July 19, 2007
I also made my first trip into Denali yesterday. It was as beautiful as I remember it. I'll share three pictures here.
The first picture is from the Parks Highway driving up to Denali. I like it because it shows the fireweed growing on the side of the road and the mountain range in the distance.
July 19, 2007
I forgot to mention before that I think the river is at least 200' across in the area where I'm skipping the rocks, maybe 300'. I need to find a way to measure it. (Just thought of one way -- the bridge!) I drew a good crowd last night, skipping a few more rocks about half the width of the river. Some day maybe I'll be known as the rock skipper of Talkeetna. :)
July 18, 2007
It's 6 p.m., Tuesday evening. There's a knock at the front window. It's the squirrel. I open the front door. "What's up squirrel?"
"Another beautiful day" he says, pausing and looking at the clear sky. "You got any more of those white corn tortillas?"
"Yeah, sure, just a minute." I step back inside to get him a tortilla, and he comes to the doorway and looks inside. "Hey, nice place. You got heat in here?"
I hand him the tortilla. "Yeah, a Monitor 2200. A free-standing kerosene heater, over there" I say, pointing to the unit in the living room.
July 17, 2007
Living here in my quiet, television-free, two-story bungalow on the Alaskan Rivieria (see Maurice Minnifield), sites like YouTube are great for taking music breaks. I just re-discovered a song named "Not an Addict" by K's Choice, and my neighbors and I can't seem to listen to this song loud enough. There are a couple of good versions on YouTube, one live-ish clip from '97, and an acoustic version.
July 17, 2007
As much as anything the Talkeetna Moose Dropping Festival is a big music celebration, with two days of music from Alaskan performers. One of my favorites was Melissa Mitchell, shown here:
July 16, 2007
It's easy to forget how REALLY REALLY BIG the Denali mountain range is, even if you live here.
July 16, 2007
One of the more surreal "only in Alaska" things I see here is a young boy, less than 10 years old, driving an ATV around Talkeetna. I usually see him about every third day. I'll be walking along the side of the road as he rides by, usually with a younger girl on the seat behind him. As he's driving by he's always real nice and smiles and waves. He looks like a kid from a commercial on tv, but I can't think of what commercial it is.
July 15, 2007
Squirrel generations
It turns out that the squirrel goes back to two previous generations of renters here. I asked the people who lived here before me if they knew of him, and they said oh yeah, they had a picture of him eating the wicker chair that's on the deck, and the renter before them also fed him.
July 14, 2007
The Talkeetna Moose Dropping Festival parade just finished. Hundreds of people lined the streets street to watch it. Highlights included the VFW gentlemen that started it, followed by the bagpipe players (my personal favorite; they could have played for a while). After that I think the lady on the bicycle being pulled by the sled dog was next best, followed by the hound dog barking out the side window of an SUV.
July 12, 2007
Wow! I just came back inside, and it's a gorgeous, gorgeous day outside. The sun is shining, there's no humidity, cool temp, light breeze. Wow! The mountain bike is calling my name, and I'm outta here!
July 11, 2007
This has nothing to do with Alaska, other than me taking a long break here and goofing on YouTube for a while. It brought back some great memories of songs, and Law and Order, Criminal Intent, my favorite show of '06 and '07:
July 11, 2007
The squirrel still comes by and visits at least once a day, usually 2-3 times. Most days I can stand out there while he eats my Cheerios, other times he jumps in a tree and just starts screaming. And if there isn't anything for him to eat he tells me about that too.
July 10, 2007
When you live in the Lower 48 you tend to take certain things for granted, including things like, I don't know ... electricity(!).
Here in Talkeetna the power goes out on average three times a week, some times for a few minutes, but the last two Monday's it's gone out for 3+ hours each day. I talked to a guy at the post office today, and he mentioned that most businesses have generators ... and now I know why there is a generator in the crawlspace under the house.
July 10, 2007
I should have taken many pictures before this, but I'll have to get them on my next grocery trip. Here's the first picture, a few of the buildings in the Independence Mine exhibit:
July 10, 2007
I took some time off yesterday to drive on Hatcher Pass, and I'm so glad I did. It reminded me of some of the roads I drove on in the deep-woods portions of Canada to get here.
Hatcher Pass is about 45 minutes south of Talkeetna. You get to it by taking the Parks Highway south just barely past Willow Creek, then take a left. Alternatively you can get to it from Wasilla, which is how I got on it.
July 10, 2007
It's been "mood weather" here in Talkeetna, Alaska for several weeks now, ever since the fires were threatening to burn the place down. (Ask for a little rain, and you get several weeks of it.)
It's not too bad though. Except for a few nights where the rain has been really heavy, it's usually just overcast with periods of drizzling rain. That helps keep the weather cool, usually in the 60's. And with it still being light out somewhere around 20 hours a day, you have ~20 hours of overcast-but-light skies.
July 9, 2007
I don't know anything about hunting seasons around here in Talkeetna (or if it's always hunting season) but the gunshots have been echoing through town the last few nights. It wouldn't be too bad, except it's usually at one or two o'clock in the morning, and these guys must be pretty bad shots, because it's not like just one or two shots, it goes on for a little while.
(I guess my assumption is that they're not drunks with rifles shooting at signs.)
July 8, 2007
I'm not sure what it says about me, and I don't think I want to know, but I listened to Christina Aguilera's song "Walk Away" for about four consecutive hours the other day. If it plays about 11 times per hour, I guess I listened to it 44 times in a row.
I got hooked on her music before leaving Louisville after hearing songs like Hurt, Impossible, and especially Cruz.
July 6, 2007
I just noticed on a recent walk by the river that the fireweed plants are beginning to bloom! I need to remember to take my camera on one of these walks.