Jobs? Nah, not yet!

Looking down on Williwaw lakes from the 'Ball Field' behind Little O'Malley ridge.

Most of you probably think that Tim and I are busy looking for jobs. Well, we're not, at least not quite yet. Soon the real world will catch up with us, but for now we are busy enjoying Alaska. We have discovered that there is actually some rock climbing around here, which is a huge relief to us. Tim has also been busy helping my grandfather move piles of dirt, while my grandfather is chopping wood like a madman and I put in a new garden. And of course, we are going on lots of hikes in the Chugach range behind Anchorage. It is absolutely amazing to have the wilderness so close outside the door.

On one recent evening hike with Tim, we managed to lose the trail in a swamp and began following moose trails. These got worse and worse as they wound through the dwarf Juniper and eventually disappeared. By the time we realized that we had lost the main trail and that fighting through the thick brush and trees really sucked, we decided it was too late to go back. Instead, we fought our way as straight up as possible, knowing we would get above tree line soon. We ended up literally crawling through the junipers on our hands and knees, with the trees scraping our backs and getting stuck in our hair and clothing. Finally we made it above tree line and saw what we had to hike through next; shin deep mud and wobbly swamp tussocks. It looked wonderful, compared to the trees we had just struggled through. We saw two bull moose, but no bears, although we saw plenty of bear scat. So much excitement for a little evening jaunt! A few hours later, we were back in our little straw bale and log cabin with a fire in the wood stove.



A young bull moose stops grazing to check us out.



Looking back at Williwaw lakes after we drop down from Little O'Malley ridge and the Ball Field and head out through the valley, where we ended up just a bit off track.



Tim works on a bit of Alaska rock