Alaska to Massachusetts

Most of you know, but for those who don't. Ray and I packed the car and moved from Alaska back to the East Coast (for now). We LOVED Alaska, but it was just too far from family and friends. So for now, we bought a mountain house in a very small town of Western Massachusetts (Berkshires). The town is called Mount Washington. We like it a lot and it is sure nice to be closer to everyone. Ray started his own business doing handy man work and I am working at Canyon Ranch as a Massage Therapist. Things are great here and I LOVE the Berkshires. We will be back though to Alaska just not for a while. Hopefully we can find a balance where we can summer there and rent out our house here, and winter here in the Berkshires. That would be ideal. Do drop us a line and we will forward our phone number to you!!! Our trip back was amazing and we have tons of photos to show. But here in Western Mass. we only have dial up so....the pics will have to wait....
Be well!

Fall, is here, like it or not!

Well,

I can't believe it's been over a month since my last post. Not a whole lot to report. Ray and I took a short trip this past month to Anchorage. It was great to go out and eat Sushi, and Thai food. We also enjoyed the farmers market with all of the fresh local produce, but I forgot the cooler at home, so we didn't take much with us (bummer!). We also took a trip to a town called Cooper Landing. It is right on the Kenai River which is amazing to see.

The color of the river is so magical. It's like a very deep blue. Amazing. We rented a house and loved it, and explored the area. When we were visiting it was 80 degrees! No kidding! It felt like 100+. We ate outside at one restaurant when we were there and most of the tourists couldn't take the heat outside and insisted on sitting inside. When I say 80 degrees, the heat index has to be a LOT higher here in AK.

My job ended on Labor Day, which was a week too late as I got a bad case of Bronchitis the end of August. I was working, but it was very difficult. After losing my voice completely, and a week of coughing, Ray took me to the Dr, who gave me the meds I needed. I am feeling MUCH better, but still not 100%. It surely took a lot out of me. Ray's job ends in a couple of weeks. We hope to get some travelling done before the snow starts to fly too much. There is already a chill in the air in the mornings. Still though, the thermometer reads 60's in the day and 50's at night. But we are seeing some of the leaves beginning to change color, so Fall is definitely here.

Here are some pictures of the Time Bandit for you folks who follow Deadliest Catch on Discovery Channel. The guys that run the boat live in Homer and we see the boat and the guys quite a bit. They are so "Alaskan" and don't take their fame too seriously. Still walking around town with torn clothing and beat up cars. That is one of the reasons why I love Alaska so much.

No one is out to be someone they aren't. They are just themselves. No snootiness, no clothing wars, or who's car is the best or house is the nicest. People in Alaska just live. It could be typar as siding or cedar shingle sided, Carhartt pants, or........Carhartt overalls, Rubber boots, or XTRA Tuffs, all Homerites come as they are. They shop in their PJ's, walk around town shoeless, eat dinner out braless, and in most cases un showered for several days, and everyone is OK with it. The other day while at Safeway, I saw a woman in a full pink PJ suit with full booties and zipped up front. She just casually walked and got what she needed, and not ONE person looked at her funny or said anything. Amazing! Perhaps the locals just know they can't compete with the breathtaking beauty of the land so they submit to it by just being.........themselves....with no errs.......

Until next time. Be well!

Across the bay

Across the bay from Homer is Kachemak State Park. It is Alaska’s first state park, and only wilderness park, it contains roughly 400,000 acres of mountains, glaciers, forests and ocean. Visitors who want to visit the park can do so by boat or by plane.

VISITING THE OYSTER FARMER~

There are no roads to the park. We decided this week to take a vacation "in the park" at Tutka Bay Wilderness Lodge. Since Rays tent camping is over because of his "awareness level" of bears, we opt for a roof over our heads and a shower to come back to every day after our kayaking excursions.

The lodge was OK. But for our money paid, I probably wouldn't return. It was very expensive. We had a great time nonetheless kayaking every day. We went tidepooling and saw some great starfish and sealife. We also went clamming (which turned out to be a futile effort) and berry picking. We also visited an oyster farm and was able to buy some oysters right from the farmer in the sea. That was a neat treat! Can't get much fresher than that. Whales were around and porpoise and hundreds of bald eagles soaring. I highly recommend that you visit this park at least once during your lifetime to see the vast wilderness and sweeping vistas at every turn. It is truly breathtaking.

We have gone to two concerts this summer across the bay and they both were neat. Here is a picture of Ray enjoying a conversation at Quiet Place Lodge for the Jazz Festival. Smiling as usual.

More pictures and stories to come. Hope you are all well!

Earthquake!

Hello all,
Well two nights ago I was startled awake by the entire house shaking violently and the windows rattling so hard, I thought that they would break. At first, because of the time (3:40am) I thought someone was trying to break in the apartment, but after quickly gathering my bearings, I realized that it was an earthquake. I was completely freaked out. I tried to wake Ray up to tell him, but all I could rouse out of him was "that's nice go back to bed"...... and a complete blank stare the next morning when I reminded him of the incident and trying to wake him up...(in case you hadn't noticed, he is a very sound sleeper....)
I found on the Alaska earthquake web page that it was a 4.2 earthquake about 100 miles west of here. This earthquake was at the SAME EXACT time as the earthquake in San Francisco the other day which got press in the media, but not even a yawn from folks from Alaska. Unbelievable.

The bear web cam is up and I wanted you to all experience the live bears first hand. I believe that it is up from 1:00pm-5:00pm Alaska time. Which is generally 4 hours behind anyone on the east coast. The web site to see this is www.prattmuseum.org and click on bear cam.
Have fun. It's another beautiful day here in Alaska!

Where has the time gone?

OK OK, I know, I have not posted lately. Sorry about that! The summer has been going great. Lots of sunny days and little rain. We just had a spell of cool overcast rainy weather and I thought it was never going to end. But, after the locals tell me that it rained every day last summer, I don't feel so bad. I think yesterday it may have hit 70 (feels more like 90) as it was HOT. I can't explain the weather here. When I explain that it rarely gets into the 70's here, most folks back home say, "boy that sounds cold!" but when you are actually experiencing the weather, it feels hotter. Perhaps it is because it is the area on the globe that positions us closer to the sun in the summer? Who knows, but I do know, that even though it says 70 on the thermometer outside, if you go outside and soak in the sun, you would swear it was at least 10-15 degrees hotter. The weather also seems dry to me. Now I know you are thinking "dry.... how can it be dry if you are surrounded by the ocean?" but believe me, we have very little humidity here. Not that I am complaining mind you, I would much rather have the weather here, than the weather you folks in the Northeast have been getting, yikes.

So we bought tickets to see "Hot Tuna". Ray can tell you who all is in the band, I was just excited that we had a date to see some live music and get outside. Well, this is Alaska, and can you believe, the DAY the concert was to perform, they moved the venue? No posters, no announcement, just a small sign on the fairgrounds entrance saying "The venue has changed to Alice's in Homer". They were supposed to play in Ninilchik which is 40 miles north of Homer at the fairgrounds, but because they thought it might be a better venue, they moved them to a bar in Homer. Now mind you, we, fortunately enough, found out ahead of time. But most folks actually drove to the fairgrounds and back. I was sort of angry about this, but as it turned out no one seemed miffed, and everyone who had tickets made it to the bar. The band actually waited to play until all of the ticket holders could make the drive.... I just kept thinking to myself, this would NEVER have happened back east, and to see that everyone made it to the bar on time, and the band played, and no one was miffed...was...well....strange....but after I got over myself, I had a great time and they were really neat to see in concert.

OK so the Greepeace Boat was in port the other day and they made an announcement on the radio that we could tour it. Unfortunately I only had 45 minutes before work to quickly go on a tour and take a few pics. I think Greenpeace is an amazing organization and it was neat to see what they are doing and what they are trying to protect. They are also about education, and their mission in Alaska was to travel to native villages and educate them about fishing and subsistence living, and keeping the environment healthy. Unfortunately, most of these remote villages have little education, and over the past few years, big corporations have come in and thrown money around to them to "mine" their lands, and what they leave them with is waste and a destroyed environment. The money looks good to them, so they take it, and years later they are suffering to make ends meet. Sad story, but one that happens more and more here. If you want to read more about a projects like these, google "pebble mine" and there is case and point for you.

We still can't get over the view, and Ray the other day, on his walk had to take this picture for you all to see.

Can you believe that this is our view?

Still amazes me every time I look out the window.

I am homesick for fresh produce, corn, tomatoes, and all things summer. I guess our trade off is fresh fish here, and I like that, but boy what I would do for a fresh tomato sandwich with a ear of corn. I am also homesick due to the lack of choices here. The one grocery store in town has been out of chicken for over a week. They keep saying "tomorrow" but every day returns an empty cooler. A bit frustrating and at the same time sobering to know just where we live and how remote we actually are.

The fire I was talking about is pretty much out. They let nature take its course as it was headed where no one lived in a remote forest owned by the state, and they wanted it to burn itself out. Our forests here are LOADED with dead Spruce trees due to a bark beetle that came in a few years back and destroyed thousands and thousands of trees. So they figured that it would burn the dead stuff and it would help the forest regrow and regenerate in the future. Sounded silly at first to me, but as soon as Ray explained how forests regenerate, it makes total sense. Here is a picture from about a month ago from the fishing hole. It shows the smoke headed towards Homer. Pretty eerie....

There is another web cam if you are so inclined. It is www.justalaska.net they for some reason have been down a lot, so I never put their website up, but over the past few days, it looks OK again. So if you would like to see what is happening weather wise, and view wise here in Homer, check out their webcams. They have several.

Hoping you are all well, until next time!

It's almost July!

I can't believe that it is almost JULY! Where does the time go. The fire I was talking about is 60% contained now. They lost 80 structures to the fire and with a little help from a day of rain they got it under control. No more smoke and the skies once again are filled with the sun! It has so far been a very dry summer. I would say it was still cool, but the locals call this a "hot dry summer". We haven't seen one day at 70 yet. But if you have ever visited Alaska, 65 in the summer sun feels like 80. I don't know why that phenomenon is, but it just "feels" warmer. One thing we don't have here is humidity. Which I don't miss at ALL!

The Alaskan tourist season got off to a slow start, but this week, all of a sudden, it just went crazy. I am very busy at work from the moment I get in until the moment I leave, and then still at 10pm, even when the store has it's OPEN sign off, and the doors are locked, people STILL knock at the door and insist on coming in. The fishing charters that I book for have been very busy and they all have been catching their limit of Halibut. The largest so far is 340.6 lbs. sure to be a contender in our Halibut Jackpot, which last year netted the winner over $44,000.00

I am very surprised at the amount of Eagles that are hanging around this summer. Generally this is their stomping ground in winter, and they find other refuge in summer due to the crowds, but this year, they are still EVERYWHERE. Last night on my way home from work, I swear some tourists got as close at 10 feet from one to take it's picture and it just sat there, undisturbed.

Here are some pics for you to enjoy! These are from last year when we visited with my sister in September. Still of beautiful Alaska, but I haven't had my camera out lately to show any pics. Talk to you all soon!

Update...fire

Here is two pictures this evening of the smoke in Homer. These pictures are of the sun taken from our deck. All is fine here, smokey...but fine...