Shedding Winter

I have been taking a lot of long weekend trips to Homer, and have been spending many nights in log cabins. Jedd lives in a log cabin, we've rented a log cabin on Tustamena Lake, and we have friends who have a log cabin in up near Talkeetna.

We went up to the Talkeetna cabin a few weeks ago. You park along the highway, and then snowmobile in about 6 or 7 miles. Wrigley refused to ride the sled (why ride it when you can race it?) and ran behind it at 20mph for about 5 miles before he slowed a bit. I was impressed! While at the cabin we decided to do a little Alaskan white trash version of water skiing... This involved a snowmobile, a tow rope, skis, and some alcohol. Yours truly was pulled all around the place, first along skinny, bouncy trails, and then we hit the "open road" of the lake. Yeeeeee Haaaaawwwww! We were on cross-country skis, so it's not like we had awesome carving abilities...and that's where the alcohol helped. :) It was VERY fun, and while trashy, I highly recommend it. I couldn't wipe the smile off my face. Sadly, there are no pics of this. Actually, maybe that's a good thing.

We also spent some time shed hunting. Sheds are the paddles/antlers that moose shed every winter. They tend to whack their antlers against trees, and whomp! down to the ground they go. We made our way over to the very appropriately named Moose Creek and began our search. Brandon, one of our friends, was the first to call out, "Found one!" He did that within 5 minutes. So we were all pretty stoked. Then, about 30 minutes later, I accidentally found one! I was only stopping to put my gloves in my backpack b/c it was too hot and just happened to notice the tip of a shed sticking out of the ground near my feet...I almost walked right by! I had to unbury it, and holy moose racks, it was a big 'un! I took this pic of Wrigley with it (note the old timey snowshoes...they were awesome)...

He kinda reminded me of Max from the Grinch Who Stole Christmas. Or the Life is Good puppy. Wrigley, however, wasn't psyched about having it on his head. In his mouth was more his style.

Later in the afternoon we went several miles up the river to check out a different area, and whaddaoyaknow?! Jedd found the perfect match to my shed!! So now I am the proud owner of a "nice rack." (snicker snicker)

Also noteworthy is the northern lights displays lately. I have NEVER seen them from my house b/c it's way too light in the city. But they've been so impressive that I actually snapped a few pics from my back deck. Here, they are directly over Denali.

Finally, what's a blog post without some alpaca poop? As part of a fundraiser for the Homer Broomball teams, I entered the Alpaca Dung Raffle. Basically, there's a $1,500 pot split between two winners. Each of the winners are chosen by two lovely alpacas, and when they poop, that poop is measured out on a quadrant grid, and there you have your winners. Here's Marley goin' for it. (Sadly, I did not win, though I did get some awesome schwag in a silent raffle.)

Trips in the works

Before I post about my most recent adventures, let me tell you how excited I am about upcoming trips! First up will be a kayak trip from Valdez to Whittier. This will be the longest kayak trip I've been on, and I'm PSYCHED. Next will be an amazing trip to Kauai. Jedd and I, along with a few other Alaskans and Hawaiians, are going to kayak the Na Pali Coast, then hike the sucker, then explore the island, likely via foot, bike, and helicopter. Views ought to be something like this:

Photo courtesy of the interwebz

Then towards the fall I'll be hitting up Yosemite with Julia and my second set of parents. Julz (and Krista and Duncan??? Pretty please!!) and I are going to do some serious backpacking and hiking. It'll look something like this:

Gracias again interwebz

There will, of course, be adventures in the interim too. I've just been busy planning these trips, so they're on my mind right now.

Next up, a recap of my latest adventures. They involve alpaca poop. Stay tuned...

East of Denali

Denali from our drop in point (there was actually snow to ski, don't worry)

My friend Andy and I went exploring this past weekend. I was up before 6AM (on a weekend?!), and we drove waaaaay up north, and parked due east of Denali (aka Mt. McKinley). Then we blazed a new trail to slopes that are probably never skied (b/c they're so remote and the snow is meh). Holy sh*t was it beautiful out there! We toured and climbed for about 5 hours...not exactly what most skiers dream of when scoping lines for downhill turns. But it was like summer out there. We were down to just shirts and pants - no jackets, hats, or gloves necessary! Once we reached our summit for the day, we assessed avalanche conditions, determined that things were a bit sketchy (don't' worry, mom, we played it safe), had some late lunch in the hot sun, and then made some rather pathetic turns down the breakable crust. Breakable crust is so NOT my friend. All the powder was down in the alders, which we "skied" through while bushwacking. Thank you winds. Once we were down the mountain, we began the slog back to the truck. I was back home at 10PM. What a day!! I'd do it all over again in an instant.

Yours truly on the hike up. We had to boot pack the last bit up the mountain, and we hiked on tundra! Bring on spring!!

Here's a video I took to show you our surroundings b/c pictures couldn't capture the 360 degrees of mountains. Andy makes an appearance too. We skied a run that you'll see right behind him.

Jedd

Now you can see him a little better. :)

Connections

Let me tell you a little story about connections...

My friend Amy and I met through a mutual friend, Bree. Bree grew up in Portland, which is where she met Amy, and now lives in Chicago, which is where she met me (before I moved to AK, obviously). I almost never met Bree, but through an awesome turn of events, we met and became friends. Then I was invited to her bachelorette party several years later (which is now several years ago), where I met Amy. Amy and I hit it off, partially because I had just moved to Alaska when I met her, and she was bound and determined to teach in Alaska...just as soon as she finished the Masters program she had just started. So, a couple of years after Bree's wedding, Amy landed a gig teaching in Homer, Alaska, about 4 hours drive from Anchroage! I get to see her more than I ever got to see Bree in Chicago! Small world.

But the connections continue... Seldovia is a small town across Kachemak Bay from Homer, and had been on my hit list for a while. So when Amy invited me to a music festival in Seldovia my response was something like, "Hell yes!" I highly recommend the music festival, which highlights artists from all over the country, not just those from good 'ol AK. But I'm not here to tell you about the music; I want to focus on how the connection chain kept going. That weekend I met a slew of people who are friends with Amy. Among those people were two guys, Ross and Cody, and Moses, a big brown dog. Ross and Cody are brothers, and Moses is the dog of yet another brother living in Homer. But the third brother was working in Valdez for the summer, so while I heard stories about him, I had no idea who this third brother was. I was just there for the music, after all!

Well, many months later, well after Scott and I broke up, Amy invited me down to Homer for a Halloween party weekend. Again, my response: "Hell yes!" I can't pass up a chance to hang with Amy, and if it involves costumes, even better! I knew it was going to be a good weekend when it was requested that I bring wigs to Homer, and when I walked in the door and Amy said, "You have to meet Jedd," and then Brandon handed me a "Juicy Lucy." I had never before worn a wig, met Jedd, or ever heard of a "juicy lucy" (which, is two burger patties smashed together around a gob of cheese and tossed onto the grill...in other words, edible heaven). So, while taking my first bite of the "juicy lucy" I met Jedd. This was the third Homer brother, and Moses's dog dad...in the flesh! I'd heard a lot about him, but I wasn't expecting him to be so fricking cute! I did the best I could to say hi and shake his hand, which was kinda hard considering I had cheese practically dripping out of my mouth, and my hand was covered in burger juice. Ah, first impressions. That night everyone gathered at Amy and Brandon's place for a fire pit party. It snowed on us, we smashed pumpkins, and passed a bottle of whiskey around the flames. Ingredients for pure fun, I tell you.

The next night everyone got dressed up for a costume party at one of the bars in Homer. I went as a flapper. Here's proof:Wigs rule

Jedd was "The Dude." I had an epic fail and didn't get a picture of him in his robe and slippers with a white russian. And I'm happy to report that it was in fact a costume, not the way he dresses all the time. Anyway, we hit it off that weekend, and the rest, as they say, is history. Here's a pic of Jedd (center), Brandon (left) and their friend Mark (right). This is the most "Dude"-like picture I have of him yet.

Stay classy, Homer.

So, to summarize: I meet Bree (2003) --> Bree introduces me to Amy (2006) --> Amy finishes up grad school and moves up to Alaska to teach (2009) --> Amy introduces me to Jedd (2010). A 7 year connection chain that almost never happened. Whew!!