The Fall Guy

Let me be the first to say.......WoooooooooHooooooooo! Snowed Sunday morning - flurries down here, a little more up in the Chugach. I guess I'm a true convert - looking forward to such a long cold winter. The joy of the extremes. Plus I love jacket weather.


I picked up a new "B" camera - a little one for light duty - still haven't gotten a real one.

This has been a funky summer - we set an all-time record with 31 straight days of rain - which might explain the lack of pictures posted by me (I do have some pics forthcoming of when my buddy Jeff visited in early August.) But early summer it was beautiful, and we've had an Indian Summer since the rain stopped (or is it Native American Summer?) But now, it's solidly Fall, or perhaps more accurately, Pre-Winter.

A couple days ago I went up to the Denali Highway, not to be confused with Denali National Park. The Denali Highway, the 135 mile almost all-dirt road between Cantwell and Paxson, and the original "way" to the Park, is one of my favorite places on Earth. On a Thursday in September, I'm quite confident I was the only person in at least a 25-mile radius. Dead quiet up there, which is hard to find these days - it's not even in a commercial flight pattern of any jet low enough to hear (I've never seen one up there either). Pretty sweet spot, huh?


The conglomeration of rocks around the fire was necessitated by the crazy wind - I swear it took 20 matches to get that fire going, and it only got going because I cut the top off of a soda can and started the fire in there. During summer fire is first and foremost for entertainment, then for cooking, then for warming. This late in the year, warming takes precedence. I knew before I went, while it was still in the 50's here with lows in the 40's, up there the highs would be in the 40's, with lows in the 20's at best. The weather didn't disappoint, as evidenced by my partial water bottle which, while laid on its side overnight, froze solid.


Thankfully, due to gear, I didn't (toes did lose some feeling though.) I just finished a book called "From Sea to Shining Sea," about the Clark family in the late 1700's and early 1800's, including the well-known Clark of the Lewis & Clark expedition. I don't think those boys (nor Sacajawea and her newborn) had sleeping pads and zero degree bags to keep them from freezing while crossing the Rockies. People back then were crazy tough.

But there's still a little adventure left out there in the World, no matter where you live.