Oh Happy Day

To appease the recent complaints I've received in the past week in a half, I've decided to write another blog entry. (Or to possibly capitalize on the opportunity to yet again brag about what I have sown?)

Anyway, my time here is soon coming to an end, and that fact has been depressing me. As is clearly evident by my blog posts, I've had (and am still having) an absolutely amazing, life-changing time here in Alaska. The fact that I must leave this gorgeous place to suffer the hottest temperatures of Florida's summer, quite frankly, makes me want to cry. Since the days of my internship are quickly waning, I'm trying to soak in all that I can before I leave.

This Sunday marks my and Sam's 5-day off period to do whatever we want. We've planned to partake in a surmountable hike of 23 miles, stretching over the Summit Creek and Devil's Pass trails (check it on the map of the Chugach National Forest near the Cooper Landing/Hope/Seward area) in two days. We've heard it's a beautiful hike, so we're looking forward to it. After that, we plan to travel to Seward to check out the SeaLife Center and go on another Kenai Fjords Wildlife/Whale-watching tour (even better than the one I did when I first got here - see first blog entry with the pictures). We'll camp in Seward for two nights, and then leave for Anchorage the following day. We'll stay the night at Sue's (grad student that's been periodically staying with us at the bunkhouse while she does her field work), hike Flat Top Mountain, and check out all the museums and shops Anchorage has to offer. Then that Thursday, (August 14th) Sam and I travel back to home sweet home, to do a wildberry fun walk (!) the next morning.

All in all, I would say the days since my last blog post haven't been as exciting. Spent 5 hours trying to get the tracker un-stuck, pet some moose, caught some halibut, counted snowshoe hare poop, fed a robin, watched the dipnetters at Beluga Lookout during a beautiful sunset, and caught a salmon. Yep - not exciting at all.

This picture is just the preview. This is a little teensy weensy halibut. Dusty told me I had to take a picture of it to show that all the halibut I'd been catching were around this size. Then I caught this one:

and then he shut his mouth. Yeah, that's right. This is a 61-pounder! Dusty had to hold it up because my weak arms couldn't handle the massive weight of this behemoth. So, we went halibut fishing yesterday. Dusty (as I'm sure I've mentioned in an earlier blog post - he's a law enforcement officer at the refuge) was kind enough to take both me and Sam out to Anchor Point yesterday, to catch us some fish. We jetted to about 10 different spots in all (I think), and all caught our limits (2 per day). I caught about 10 halibut in all...but threw back all of them (with the exception of one: according to Dusty, you have to keep your first fish you catch - otherwise it's bad luck), until I caught this tank. After we were done fishing, Dusty filleted all of the fish, and then we drove home. I took the fillets to Peninsula Processing where they will be vacuum-sealed, and then I'll take them to the bunkhouse, freeze them and then take them on the plane with me home. Here's a better view of the monster. It was more than half my size! Should make for some good eats.

This is the 25-pounder Sam caught. What a beaut! She was so excited. I'm glad she got to go halibut fishing, and surpass her fishing license's worth. Here's one of the many seabirds we saw that were constantly following us. They smelled the herring we used as bait and were hoping to get lucky.

So, I think I mentioned something about the tracker being stuck. Yeah, those were good times. Unfortunately, I didn't get any pictures of the hilarious event, so those will just have to remain in my heart. About two weeks ago, Julia, Sam and I had a field day assigned to us, in which we had to go garbage-picking around the Swanson River Rd/Swan Lake Rd canoe area. We finished around noon, so we (okay, I did) had the great idea (and it was great, lemme tell ya) to go to the moose pens! The moose pens is a highly restricted area. It's regulated by both the refuge and the Alaska Department for Fish & Game. The moose here are held in captivity (but for the most part, it's pretty natural. The pens cover several miles. Only calves are held in smaller ones.) because they have been injured by human and/or natural causes. Its purpose is for research: they are studying the effects of copper deficiencies in moose.

Anyway, we heard about the moose pens through Annie, who is a researcher there. We met her previously and she had told us that we were welcome to come out there and check the place out (and possibly feed the calves!). So, after getting the proper gate combinations from headquarters, we went through about 8 different locked gates until we got to an area where there were a number of log cabin-ish buildings. We knocked on several doors, but got no answer. The place was completely desolate. So we decided to go through one final gate. This gate marked the transfer from gravel road to no road. We weren't sure about it, but we decided to steadfastly drive on. At the very end of this path, two gates on either side led to more non-gravel roads. We decided then that we'd gone far enough, and turned around. Not 1/4 mi on the way up, we got stuck. I forgot to mention that it had been pouring rain this entire time. So the dirt was slick. After about an hour of trying to do whatever we could to stop the wheels from spinning, Julia walked the way back in hopes of finding someone to help. Lo and behold, she found Annie! Her and Annie came back with a four-wheeler. Annie surveyed the damage, and decided that her F-250 should be able to do the job. Annie came rolling in with her truck, and you wouldn't believe it - but, that got stuck too. All this time I kept on thinking to myself, there's no way a truck like that shouldn't be able to handle this. All the same, Annie thought that adding gravel to the path may give the tires traction - so another two hours later, we started piling shovel upon shovel of gravel onto the path. Tried the truck again - but to no avail.

At this point, Annie was cursing up a storm and told us we better radio our people. Until this point, we had kept quiet. We figured we could take care of this predicament on our own, without having to notify the entire world what dumbasses we were. Unfortunately, we had to commit the deed. We radioed headquarters, much to our shamefaced embarassment, and were told that we had an "emergency team" headed our way.

Then Annie's partner researcher, a city girl from Los Angeles, had the smarts to realize, Hmm, don't you have to do something with the tires to have it in four-wheel drive? (the city girl, of all people. Come on.) Annie loudly proclaimed "Shit!" and then locked the tires. And guess what - the truck got un-stuck. So we hooked up some rope from the tracker to the truck, and within minutes, the tracker was freed.

We radioed all the necessary people again and told them that everything was under control. But the damage was already done. We came back, heads hanging and our eyes downturned, and suffered all the mockery from all angles. But we did get to pet(and feed) some moose:

This is a baby calf. She's eating fireweed.

And apparently some us even got to kiss some moose, too.

Sam, Julia, and me with the calf. You can't really see it so well, but if you look close enough, you'll see how muddy we are.

About a week ago, Sam had the brilliant idea for all of us to enjoy a sunset at Kenai Beach, while enjoying glasses of champagne and the warmth of a fire. But when we got to Kenai Beach, it was absolutely crowded with dipnetters.

Dipnetting, for those in ignorance, is a way to fish, only open to Alaskan residents. Depending on how many mouths there are to feed, one can fish up to 100+ salmon for one household. It's considered "subsistence fishing." They take a big net, put it into the water, and catch as many salmon as can fit.

So, since the beaches were so packed, we decided to go to Beluga Lookout, which overlooks the mouth of the Kenai River, where river meets Cook Inlet. Eve, Sam, Julia and I all sat on a bench, sipping champagne and realizing that this place is absolutely remarkable - and we're really gonna miss it - and eachother.

Alright, these last couple of photos are of a momma moose and her calf that like to hang around the bunkhouse and headquarters. This calf is just a yearling, so it was born this year. Anyway, feast your eyes upon the photos - I gotta run. Post later!

FISH ON!

So for those of you that haven't heard Mom's bragging (and bygum - she better be braggin'!), I caught my first Alaskan halibut down in Homer yesterday. It was a whopping 40 pounds - so a long, heavy and suffering haul to reel in. Although it's me saying it - without any biased-ness and bigheadedness, my fish was the biggest on the boat. There were 20 fishermen on the boat (only three women - the two other women were older, and the rough lookin' type) altogether. The bag limit for halibut is two per day - so there were about 35-40 fish on the boat - and out of all of 'em, mine was the biggest. It was so awesome.

So, the day started out with Wesley and I driving down to Homer around 8:30 in the morning. We looked around the shops for a while and then piled into The Jackpot boat around 12:30pm, after our fishing licenses were checked and tallied. We then drove out of Kachemak Bay for a good hour and a half before we found what was supposed to be the "perfect" fishing spot. Got the run-down on how we were supposed to use the reels, and then we got to fishin'. We were given halibut poles (rods that can handle over 100 lbs. of fish), twisted line that was about 1/4'' thick, two-pound weights attached to the line, and about a 3-inch hook with herring on it (as bait). Once you let the line out about 150 feet down to the bottom, you wait to feel a pecking on your line. On the first drop, I got a bite. I whipped the pole up and pulled it to the side to lodge the hook in better, and started reeling in like a fishin' fool. Now, if you gather that without a fish you're having to reel in about 150-300 feet of line that is 5 pounds of sheer line, hook and weight, add on the weight of a huge fish - that has a ton of power to fight with you as much as it can.

This is the Jackpot, the boat we were on.

Reeling in was HARD. I have never had to reel as hard as I had to yesterday. By the end of the day, my left hand was cramping, my arms were sore, and I was soaked to the skin. It had been raining all day.

So, you reel in with your right hand and hold the pole steady with your left. Thankfully, I had Wesley and the boat captain helping me with holding the pole. Not only does it take so much strength to reel in the large boulder attached to your line - you also have to hold your rod steady so the fish doesn't pull it out from underneath you. It was hard work. While waiting for the fish to bite, being that it was probably 48-50 degrees outside and raining - you were cold. But once you got to reelin,' you were cursing all the layers you had put on - because you felt that they were now a hindrance.

It was an amazing time, though. To my annoyance, most of the three hours we fished I caught gray cods. Gray cods are trash fish. They play with your mind into thinking you're catching a big halibut, and then after grueling over reeling in 200 feet of line, a gray cod pops up, mouth wide as a size 4 soccer ball - clinging onto the piece of herring that was meant for your record breaker halibut. Gray cods aren't small by any means - some were as long as 2-3 feet probably, and 12-18 inches wide. Unfortunately, they're useless (for the most part), as they're filled with parasites and worms and aren't good eating. The deckhands on the boat said that they don't even use gray cod as bait. I (no exaggeration) probably caught 15-20 gray cods before I caught my halibut. With an all-call stating that there was 20 minutes left to fish, I had to catch one. Once I caught my halibut, it was worth all the effort. Sadly, by the time I caught my halibut, we only had a couple of minutes left so I didn't end up limiting out. Imagine catching 2 40-pounders! That's a helluva lot of meat.

This is me catching my first gray cod. I'm holding ono the two-pound weight as the deckhand pulls off the fish and lets it go.

This is a gray cod. My face looks terrible. Rain was pelting my eyes. Anyway, this is a smaller one. I caught bigger cods than this -but it gives you a good idea as to how they look like. And, I didn't keep any of those. Like I said, the meat isn't good so it was pointless to keep them. Most of us (with the exception of this one here - a man wanted to keep it to use it for bait) threw them back into the water after we pulled our line up. This is my halibut. I didn't have the strength to hold it up all of the way, so you can't tell how big it is compared to me. But it does look pretty big. Wesley held up the halibut so you can see how big it is. It doesn't look as big compared to him...but it sure looks big compared to me!This is the halibut Wesley caught. He felt embarassed that I outdid him. It was really funny - all the guys on the boat were saying, "The littlest thing on this boat caught the biggest fish!" Don't make fun, though - like I said earlier, he caught a 75-pounder just two weeks ago (that was really tasty, by the way). This is just some of the halibut caught on the boat.The rest is on the other side of this picture not shown. The two deckhands filleted all of the fish on the drive back to the dock.

This is one of the deckhands filleted a fish.

Went to Buttwhackers again to check out the damage. Biggest halibut on the end (on the left) was a 45 pounder, so just a teensy bit bigger than mine.

So, after getting back into Homer, we went over to the fish processing place so I could send all of the fish home to my mommy. Guess how much it cost me - for 25 pounds of meat - just guess. Betcha guessed wrong! Cost me 175 bucks to send that sucker home. After filleted the fish, I was left with 25 pounds of meat. So there'll be plenty to make dinner for those hungry for halibut. I'll definitely be taking some up with me to Gainesville.

This picture below is of me and Ed, a volunteer here at the refuge. This is when I caught my first Alaskan salmon! As much as I hate to admit this, my fish is on the right. A nice woman volunteered to take the picture for us - but unfortunately, took a crap photo. I'm not just saying this to atone for the fact that my fish looks tiny in this picture. It was small, I grant you that - but not as small as it looks here. The way it's held you can't tell how big it was around. Anyway, Ed and I went fishing around 10 at night for about two hours - and didn't get a thing. We both had a few bites, hooked a few but lost them as they started jumping out of the water - but nothing after that. Then suddenly, Ed caught his big 'un. His is a male Sockeye. Once he caught his, I said to myself, I aint leavin' this place empty handed. So I fished with a determined gleam in my eye (oh yes, I'm editorializing) and in no time, caught my salmon. Mine is a female King. She was probably about 5 pounds. Her body was mostly filled with eggs - but we still got two good-sized fillets out of her and it was SO good. I cooked the salmon the next night. I marinated it in teriyaki, italian dressing and cajun seasoning - and boy, was it good. I cooked some for Sam and had 5 other taste testers - and they all assured me it was finger lickin' good. So no biased-ness there. No worries to the family - I'll be catching some more salmon to send home.

Shortly after I caught my first salmon, I foul hooked one close to the size of Ed's. Unfortunately, it was foul hooked so I had to let it go. To this day I still beat myself up about it, because I should have kept it. The hook was just under the gills, the fish had tired out, and it probably died after I let it go. I should have kept it.

Anyway, since that night, I've fished three times. Hooked and caught a few, but haven't managed to land them. I'm supposed to go out again tonight, so hopefully I'll have better luck.

Last Wednesday, I went over to the Russian River ferry and caught my first Rainbow trout. The limit for that is one per day, less than 16 inches - and it was bigger than that, so I didn't get to keep it.

The Sunday after I caught my salmon, I went to Girdwood with Ed to go gold panning. Girdwood is really close to Anchorage, if you want to look at it on the map. It was an absolutely beautiful drive to there. I swear, the mountains and scenery here are 10x better than what I've been showing you guys already on this blog. The mountains were bigger, and more snow-covered. We saw Turnagain Arm and the Alaskan Train that runs from Seward up to Denali (and probably more North).

We gold panned at what I think was Copper Creek. I can't remember the name of it now. I do recall that the creek's name started with a C. We got our pans, two buckets, and two shovels and then hiked down to the creek. We shoveled a ton of dirt and gravel, put them in our buckets, and then sifted that material handful by handful into the pans, searching for gold. I could almost taste the metallic sweetness of that nugget I was sure to find.

To tell you the truth, I never had much of a hankerin' for gold panning, but I figured I'd add that to my repertoire of Cool Things I've Done. In addition to the fact that you can't go to Alaska - the Last Frontier - place where thousands of men, with hunger in their eyes, pilgrimmaged to make their living - the Gold Rush - without searchin' for a little gold. So search I did. For two hours. And found four flecks. I wasn't expecting much - so I had that going for me. I went for a good time - and a good time is what I got.

Above: Me looking through my pan for gold. Below: Ed searchin' for gold. He reminds me a bit of you, Dad. Not in the looks, but in the personality.

The four flecks I found. Ed had been gold panning before - so it was funny that I should find some - and he didn't find any at all.

Before and after we gold panned, we took a little drive around the area - saw Alyeska Ski Resort - and made a lot of stops at overlook areas. I got some really good pictures.

After we gold panned, we took a hike to the Copper Creek Gorge. We took a hand tram over the gorge to get to the other side of the river.

This is a view from the tram, smack dab in the middle of the gorge.

This is a picture of the path we took to get to the hand tram. The forest was beautiful, and it left kaleidoscope dappled sun patches on the ground wherever we went. This is Ed and another man on the tram. It took you 500 yards across the swallowing depths of 500 yards below your feet. This is a picture looking down from the grate of the tram cage. My shoe is on the lower left corner. The water was running so fast. It was an amazing and beautiful sight. This is a picture of the Alaska railroad and train. It was headed in the opposite direction, away from the mountains. In between the mountains there is a glacier.

Another photo of the train, this time of the front.

This is a picture of a mountain peak from the car. Can you believe it? Just from the car. It's really cool to look at the shadows from the clouds on the snow. Took another one from inside the car. This is on the drive back to Soldotna. Such a breathtaking drive, isn't it?

Photo of the rushing water of the gorge.

The loon tagging and capturing I did last Tuesday was absolutely amazing. I held two loons in my hands. I held their beak tight shut with my left hand, and kept their head down with the right. The two researchers took blood and fecal samples, made several measurements of their beaks, and then tagged their left foot. I met them at the Drake/Snookum Trailhead at 8 in the morning, and didn't get back 'til 9 at night.

The second loon we captured was a thrilling adventure. We set the capturing net and grid and all sat in our designated spots hidden by camouflage curtains we had hooked up. The one researcher (Chris) started playing loon calls from a device, and the three of us sat silent, waiting. Within ten minutes of making the calls, we spotted a group of four loons way down the lake. Four loons is unusual. Loons are, by nature, solitary. They have their one mate and that's it. When another loon comes onto the lake, that loon, by the other male loon's perspective, is not respecting his territory. And this is just what happened. The loon we eventually captured was being extremely territorial. He chased the other loon on the lake for a good ten minutes. Apparently, I witnessed something that was extremely unusual. Chris had said that that was probably one of the longest chases he had ever watched - and he's been working with loons for years.

When males feel threatened, they do the "yodel" call, which only males do, and they do the "penguin dance," in which they make the call, careen their heads to one side, hold their wings outstretched, and kick the water out from underneath them. It quite literally looks like they are walking on water. This male was doing that several times. It was such an amazing sight. When they "chase" another loon, they stay on the surface of the water, but flap their wings and use them as propellors as they speed through the water. The territorial male was clearly faster than the other, but the other was doing these sharp and quick turns and so was able to escape. After the other male left, we finally were able to snag the other and then do our measurements.

Unfortunately, I didn't take my camera out because I didn't want to risk it falling into the lake - so the pictures with me and loons in my lap are with the researchers. They said they would send me pictures in August. Those should be awesome.

Anyway, that's all for now - but more adventures are sure to follow!

I gazed and gazed, but little thought what wealth the show to me had brought

So, the tables have been turned. I'm the one posting copiously, while all of you are scrambling to keep up. Come on now, you asked for me to have fairly regular entries, I expect enthralling comments to follow!!

So on Thursday, Wesley, Luke, Andy (two other guys that work at the ferry) and Dusty (one of our law enforcement officers - the one that I went out with on the "cadaver search") went halibut fishing. What's key here is the fact that they went without me. Unfortunately, I had to work that day, so I missed out. But, what reaped out of that misfortune was reward. Wesley came by and dropped off a hunk of halibut meat that was probably 15 pounds. This slab was only 1/4 of the entire fish. Wes told me that all four guys had reached their bag limits (2 halibut per day) and each fish was within the 50-80 Ib range. Just imagine - reeling in a 70 Ib fish!

So. I had 15 lbs of halibut and had no idea what I was going to do with it. Eat it, ofcourse - but I hadn't ever cooked it before. Fortunately, Sue (a grad student that stays with us at the bunkhouse) is a halibut cookin' fool and gave me some ideas. So the next night, we went out shopping together and spent nearly $60 on ingredients to make curry (with snow peas, mushrooms, onions and garlic), macadamia nut-encrusted baked halibut, and ceviche (a salsa of chopped up kalamata olives, onions, cilantro, tomato, green pepper, mushroom and halibut). And it was absolutely delicious. (Tessa, I can't wait to make curry for you when we get back to Gainesville!)

Tomorrow, Wesley is supposed to come over and all of us are gonna eat beer-battered halibut and french fries (aka fish n' chips). Mmmmm. I know all of you are jealous. Especially you, Mom. Wish you were here. Whenever I do go halibut fishing (and catch my Alaskan salmon, don't fergit about dat) I'm sure I'll catch a record breaker (over 400 lbs.) so I'll have plenty to send home some for you.

Yesterday Sam and I had our campfire program. What a downer. Only had 10 people show up...and it was a pretty horrible crowd. On the upside, afterwards, Sam and I saw our first brown bear! It was just on the shore of the Russian River/Kenai River confluence. If you look at the picture, you'll see how close it is to the fisherman up on the top of the stairs. This is probably a yearling on the cusp of turning two.

Today, Eve and I did the Skyline Trail. So I have officially done all of the hikes now! Skyline is

virtually a 45-degree angle ascent up a mountain. Round trip, it covers about 4 miles. At the top, you get a wonderful view of the Kenai Mountains, a lake right there in the middle whose name escapes me (I know, unforgivable) and Skilak Lake in the distance. It was an absolutely beautiful view. Unfortunately, it's been rainy all day, so the clouds shaved off the top of nearly all of the surrounding mountains. When Eve and I got to the top, we decided to take a little restie-poo and eat some snacks. In the span of probably 10 minutes, everything around us was covered in cloud. We couldn't see 10 feet past us in any direction. Before we got to the top, I had told Eve - "Eve, I want to touch the clouds." And by golly, I sure did! As soon as we were covered in mist - I told Eve - go and grab the clouds, baby - 'cuz they're all around us. And so we did.
That's the view when the clouds were rolling in. Below is a picture Eve took without me realizing. Nice panorama of the spruce trees, don't you think? This is just a taste of what we hiked. We had to climb up rocks and other slippery, craggy surfaces. On the way down, we slipped and slided our way down. It was skiing with our feet, without the skis - and the snow, ofcourse. Here's the aftermath:

Eve has a sexy butt.

This is a columbine flower. They were all over the place. It's so amazing to see such an abundance of colorful wildflowers in a place that hosts such harsh conditions during 80% of the year.

Eve and I are hardcore. Does Legends of the Fall ring a bell to anyone? Like Brad Pitt, we put three lines on our face - because we had undergone a tragedy. But see, we're tough - and we're handling it just fine.

View of some Kenai mountains. The snow stays on their peaks for the entire year. Oh, by the way - I just figured I'd tell all of you Florida folks and those of you suffering in the summer heat that it has been in the upper 40s this entire week. Absolutely gorgeous, and I love it. Who could imagine that even in those temperatures, you get all sweaty after hiking - and that's wearing only a t-shirt and lightweight pants!

Eve fell.

Eve died.

Here's a video me and Eve made while at the top of the mountain. It had just started raining. And we were hungry. Cravin' some cereal and milk.

Picture of me at the Skyline Trailhead after we braved the wild. I know it says 1 mi. First of all, the trailhead doesn't include the roundtrip. Second of all, we hiked past the saddle of the mountain and went up through the ridge, which cost us another mile. Hence the four-mile trek.

Anyway, that's all for now. On Tuesday, I'm supposed to meet with some researchers and do loon captures and tagging! I'm excited. We get to canoe some lakes and hang out with the loons. It'll be a long day though - from 8 am - 8 pm!