art on the walls, carpet on the floor, and down duvet on the bed. Right now the bread is rising, later on I'll start the kettle of soup. Because we're still in late winter here (note the picture--the view to the south of the lake), I've swapped the intrepid but decidedly delicate Miss Scarlett for a company Jeep Cherokee with snow tires and four-wheel drive. Tomorrow I'll venture out on the Park road to sightsee. I'll be careful, though, because the bears are awake, and they're cranky after their winter's hibernation.

The transition from city life and road trip seems to have been effected, and my mind is back into rural life. I have a stockpile of food to last me until I head out to Camp, the distances required to restock have been duly recorded, and I'm hopeful that I'll get to knitting group next Wednesday evening.

As the weeks go by, I'll have more to say, and my posts won't be quite so short. In the meantime...on to the soup!

akhyx8!

I have now driven the Alaska Highway eight (8) times!! Wow! Granted, I left the highway in Tok, short of its finish in Delta Junction, but still, 1,247.7 miles is not to be sneezed at. //Since I'm a couple days behind in the Trip Chronicle, I'll start back in Muncho Lake, British Columbia, on Saturday morning. Waking to a sky vaguely sunny sky, that blank white expanse that means snow is in the area, I consumed a whopping (for me) breakfast of eggs, bacon, potatoes, fresh fruit (a luxury in the far north), and delicious Swiss twist bread. With the gas tank topped off, and sun gleaming off the eastern face of the mountains to my west, Miss Scarlett purred off. Snow shower #1 barely dampened the pavement. Then followed a period of brilliant sun and snow showers #2 and 3. The black objects ahead resolved themselves into three sets of two Wood Bison and two herds of Wood Bison. About 50-60 animals all told. A re-introduced species, these behemoths graze in the wide swath of wild grasses at either side of the road. They are very healthy, if one considers the evidence of their previous...er...passing. //Watson Lake offered a chance to top off the gas tank, to recycle morning coffee, and to get another cup. Things passed uneventfully--in once more brilliant sun--past Fox Creek, Porcupine Creek, Partridge Creek, Smart River, and Swift River. When I crossed Deadman Creek, I stopped pondering the naming! After a brief stop in Teslin--after crossing that awful bridge...more metal decking that not only makes the tires feel flat but bounces at the junction of each of the seven spans--I sailed into Whitehorse. I'd been playing leap-frog with an Alaska-plated SUV since about Watson Lake; they turned off at the Whitehorse City Centre exit, too. This intersection had the first stop light I'd seen since Prince George, B.C., 1,109 miles ago! //And then the day started to go downhill. Saturday night's kind-of-restless sleep under my belt, I started out Sunday morning in more of that blank, white, snow-filled sky. I'd checked at the hotel's front desk; they said snow showers just out of town, and an area of snow near Beaver Creek. I stopped for gas, and the bank card that had been working fine, with an occasional double-swipe being necessary, now required attendant help, but it worked. By the time I reached Haines Junction, the sun shone (again) brilliantly. Still just below freezing, the air was fresh, the puddles crunchy, and not a cloud sullied the sky. That Alaska-plated SUV took to the road at the same time, had sped off, and was last seen pulling back into a gas station, with a wave from the driver, in Haines Junction. Now, apart from a road-services pickup, I was the only car on the road. I did see two mountain sheep at the south end of Lake Kluane, but apart from that, no humans. Hey, Sunday morning in the Yukon Territory is a slow morning. // The sign warned that the road from Burwash Landing to the border was bad. Well, I knew that. Subsidence, cracks, humps, dips. About all you can muster for speed for this 105-mile stretch is 45 mph. I finished my apple about the time two hands were required to grip the wheel, and about the time greyish cloud ahead descended to ground level. Snow started. Since I was well past the last warm place in which to shelter, and since the plows had cleared the road, I continued. Then the road maintenance responsibility section changed from Destruction Bay to Beaver Creek, and the shoulders narrowed. Previously salted and sanded, the road was now snow-covered. Soon 2-3 inches deep. Still coming down heavily. Eeee. A plow passed me from the north, but there was no evidence of its having plowed anything. //At this point I don't know which took over: sheer determination or sheer stupidity! Honestly, to stop would have been a really dangerous idea, so I figured that I'd keep moving (at 35-40 mph) as long as I could. A van was about a mile in front of me, two semi's and a U-Haul truck passed going south, so I talked myself through the storm saying, "If a U-Haul truck can do it, so can I." After about 80 miles of gripping the wheel and talking to myself, the snowfall lessened, the tracks of the van in front became more visible, and by the time I reached Beaver Creek (about 15 miles shy of the border), the sun was back out, the pavement merely wet, and the "traffic" even less. And I figured out why the woman in the Alaska-plated SUV waved to me back in Haines Junction. Not greeting, but warning. //Continuing the downhill motion (the one bright spot being the cheerful customs guy who practically waved me back into the U.S.), the stop in Tok for check-in at the motel revealed that my bank card froze the computer system at the motel. Now, I've stayed there before, and it doesn't take much to freeze their system, but still. The guy was really snotty about it, so since it was only 2:00, I cancelled the reservation, called Gail in Anchorage (only 5.5 hours away) and said, "I'm coming in." //The Tok Cutoff is interminable. It seams through the Mentasta Mountains, a sub-range of the Alaska Range, then seams through the Alaska Range, then jounces across a whole bunch of not much (but beautiful) for 139 miles. You find yourself looking for those mile markers, hoping that single digits will appear on them. I crept through Glenallen at the posted speeds, and then cruised along a little (OK, a lot) faster when the road opened up again. At least until the Glenallen Highway Patrol pulled me over. I'd forgotten about the policing near Glenallen. When he asked if I had a reason for going so fast, I had to agree with him that yes, I had a reason, but no, it wasn't a good one. It was my first speeding ticket in 52 years of driving. And it cost about what the motel stay, supper, and breakfast would have, so it was kind of a wash. And a good reminder about concentrating on driving instead of thinking about...well, whatever it was I was thinking about. //And I still made it to Anchorage at 7:30 p.m. An 11-hour stretch of driving, which is still amazingly good time. //So, the road trip is done. I'm in Alaska, sorting out the laundry, taking a day to get my head out of the car. I'll mail the postcards, mail in the check for the ticket, and get on with the week. I may even take a nap!

British Columbia, bottom to top

The road trip wears thin. No, I'm not tired of the wonderful things I'm seeing, but I am glad there are only two and a half more days of driving. I'm reminded of an Anna Russell line: "Too much of anything, even if it is nice, it is too much." //That being said, yesterday's drive from Williams Lake to Fort St. John provided vistas of empty country that filled my soul! After scraping the frost off the windshield and rear window, I started out. Just beyond Quesnel (kwez-NEL, I'm told), the car started making a painful noise. A medium-pitched howl. I panicked. I slowed and pulled over, it stopped. Back at speed it resumed. I panicked some more. Then I swore off all road trips for now and forever amen...and then I realized that the pavement I traversed was making the noise. After I stopped feeling stupid, I stopped for a light breakfast in Prince George. //Continuing north and east, I crossed the Rockies and arrived at Chetwynd, where I changed my US$ to Canadian, got a refrigerator magnet (Chetwynd, B.C., is the chain saw sculpture capitol of the world) and topped out onto the Peace River plateau. The view is always calming for me--although crossing the Peace River on a v.e.r.y. long metal-decked bridge is not. It's a long way across at 45 mph, and the metal decking causes the car to handle as if all four of its tires are flat. //When I arrived in Fort St. John, I checked in to the EconoLodge. Apparently when you claim an AARP rate, they give you a room with shiny metal rails in the bathtub, a special chair to sit on in the shower, and a bathroom door wide enough to get your wheelchair through. AND a nice high toilet! Anyway, after I quit laughing, I went and had the car's oil changed, drove through the car wash, and got some supper. //This morning started late. The alarm had gone off at 5:30, I turned it off and then turned over. About 7:15 I woke up for real, and was on the road by 8:15. The weather started out very windy and overcast, with the sky looking ominous. Sort of that blank whitish grey overcast that means snow. I stopped at Pink Mountain (which was still snowy white) for coffee, and the fellow outside noticed Miss Scarlett's Wisconsin plates, chatted a bit, and gave me advice: "Watch out for moose, and fuel up every chance you get after Fort Nelson." By the time I got to Fort Nelson, the sun was shining brilliantly, it was warm enough to open the rear car windows about two inches, and the number of vehicles on the road dropped to one or two each hour. //The Alaska Highway seams through the northern Rockies following rivers. The mountains are spectacular--not jagged and craggy the way they look near Jasper and Banff, but monolithic and solid. Some show sedimentary stripes, others rounded tops of granite. I love this particular stretch of road: the little "mogul runs" of original road along cliffs and rivers, the broad and recent sweeps that rise and fall over mountain shoulders. I've never seen it snow-covered, and it's like seeing an entirely new landscape, even though this is my eighth time along the road. //The only wildlife I saw today, apart from the roadside signs warning me to be on the lookout, was [were?] five deer, several ravens, and two very dead and very picked over moose at the side of the road. //In the morning I'll set out for Whitehorse, about an eight-hour drive from here. There is blue sky showing now; hope it signals good driving for tomorrow.

Oh, Canada

To complete the backstory I rushed over yesterday, I arrived in Seattle safely, and had a most wonderful evening with Ashley, KC, and Lindsay. We talked, laughed, did errands--including picking rosemary from someone's way-overgrown rosemary bush somewhere--enjoyed a delicious meal of roast chicken, onion mashed potatoes, steamed broccoli, and salad. And, we went out for ice cream at about 10:00! It's embarrassing to say this, but I haven't been out that late in decades. Totally worth it. //This morning I got up just before 7:00, had coffee and said my goodbyes to the three very special young women, and was on the road by 7:30. By 8:00 I was in another Seattle backup from a previous accident, but this time a 'snainfall' piled on to the experience. By Bellingham, sun shone on blooming forsythia, flowering crab trees, yellow and white jonquils. There is a back road that cuts over to a border crossing in Sumas, and practically before my passport was back in my bag, I was in Abbotsford, getting more coffee and crunching kilometers to miles. //Back in 1997, I drove the Fraser River and Thompson River canyons twice--a round trip to Vancouver from Cache Creek. I'd either forgotten or blocked much of the experience. For someone who gets the screaming mimi's around heights, this is--trust me--a stretch of white-knuckle driving. The road is benign until the turn at Hope. Canadian Route 1 continues, but not much hope for a relaxing drive sticks around! The Fraser River canyon is sheer bulky rock with trees and vegetation, tunnels and twisty turns. W-a-a-a-a-y down there at the bottom of the canyon is the river. I didn't spend much time looking for it. At one point, Spuzzum, I think, the road crosses the canyon. I didn't look down there, either. By this time it was raining with snowflakes mixed in. //At Lytton, the road grinds around the shoulder of a great big mountain, and the river at the bottom is now the Thompson River. This canyon, wider than the other and bracketed on either side with rail lines, is walled with crumbly sedimentary rock the color of old scrambled eggs. Lots of around the corners up and down stop for construction blah blah blah. Then the road, at Spence's Bridge, crosses that river (just watch the pavement....), and the sun blessed much of that bit of driving. //The sun gave out and the wind and snow showers picked up just north of Cache Creek. This particular section of B.C. 97 is called the Caribou Connector. A several-year project is afoot to improve the road connecting Prince George--slap in the middle of the province--to Vancouver. While there are communities fairly frequently clustered along the road, for the most part, the road traverses vast untamed spaces. I still love looking at the different trees; I enjoy noticing how far behind Spring is here at 57 degrees N. Lat. The elevation is only 1,942 feet, but one of the summits I traversed today clocked in at 3,873 feet--if my calculation of meters-to-feet is correct. //One place where traffic stopped for single lane passage, workmen were hanging enormous lengths of chain-link fencing from the cliffs to keep the falling rock from pelting passing vehicles. I drove through rain, snow showers, mud spray, sun, more rain, etc., stopping in Mile 93 House--that's the name of the community--for gas, where the price is advertised in litres. //The sun came out for good as I approached Williams Lake, my destination for the day. I think I've done the last bit of dramatic driving for a while--at least until the descent along Long Lake east of Anchorage, but at least I'll be on the cliff side and not on the drop-off side. //So, I'm in for the night. It's a treat to know that the car is still purring along, even if she does look quite hideous from all the road spray. //I think Fort Saint John has a car wash.

Evening in Seattle

The journey has taken me through two wonderful family visits in California--Bill and Norma in Carmel, and Uncle Larry in Santa Rosa--and a delicious and quick lunch in Sausalito with my last summer's roommate. Great talks, comfortable time together, and I'm so very glad I swung south to include the Bay Area on my route. //Yesterday I left Santa Rosa about 8:30 in the morning, but I ran out of steam in Medford, Oregon, checked into a Day's Inn and read, napped, had a light supper and a wonderful night's sleep. This morning I started out at 7:00 and discovered just how gorgeous Oregon is. Mountainous in the southwest, flat and lush through the Willamette Valley...just gorgeous! //Washington state is not so pristine as Oregon, and--as you might expect--traffic ground to a crawl when I got to Seattle. Since my notes are all in the car, and since I'm not prepared to go out and get them, I'll close for now and include those details tomorrow!

From Pigeon Cove to Monterey Bay

//We, Miss Scarlett and I, have reached the Pacific. In February I stood at the edge of the Atlantic Ocean in Pigeon Cove, Massachusetts; today I came around the curve at Seaside, California, and there was the bay. The last time I'd motored across the United States, I was nine years old. I'm glad to have done it again--it's an incredible land. // Yesterday we crossed the Sierra Nevada, which is spectacular, still very deep in snow, and rough road (chains on the truck tires during bad weather chew up the pavement). //But back to Battle Mountain. Western Nevada has a stark loveliness to it that I wasn't really prepared for, and it makes me go back and look at all that dusty tan rock from the day before through a different lens. Yes, the trek across the state is long, but everywhere you look you're either in mountains or down on the flat looking at mountains. As I've always looked to the mountains as my center, the vistas were calming and helped me focus on the beauty of all that rose, or fell, around me. Oh, what a beautiful morning! //In Sparks I stopped for gas ($3.80 per gallon) and practically inhaled the warm air and the sight of blooming trees! The Truckee River runs through town watering the flowering crab, early pear trees, and lovely purple shrubs. Ah, April, and not a fool in sight (present company excepted). //The fairly fast climb up to Donner Summit and the long descent to Sacramento had me focusing more on road and traffic; the clot of traffic through Sacramento slowed, sped, slowed, sped--as you'd expect for a Friday noontime. Taking I-5 south, I drove past Stockton, noting that the valley's agriculture thrives. The hills showed emerald green, and recent heavy rains topped off all the reservoirs. Cutting west to Gilroy, I seamed through those brilliant hills, even recognizing patches of bright orange California poppies. //Then came the familiar home stretch through Prunedale and Seaside with glimpses of the ocean off to my right between the dunes. Highway 1 is closed to the south of Carmel; about a lane and a half of the two lane road slid off into the sea in the last day or so, and the northbound traffic moved heavily and slowly. But with the windows open to the breezes, I drove up the hill to my cousin's house, and after a delicious dinner in Pacific Grove, the bed beckoned. //Today (Saturday) will be spent here in Carmel, then tomorrow it's off north to Santa Rosa with a stop in Sausalito for lunch with last summer's Camp Denali roommate. What a wonderful celebration of place and person this trip is!

Wide Open Spaces

Another long day of driving. Woo, this country is big--my jaw spent the day dropped onto my chest as I traversed parts of the nation I've never seen from the ground. //And those deer I saw yesterday? Not. They were antelope. I thought they'd looked like strange deer, too chubby, and out in the open during the day, which isn't deer behavior. Anyway the frolicking flock bounded off away from the highway, obviously on their way to a play date with the deer. //Today's drive started about 7:30 in Rawlins, Wyoming. Shortly west of there, the landscape opens wide. It's called the Great Divide Basin, and lies up there about 7,000 feet above sea level. And it is about 100 miles in diameter. At 80 miles per hour, that's more than an hour to cross it. In the distance clouds and mist obscured the mountains, but I was puzzled by the many dark clouds. Not thunderheads, they were just long blobby things. As I approached the Bridger Power Plant, I was thunderstruck by the size of the smoke stack--and by the clouds of coal smoke it was belching into the sky. What I'd seen from the distance of close to 100 miles were the burps from that stack. With all the wind that Wyoming has, I wonder why (rhetorcially) there aren't more windfarms than there are. //The road twists and turns quite spectacularly around Rock Springs and Green River, goes back up onto a plateau, past an enormous wind farm (I only saw two in southern Wyoming) and on into Evanston. That town sits at 6,748 feet above sea level. From there it is about 80 miles to Salt Lake City, which sits at 4,266 feet above sea level. You do the math! //I-80 slaloms down down down from Evanston to about Park City, then climbs up up up to go through the Wasatch, then chutes down to northern Utah's floor, where it clots up with traffic. After 2-1/2 days without city traffic, this was not a welcome noontime...so I got off the road and had some lunch. //What happens then is revealed in the signs admonishing "drowsy drivers" to perk up or pull over and sleep. The road speeds west past the lake, out onto flat, flat, flat...er...flats. Salt flats. Aka the Great Salt Lake Desert, home to the DugwayProving Grounds and the Bonneville Speedway. Not a tree in sight; the tallest things are the fenceposts alongside the road. And the road is straight. For 50 miles at least, probably more. I wish I could say parts of it were pretty, but it's flat, the water--where it hasn't evaporated--is green. In the distance you can see mountains; in the rear-view mirror you can see mountains. But from the north to the south, all you can see is flat. //Eventually you reach Wendover, climb into Nevada (more rapidly than you climb into Wyoming from Nebraska), and gain another hour. Take that Daylight Savings Time! Again, I wish I could say it was pretty. The road is up to 6,900+ feet again, and everything you see east of Elko is the same shade of dry, dusty tan. Lots of rocks. I think Nevada wins on rocks, but it has to yield to Wyoming's wind. And mountain ranges, all running north-south, which means you chug up 'em and schuss down the other side. If Lewis and Clark had seen eastern Nevada, I think they'd have thrown up their hands and said, "If Tom wants it that badly, he can come claim it." //At Elko, the Humboldt River shows up, and you rub your eyes because there, on the hillsides, look! It's green! Vegetation follows the river, and even this early in Spring, there are signs that the desert is greening up. But lest the driver be dazzled by these glimpses of incipient seasonal change, the highway promptly twists and turns along the river canyon (Trucks Use Left Lane direct the signs--probably to avoid the fallen rocks at the side of the road), slams into a tunnel, bursts out at the other end...into the same dry, dusty tan back before the river came on the scene. //But to be truthful, not that I was exaggerating at all, but honestly now.... I am in complete awe as I drive. I have long known that these united states are many, collectively large, and shelter an unimaginable diversity of climate, flora, and fauna. And altitudes. And attitudes. On road trips northwest through the Dakotas and across Saskatchewan and Alberta, I'm continually impressed with the expanse of the Plains. But to drive where I've never been--even on an Interstate--is to be exposed to exactly what comprises those myriad differences. Whether these lands were wrested or ceded, they are magnificent. Wind erodes more than water, elevation and rainfall determine what vegetation will grow. We from the East, where water is plentiful, forget that. //So tomorrow I'll get to Carmel and see the Pacific Ocean. From 8,000 feet to sea level; from alfalfa to avocado! For the moment, I'll take my musing over to the comfy chair, read a while, and then go to bed. It's been an amazing day.

If today hasn't been a day...

Note: five spaces followed by two virgules (//) = paragraph break. //OK. Back to the blog. Things started calmly enough this morning in Lincoln, Nebraska. Foggily, but calmly. It was the weather that was foggy--I slept well and felt great. The temperature sign read 32, but I think it was warmer than that. Still, the fog was high--letting in just a bit of sun. It's hard to determine the position of the sun when the air is simply glowing. The road was dry, the visibility good. //East of Kearney I-80 runs alongside the Platte River. While, no, you don't see a lot of the countryside from the Interstate, you do see some of it. Trees to the south said, "Here is the river," and the sky was full of ducks, songbirds, and what I thought were geese. Glancing to the stubbled cornfields on the right, I was thrilled to note that the fields were filled with grey birds. The second glance confirmed that they weren't geese or wild turkeys. They were Sandhill Cranes! Mile after mile of them! //Somewhere in there around North Platte, it started to rain, then snow was added in. It all stopped in less than 10 miles, and by the time I reached the fork where I-76 splits off to head for Denver, the sun shone brightly, wind stirred the branches of roadside trees, and puffs of clouds floated across the sky. //I continued on I-80 West (new territory for me), which promptly began the 150-mile climb from about 3,200 feet to 8,640+ feet just east of Laramie. The landscape holds little more than snow fences sheltering large wind-corniced snow berms, chapparal and rock, dust and rolling open land. Even cattle avoided it. I came down from the height into Laramie, finding a gas station right away. I mentioned yesterday that MSCARLT was running low in the water--well, pushing her uphill and into the by-now-very-strong wind took a lot of gas. //If I'd given any blithe thought to plunging into uncharted territory (to me, anyway), I was quickly disabused of that notion. While I'd smiled benignly as I zipped across Nebraska's Mud Creek and noticed sweet towns named Hershey, I was now playing with the big boys. I jolted across Knife River and widened my eyes at signs for War Axe. West of Cheyenne, more signs admonished "Possible High Winds Next 5 Miles." Repeatedly. Every 5 miles there was a new sign covering the Next 5 Miles. I don't know--maybe it's better than seeing a sign saying "Possible High Winds Next 72 Miles." Oh, and those big overhead signs that usually post Amber Alerts? "Slick Spots Ahead," they announced. "Blowing Snow." "Light Trailers Not Advised." We are, for brevity's sake, ignoring all those signs saying, "Road Closed Ahead When Lights Are Flashing. Exit Here." //I thought again of the insouciance with which, from the comfy depths of my couch, I paged through my road atlas--hmmm, I'll go to California first, I mused. It's interstate all the way, no prob. There's a certain amount of the Honey Badger in that comment (see YouTube...if you can get past the cobras, it's worth it). Wyoming? March? Ppffff. Honey Badger don't give a shit about that. //Of course, Honey Badger never accelerated downhill into the wind either. One thing Wyoming's got a lot of is wind. This place is definitely not for sissies. //So here I am in Rawlins (the temperature sign said 55, but I don't think it was that warm), two nights into my trip, relaxing before bed. I gained an hour today, ...and gosh, I almost forgot to mention that I passed through Sidney (New Braska), home office of Cabela's. //To think I said one doesn't see much from the Interstate!

Day One, Addendum

I am SO SORRY! I didn't realize that the returns at the end of the paragraphs didn't work. Will try to edit! Oh, ick, English major panics at huge long paragraph!

D minus 8

Saturday's dinner party is over, and now I can concentrate on amassing the stacks of stuff I will tote back to Alaska for my second summer on staff at Camp Denali/North Face Lodge. My second summer of living in an indescribable national park (although that doesn't stop me from trying to describe it). My second summer of testing my limits of physical endurance.

No, I'm not climbing up anything or trekking from point A to point B. I refer simply to working 10-hour days this far into my sixties. While the job description is different this summer, I will be in the same location, and I'm hoping that more hours hiking on days off will balance the increase in time spent at a desk in the office.

Like last year, I'll be driving the formidable Miss Scarlett, my red Honda, All. The. Way. To. Alaska. Unlike last year's direct trip northwest, this year's route detours to Carmel, California, and thence north through Oregon, Seattle, (to visit friends and relatives) and British Columbia. I'll pick up the Alaska Highway at Fort Saint John, BC, ending up in Anchorage on the 11th of April.

There will be some who'll gasp and groan at my planned 14 days on the road (come to think of it, so do I, just a little). But just remember that I absolutely love to drive, love to absorb everything I see around me as I go, and yes, I really do enjoy days in the solitary bubble of my car. It's delightful to chat with people I run into along the way; it is instructive to see that others respond happily to out-of-staters at gas stations, restaurants, motels.

Others will ask if I listen to books on tape (no, too distracting), or to music (occasionally), or the radio (NPR is right there at the left end of the FM dial). Often I sing. I make up songs or just dootle-doot-do a tuneless melody. Invented conversations bounce around my cranium, and many of them end up on paper. At a friend's suggestion, and because some of those particularly scintillating inventions bounce right out the window, this year I'm taking a small tape recorder with me. It will sit in the gearshift console, right next to the Nalgene bottle of water and the travel cup for coffee.

Blog postings will come fast and furiously while I'm on the road--they're my conversation at the end of the day, full of observations, random thoughts, even a bit of insight. It's amazing what the brain conjures up while you're alone in the car for nine hours at a stretch. As I did last summer, I invite you to follow my blog for details of "retirement" in the far north. It's the best way to keep each of you current (sort of) with what's going on in my days.

Excelsior!