Alaska
Alaska
Verenigde Staten
IngeDavids
A day in Alaska, part II
Tuesday, June 19th
Another trails day! Today the sun is shining in a bright blue sky as I head out to the trails garden. Days like these are rare and precious in Alaska, and are to be used to the fullest. We have a short morning meeting, anxious as we are to get out on the trail in the sun we drive out at 7.15. Good morning Alaska!
Today is an exciting day, as it will be the last day we work on our first reroute. Our first task done! I spend the morning working on the very last rock work of my drainage, crushing some rocks for trail coverage (swinging a 20 pound double jack hammer), and revegetation; we replace the tundra mats that we cut out for the new trail on the old trail. It's so hot today (slightly over 20C feels like 30C in Alaska), that during lunch we sit by the river and dip our toes in the freezing cold glacier water! So lovely :)
I spend more time crushing rocks and working on the revegetation in the afternoon, but eventually have to hike all the way out to the Savage Box (check point on the park road) where I hope to find more water for our crew. Thankfully I can fill our water bottles here, our afternoon is saved! I also run into Matt, a friend from C Camp and a Wildlife Tec who came to check out the area. Yesterday we had a slight commotion and bear jam ('traffic jam' becomes 'bear jam') caused by a female grizzly bear walking around in the area. My first grizzly on the trail! She went far up the hills though, and I am good to hike back out again.
We end our afternoon by hiking down the trail further to our new workplace, and setting out the new reroute. This involves quite a bit of thinking, looking, measuring, debating, and 'testing out'. This new reroute will be our longest this season; over a 100 meters! Once done, we hike back out to our truck (now almost a half our walk) and drive down to the very beginning of the park road, where we get ourselves some serious ice cream to celebrate finishing our first reroute! And also just because it's 20C, the sun is shining and ice cream is awesome ;)
My evening is somewhat chaotic and busy, but fun nonetheless. After a quick shower and leftover diner I walk over to the Denali Kennels, a short 10 minute walk through the forest and Headquarters area. I go here about four times a week to walk my husky dog Chulitna. I 'adopted' her a couple weeks after I arrived, and have walked her ever since. Chulitna is ecstatic when she sees me. She very well knows that I come to walk her, and shows her enthusiasm by barking like crazy, running in circles, jumping up and down her little house and (when I approach her with her leash) giving me paws - basically slapping me quite painfully as she doesn't really know what she's doing. Chulitna may be an older lady (she's a little over 9), she's still very strong and can easily pull me over. So I hold her on a leash and keep an eye out for things that get her excited or aggressive. I also keep an eye out for wildlife, as moose can always be walking around in the area, and they don't do very well with dogs. After the walk Chulitna is a lot more mellow and calm, and I usually stay with her for a while to brush her, sit with her, cuddle a bit and get my face licked.
Once back in C Camp I head over to Jessica's and Jakara's cabin, where I also find Matt. Matt is going to be my model for tonight, as he is part of my 'Boys and Beards' photography project. Most of the guys here are growing some serious beards, and I decided to photograph them to create an interesting portrait series. I've been pestering Matt about this for weeks on end, and tonight I finally get to shoot him!
He jokes around, poses a bit awkwardly and follows my instructions until I'm satisfied. I'm excited about sharing the final series with you when they're done at the end of the summer! I hang around a little bit more and go to bed too late around 11.00 pm. I can't seem to go to bed earlier, there is always so much going on here in Denali!