Walking the dog

Sun - after four or five days of hard rain - makes me happy.  There was a bit of fresh snow last night, just enough to cover the slippery ice that's pretty much everywhere now.  In some places, the ice on the roads and in parking lots is 10-12 inches thick, except where it's chipped away and made giant ice-hole craters that will swallow a whole tire.  It's not as bad at our place, the rain melted a lot of the ice almost down to bare ground.

We loaded Seca up for her first visit to the glacier.  Since it's been warm and rainy the lake isn't completely frozen any more so we couldn't walk far on it and diverted to a short loop trail instead.  Seca was having a lot of fun - she has so much more energy up here where it's cold compared to South Carolina. 

The visitor center (which we've still never been inside to see) is a really beautiful building.  And look at the clouds hanging behind it!

 Steve and Seca posing patiently for picture. 

The days are getting noticeably longer - it's light until almost 4:30 pm now and at 8 am when I'm heading into the lab it's also pretty light outside.  I'm looking forward to daylight at dinner time.

I thought the waning yellow light through the trees was pretty.

Backcountry film festival

Last night we went to see the Backcountry Film Festival at this great little theater downtown.  The movies were all very good; most were short videos of extreme backcountry skiing and snowboarding experiences.  Many were filmed in Alaska.  Some of the skiing was so extreme both Steve and I agreed that we wouldn't ever want to do it, it was just too steep and remote. 

The theater was also really neat!  The seating was rows of old lecture hall chairs, with random cushions and chair pads added for eclectic comfort (and they were comfortable!).  There were maybe 50 seats in the theater narrow theater.  At the back, there were a couple of comfy couches and a high-top table or two.  The concession stand sold real popcorn, popped on site with a crock pot of melted butter you could add if you wanted some.  We'll definitely be back for more shows.

East Glacier Trail

After the snow from Friday, it's in the 40s today, with intermittent clouds/fog and rain - rain from the clouds/fog AND dripping from the trees as all the snow melts.  Despite the lovely weather, we went for a great hike at the Mendenhall glacier.  The East Glacier Trail is a 3 or 3.5 miles loop, depending on which source you're getting your distance estimate. 

It also has about 700 feet of elevation gain, culminating with a great view over Nugget Creek and valley and the glacier.  The Nugget Creek is the creek that forms the large waterfall that cascades into Mendenhall Lake. 

The trail is a bit precarious in places.  I think these railings are supposed to be at waist height, instead of 'trip you and send you to your death' height - it's a looooong ways down to the creek!

Looking back along the trail:

 Lots of steps in places:

 Oh no!  A snow troll guarding the bridge!

 And one of his minions!

 Steve, eating a snowball.

 

Snowy downtown

We had a million (only a slight exaggeration) errands to run, some of which took us downtown for a change.  There was a couple of inches of fresh snow Friday night, so downtown was pretty and a bit of a sloppy mess (then again, that's about typical weather here).

That snow and or rain and sloppy messes is typical weather made this little sign outside the Foggy Mountain outdoors shop even funnier...

We had so many errands to run because we were doing some desperate organizing in Irv.  After a month of lots of space, I was fed up with a mess clothes pile in the overhead storage bin.  In fact, I was so fed up, I pulled everything out before taking a 'before' picture.  So here's Steve (less messy) side as a 'before' ...

and here's my finished, tidy side, with new hanging shelves in the tall cabinet, wire shelves in the overhead bin, and our *awesome* new shelf and tote system for extra storage! Before, all of my clothes were in messy piles, too tall and two deep.  The shelf and totes aren't low enough that you bump your head on them.  It's a vast improvement.

Irv sweet Irv

As of today we're back home in Irv.  It's been nice living in a house again, particularly with easy access to laundry, but I'm glad to be back home.  The past month has been an interesting contrast in how house size impacts work load.  I feel like the past month has been a ton of work relative to living in the tiny space of an RV.  Obviously, part of the difference between the two comes with the addition of another dog, a cat, and the guinea pigs (the turtle was almost no work at all).  A lot of pets is a lot of work - there's always a litter box to clean, dogs to walk, feedings, cages to clean, water dishes to fill, and a lot more vacuuming and sweeping (who knew a cat could spread litter so far!).  But even the house size makes a difference.  I can clean the RV, top to bottom, in 20 minutes, tops.  That includes putting stray items away, vacuuming, wiping all counters and appliances, cleaning the bathroom, and any other cleaning.  And the best part is that in the RV I never have to move the vacuum cord to another outlet as I go.  The house was just so much bigger - there's a lot more to get messy and a lot more space to cover, and there's always something that needs to be done...like snowblow the giant driveway (or worse, shovel, when there's not enough snow to snowblow but to much to just ignore), or haul in wood for the stove.  I think this past month has really made me realize how much I like living in a smaller space, closer to town, and with only one pet!

However, that said, Steve and I are going to miss Miss Kitty and the rest of the critters.  But especially Miss Kitty. 

"Whoa, I think we're having an earthquake!"

That was my reaction last night...we'd just crawled into bed a short time before and you could hear it and feel it shake the house.  We're fine.  The dogs didn't seem to get freaked out.  It was magnitude ~7.5, centered near Craig, AK (about 200 miles or so from here, I think).  No tsunami.

Shrine of St. Therese

There are seals in the tiny arm of the harbor that is just outside the house!  At low tide it's little more than a trickle of a stream running though rocks and kelp, but at hide tide the whole area floods and apparently, the seals like to come feed and hang out.  It's not a great picture - they are skittish and when I go outside they move away.

Today seems to be a bit of reprieve from the rain so we went for a long walk with the dogs this morning...we started out with just Chevy and Seca, and soon were joined by Nalah and Odin, two dogs belonging to different neighbors that were out walking themselves (seems that letting your dog wander is pretty standard out here).  It was quite the herd walking down the road!  Luckily, no porcupines today.

After the walk we decided to push our luck with the weather and go for a drive out the road to do some exploring.  We stopped at the Shrine of St. Therese, a small chapel in the woods and retreat center.  It was pretty and we walked around a bit before heading on towards Amalga Harbor.
This is the view from the path towards the Shrine... The clouds are pretty today.  Across the water (Lynn Canal) are the Chilkat mountains (the ones with snow).

At Amalga, we wandered around a bit, but it was still really icy so we didn't stray too far.  We would really like to explore this area in summer, on foot and also by kayak.  It's a pretty busy boat launch area, but it's also supposed to be a pretty good spot to see whales.