Bald Eagles

Okay, Ryan thinks our blog is getting a bit boring and that is has been focusing a lot on Zephyr and the bald eagles in the backyard.  But I think this is pretty amazing! 

I promise there will be more fun winter activities in the new year!

Beautiful Winter Sky

The days have become shorter and shorter.  Sunrise is at about 9:30 am, and stays just about pitch black until then.  It has been getting harder to wake up early!  The sun doesn't come up very high, it sort of just skirts around on the horizon.  This makes the colors in the sky so beautiful!

The temperature has been dropping to about 0 degrees, but it doesn't feel as frigid and bitter as the winter in Chicago (I just got back from dropping Zeph off at my parents' and spending a week and a half there yesterday).

Friends in the Backyard

I think by the time we leave Alaska, I will be a bald eagle cry expert.  Hank and Betty still hang out everyday and they are quite vocal.  Today they were joined by an immature bald eagle.  His head is still dark.  And he stared me down like I was eagle bait.

I am still in awe of the bald eagles, even though Ryan tells me they are not endangered anymore.  They are just not a common sight in Illinois, at least not around Chicago.  

Zeph has a bad tendency of wandering over to the neighbor's yard so we don't let him out on his own anymore.  He gets pretty bored in the house so I try to take him to the beach (not nearly as often as I should), which is his favorite place.  It was so beautiful during sunset around 5 pm.  The crazy dog still likes to go in for a dip even when it's about 30 degrees and my ears feel frozen.  

Let it snow!

It finally snowed!  We woke up to find a winter wonderland outside our window last week.  It's the pretty snow that sticks to the trees.  Ryan describes the trees as the Dickens' village trees.  This is Zephyr's first time seeing and being in snow.  He loved it!  But frolicking in snow creates a messy, wet dog inside your home.  He had a blast ripping off chunks of snow from his legs and leaving wetness all over the sofa and carpet!   It also doesn't help that Ryan finds Zeph's love for snowballs hilarious.  If Zeph catches a snowball Ryan throws at him, he lets him bring it inside the house as a treat. 

The two bald eagles from the previous post continue to hang out on the same branch.  We've named them Hank and Betty.  :)  There is also a pair of cow and calf moose that hang out in our neighborhood.

Bye Bye Summer, Hello Winter!

The summer season flew by so fast!  Fall came, and is starting to leave us to be replaced by winter.  Ryan put his boat away for the year and we are anxious about what the winter will bring.  We've been told different things by many people.  Some tell us it's their favorite time of the year, some that they get seriously affected by the winter and need to get away, and others tell us the novelty of winter will get us through it.  Sunrise right now is at about 9 am, and sunset around 7 pm.  By the end of November, sunrise will be at 9:40 am and sunset at 3:55 pm!  It will definitely be interesting!

Ryan has transitioned into his regular hospitalist role, he will be working 7 days on and 7 days off.  We've been talking about learning how to cross country ski and snow shoe during his days off.  Zephyr recently had surgery on his tongue.  We spotted a white mass growing on the tip of his tongue in August and thought it might be a wart but it was only getting bigger and other warts weren't growing either.  We feel bad that the little guy has a chunk of his tongue missing, but we're also glad that it wasn't a bigger chunk or cancer.  The day of and after the surgery was pretty tough for the little guy, all he would do was whine and cuddle, but he is back to his happy self.  He even spotted some friends in the backyard today.

Can you spot the two birds in the background?

We've seen one bald eagle everyday this week but today was the first time there were two.  They are such large and beautiful birds, I love watching them.  It was a funny sight to see these two huge birds sitting on a skinny branch, every time the wind would blow they would need to regain their balance.  They must be love birds, to share such a skinny branch and small space in the midst of the plentiful larger branches. 

Denali

Denali is incredible, it is so visually stunning.  We were able to see the peak during our drive toward it, about 100 or more miles away.  It is the tallest mountain peak in North America at a little over 20,000 feet.  Denali is also known as Mt. McKinley, but only people outside of Alaska call it that.  In Denali National Park there is only one road appropriately called Park Road that goes 91 miles into the park.  Personal cars are not allowed on this road, instead there are park shuttles (school buses).  It takes about 9-10 hours to go to the end of the road and back so the three of us (Kyle, Ryan, and I) elected to take the 7-8 hour tour.  We were very lucky because only 30% of the people that travel to Denali get to see to the entire mountain.  The peak is so high it has its own climate. 

We were able to see various wildlife on our bus ride including a red fox, golden eagle, dall sheep, wolf, and brown bears.  Above is a picture of mom and her two cubs.  I was surprised to see such big cubs but they stick around with mama until they are 3 years old.  The brown bears range in color, they can be a very dark brown to blonde.  You can tell that they are brown bears (grizzlies) by the hump in between their shoulder blades. 

This is a picture of Denali from mile 66 of Park Road, which is the Eielson visitor center and our final destination into the park.  Added to this amazing trip up north, we were able to see the Northern Lights.  While at dinner in the hotel restaurant the three of us asked our waitress about northern lights out of curiosity.  She said they were able to see them the night before and that we would be able to see them even clearer that night.  She also let us know about the northern lights wake up call service which we took advantage of.  We got the call around 11:30 and headed out to the parking lot.  The three of us thought we could get a better view away from the town lights so we got in the car and drove.  It was definitely the right decision!

My point and shoot camera couldn't pick up anything.  The picture above hardly does it justice.  It would have been perfect if we had a tripod and a camera with an adjustable shutter speed.  The lights would vary in intensity.  The green would dance around in a band across the sky and when we thought the lights were gone it would come back.  The night sky itself was really amazing.  There were shooting stars we could see clearly and different constellations such as the 7 sisters.  I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me when I spotted a couple of moving stars, but they were actually satellites!  So unbelievable!  I had no idea satellites orbiting earth are visible to the naked eye.  I was pretty deprived of beautiful night skies growing up near a city! 

Jeep Trail

I haven't posted a couple of things I wanted to about our adventures with Kyle.  After our trip to Denali (which I still haven't posted because I am waiting on some pictures from Kyle), we decided to stay in Girdwood so that Kyle could enjoy the scenic drive down Seward highway.  We stopped at one of my favorite spots, Tern Lake.

 

It's definitely a spot that takes my breath away every time.  The first time I saw this the mountains were still snow capped and reflecting perfectly onto the lake.  Since we decided to make a day of our drive down, Ryan thought it would be fun to go on roads that we haven't been on before.  He found a road behind this lake and there were Alaska state workers working on a path around the lake.  Ryan asked if a dirt road marked "Old Seward Highway" was safe to drive on.  One of the workers encouraged us to go on it and said it met with Old Quartz Road.  The beginning of the road was beautiful. 

As you can see, the road is really only wide enough for 1 car.  I thought it would be a short trip but it ended up being a very scary experience!  The road is not maintained, and it winds through the side of a mountain.  There would be a wall of dirt to the left side of the car and a cliff on our right.  

 This was a part of the road that was wide enough for me to step out of for a picture.  You can see how narrow the path is ahead.  There was a section of the road with a clearing on the right side before a part of the road that had a waterfall running through it.  Kyle and I encouraged Ryan to use the clearing to turn around.  What do you think Ryan's decision was?  He insisted that the car could handle it and drove right through the water.  

Ryan was right, we did make it.  But now there was no turning back.  Kyle had to get out of the car and clear the road of large branches.  He actually walked at a pace faster than the car.  I got pretty worried that a bear might come out and attack him.  All I could hear in my head was Laurie's voice saying, "this is like Deliverance!" Eventually we met a split in the road and knew the main highway was to our right.  We took the right and saw this car. 

Hmm...I wonder what happened here?  Probably another man not listening to his wife.  This road is not one I will ever travel on again. 

Talk about Arduous!

Kyle has joined us in Alaska for the past week.  Ryan and he have been doing a lot of salmon fishing, Kyle has been quite successful in catching silver (coho) salmon.  We made a trip up to Denali at the beginning of the week but I will wait to post pictures after I get pictures from Kyle.  The three of us completed a 8 mile, 3,500 feet hike to the top of a mountain to get a view of the Harding Icefield in Seward. 

The hike was all uphill.  It took us through a cottonwood and adler forest, rocky edges, waterfalls, heather filled meadows, above the treeline into a rocky field.  The above picture shows the type of rock we hiked over as well as a first glimpse of the icefield.

The hike up was a struggle!  I needed lots of rest stops.  I thought San Francisco hills were bad, climbing up a mountain is horrible. 

 There were bear warning signs everywhere and we saw 3 bear scats on our trail.  They are pretty gross and huge!  The warnings pretty accurate, we saw a mom and cub black bear about 100 yards from us.

You can see we are above the tree line and into the meadow.  Further up, all the vegetation was gone and replaced with rocks. 

There was also snow still up on the mountain.  The sun was so hot that I didn't feel cold at all.  I actually wanted to make snow angels to cool off! 

The picture of the icefield hardly does it justice, it was pretty amazing!  You can see the blues in the ice and there were parts with deep crevasses.  Although the hike was probably the hardest thing I've done in a while, it was well worth it. 

Here's a view from our way down, the way down wasn't easy like I thought it would be.  It was hard on our knees and toes!  It was a beautiful hike, I would recommend that everyone does it once in their lifetime.  Ryan and I agreed that this would be our first and last time!

Spur of the Moment

Yesterday morning while Ryan was trying to kill some time until I woke up, he decided he would like us to go drift boat fishing.  He's been hankering to learn how to fly fish and also to go drift boating.  He found a charter that did both.  We went on a half day guided fishing trip in the upper Kenai.  The layout of Kenai river is as follows.  It starts from Kenai Lake, then turns into the Kenai river, which then pours into Skilak Lake, then turns into the river again which pours into the Cook Inlet.  The river between Kenai and Skilak Lake does not allow motorized boats.  This is because that part (called the upper Kenai) is shallow and it is a spawning ground for many different fish.  It is also for conservation purposes.  If you want to take a boat into this part of the river, you have to have a drift boat.  Today our guide did all the rowing for us.

We were lucky to go on the trip with a father/daughter duo.  The daughter was a bit younger than us and it was really cute to see such a great father/daughter relationship.  I think that's a perk of growing up somewhere like Alaska.  You're surrounded by the great outdoors and in order to enjoy it, someone has to teach you.

Fly fishing was pretty cool.  We caught dolly varden trout (pictured above with Ryan and our guide, Mike), rainbow trout, and a spawning red salmon.  We also saw sooooo many spawning red salmon.  Even spawning king (chinook) salmon.  I've really wanted to see how the reds change and I got the chance to today really close up!  If you look carefully above, you can see some red blobs.  These are the same fish Laurie and I were fishing for off our dock.  The reds start to deteriorate after they spawn, turning red and green.

AMAZING, right?!  Such pretty red and green.  I caught this big guy and as soon as this was taken, he slipped out of my hand and bit me!  He got a pretty good grip on the front part of my hood, under my chin.  He was slimy and I was nervous that I would drop him on the boat.  It's so weird that this was the same fish we were catching a month and a half ago.  The dolly varden trout were more plentiful than the rainbows.  Ryan caught only 1 rainbow.

This is not Ryan's rainbow (he was actually the biggest one caught today!).  I only had him hold it because I was afraid I would lose it like this one:

 The rainbow trout are really beautiful, they have these pink cheeks that look like blush.  The dollies have orange spots and look like they have orange lipstick on.  :)

Ryan and I are really enjoying our time in Alaska.  It's such a different life up here than I've ever experienced before and I love it.  But we do miss our family (especially our little nephews) and friends.

B.O.A.T.

Ryan and I have two weeks to figure out what we can do to fill up our time until our next visitor, Kyle, comes to entertain us. :)  Can't wait!  We decided to do the easiest thing possible, fish in a river created by run-off from snow capped mountains in our backyard.  Our target was silver salmon (coho), but it was hard to not catch pink salmon.  Above is a female spawning pink salmon (isn't she beautiful?) I caught.  She kept releasing eggs into our boat while Ryan was trying to get the hook off her.  I'm glad I've never enjoyed Ikura (salmon roe as sushi)...and I don't think I ever will.

Today our adventurous Kenai River trip faced some challenges.  We discovered we had left the bilge pump on which had drained the battery.  That is a picture of Ryan pulling the boat back into the dock.  Imagine how cold the water is!  Ryan went to buy a new battery and we headed back out onto the water.  Everything was going well until we hit a bed of rocks that hadn't been visible before.  The water level dropped drastically in the past few days (warm weather has melted most of the snow affecting the water level).  So the boat is out of commission and is living up to its acronym.    Bust.Out.Another.Thousand. 

Dad & Halibut K.I.S.S.I.N.G. and Mom's Humpy

This is Donner. Really, its name is Donner.

So we ended up not going to Denali. I was nervous about taking my parents and Jason because I've never been there and didn't know how good it would be. We came straight down toSoldotna from Anchorage. On our way down, we stopped by the asian grocery store and mom and dad couldn't believe the prices. We made our usual stops at the Wildlife Rescue and Kenai Lake. The Kenai Lake spot is so picturesque!

Since Dad LOVES halibut, we went on a chartered tour out of Ninilchik again. Our captain had a "kiss your first halibut" rule. I'm glad my first captain didn't have it! Actually, the captain with my parents ended up being the grandson of our captain with the Smiths'. I think Dad looks pretty cute kissing his first halibut!

Ryan had one day off before work after his boards on Wednesday so the five of us went out on the river with his boat. It was pretty fun! We caught a lot of humpies (male pink salmon) but mom had the monster humpy. The female pink salmon don't have the humps, but we threw all of them back.

I am sending mom, dad, and Jason on the Kenai Fjords tour tomorrow. I decided to sit out on the 4th trip. :)BTW, Ryan mentioned that there were about 50 Beluga whales on his drive down from Anchorage after his boards in Turnagain Arm. I think between the two of us, we've seen almost every specie of whale in Alaska..ok correction, we've seen 30% of the types of whales!

The Smiths' are Here!

This past week was a whirlwind! Ryan's uncle John and his kids Jim, Tory, and Paul were able to visit us. The boys did a lot of salmon fishing while Tory and I took a day to visit the Kenai Fjords. On our tour we were able to see sea otter, Stellar sea lions, horned puffins, tufted puffins, a resident orca pod, a humpback, a smack (which is a group of jellyfish), and lots of birds. We had a pretty amazing time! I have to admit that the orca pod was the coolest mammal I have ever seen! We had resident orcas flanking our right and transient orcas flanking our left. There was a baby orca also breaching! Resident orcas have both sexes staying close with their mothers while transient orcas are usually in groups of 3 with their moms and if another is born, a sibling leaves the pod. For me, the orcas were more fun to watch than humpbacks because they were in a pod and it's exciting to see their dorsal fin coming up on the water and then their whole body. The humpbacks tend to blow and show only a little of their back. Their fluke up dive is pretty cool though!

The boys caught a lot of humpies (pink salmon) which they threw back into the water and a couple of silver (coho) salmon. Alaskans prefer not to have pink salmon because they have better options! The boys were able to hook humpies on almost every cast once they figured out the best way to get them.



As a group we were able to spend a day halibut fishing at Deep Creek. Deep Creek is known for their unusual way of getting boats into the water. There is no boat ramp. Instead, a skidder (like a tractor) pushes you into the water. It's pretty cool! The water at the beginning of the day was extremely choppy which made things very uncomfortable. Once anchored, the boat did rock up and down (I am getting queasy just remembering it) for about 3/4 of the trip then finally settled down. Fishing for halibut was a challenge, but fun. Halibut are bottom feeders so you have to make sure that your line hits the bottom of the sea floor. In our case, the depth was about 150 feet and the weight we used to sink the bait was 5 lbs. Cranking the line back up was no joke! Especially when you had a fish on. It was funny to see each other struggle to get the fish up. Tory, Paul, and I were able to just leave our rods in the rod holder and just crank the reel. :) The bait that was used was also pretty ripe (as in stinky, rotting fish) and we were fortunate enough that the Captains of the boat baited all of our hooks for us.

My parents and Jason will be here on Monday. Ryan has his boards on Wednesday so I am planning to take the family up to Mt. Denali and meet Ryan in Anchorage on Wednesday. I am looking forward to seeing the highest peak of North America! Let's hope for clear skies!

Homer Revisited

Our most recent trip took us back into Homer (which is a town, not a person..that goes out to a special someone) and across the water into Halibut Cover for some clam diggin'. An ER doctor was kind and took us out on his boat. We tied the boat and had to ride an inflatable raft to the shore. On our way into shore, there were so many jellyfish in the water. I was able to see clear ones with 4 spots on top of it and also orange ones with tentacles trailing from it. It was really beautiful!

On our clam digging trip we were seeking the Pacific little neck clams. There were also butter clams, but the little necks are tastier. We went out at the lowest tide of the month into a valley. There were little streams we walked across to get to the bed of shellfish. To get to the clams, we had to remove a layer of little mussels. Under that, there is a layer of dirt. Under the dirt it's like finding what you would when you lift a rock..but a bit scarier because they are more unfamiliar. We found little crabs, huge worms, squiggly eels (really gross), these huge things that looked like a little boy's body part, and of course clams.

We had a group of 6 digging and after about 2 hours, we left with two 5-gallon bucket fulls of clams (mixture of butters and little necks). All in all, even though the mud was super stinky, it was pretty fun to play in the mud! There were also these little tide pools with lots of sea stars (starfish) of different color in them.


After we had our fill of being on our knees, we headed back to the boat for some Halibut fishing. We didn't do very well, except for some ling cod (ugliest fish ever..they have these huge heads and huge bellies) and nondescript organism from the sea floor Ryan caught. GROSS! Halibut are bottom dwellers so you have to send the line out all the way to the bottom. It was hard enough to reel the line in without a fish, I can't imagine when there is an actual fish on!





















Ryan's uncle John and his kids Jim, Tory, and Paul will be here on Sunday. I am looking forward to seeing their reaction to Alaska. Oh and Ryan bought his first boat with his first paycheck (a dream he's always had). I am so very proud of all his accomplishments! :) Here are some pictures of it. I approved of the color.