ACTUALLY SUNDAY, AUGUST 7

HOW TO DEODORIZE A HORSEBLANKET

While we were doing laundry a week or more ago, the woman who ran the laundromat taught us how to deodorize a horse blanket. She'd worked that laundromat for something like eight years and was highly conversant in the art of cleaning fabrics.  Her default position on many of the most difficult problems was this: vinegar and Oxi-clean. Works even on horse blankets, many of which she has cleaned, de-smelled, and personally hand-delivered to many a satisfied customer. The key is in the proportions, and here's her formula:  one teaspoon of Oxy per quarter cup of vinegar, in a load of wash. To JUST DEODORIZE, add the Oxy and vinegar to enough water to fill a common spray bottle, then spray it, then air it.

Try this on yer next smelly horse blanket. We think you'll be pleased. Incidentally, that laundromat lady gives lessons every Saturday afternoon. 

It's been raining nearly nonstop for several days now.  So we spent Saturday night at the glamorous Mooseberry Inn, near Willow, which is near Wasilla, which is near Anchorage.  The Mooseberry was tricky to find. We got the reservation via Expedia, but kept losing the cellular connection to write down the address or phone number. Drove up and down through Willow several times, thinking it had to be within sight, as virtually all motels are, of the main highway ( and Willow is TINY).

Anyway, long story short, we finally found a spot with cellular reception, got the address (Buckingham Palace Road, not lying), and phone number. Called the motel, got directions.  Still couldn't find it because it turned out to be a bed and breakfast place inside a regular looking house.  

The room was fine, and the hostess, one Maggie with a thick German accent, was most hospitable and did whip us up a four -star brekky. Strawberry yogurt, spinach and bacon omelette, pancakes, orange juice, coffee, tea, and Maggie's life story were all presented in generous portions. 

Maggie still goes back to Germany annually to see her "mudder," as she pronounces it.  Owns three different B & Bs  in Alaska, all several hundred miles from each other. Two. Grown kids, a grandchild or two, and a husband who is an "all-around handyman" currently supervising "above ground " operations at a gold mine somewhere.

Also fished for a half hour or so that evening, at a nearby pond. Caught nothing.

Denial in Denali

ACTUALLY THURSDAY, AUG 4

DENIAL IN DENALI

These Alaskans can't let go of their "biggest this, biggest that" obsession. They're almost as bad as Texans, though not nearly as obnoxious. Not satisfied with being the biggest state, having the highest peak, and so forth, they had to create the World's Largest City besides.  Not in terms of population, of course, but acreage.  The CITY of Sitka, in Southeast Alaska, is 2,873.3 square MILES. 

We went to the famous Denali National Park today, but didn't see much of it.  Everything was fogged in.  Also we arrived there too late to catch one of the shuttle buses that take you into the park and from which tHousands of tourists each year enjoy viewing Grizzlies, caribou, and moose. Fortunately for us, we had been on that little tour 29 years before, so we didn't mind missing it too much.

Did see one caribou while driving in on the short distance of road that autos are allowed on. And took a pleasant one-hour hike on the tundra along a river called the Savage.

We then drove down to Denali STATE park to get a campsite. Jim had determined, through vigorous and painstaking research, that this camping spot was right across the main road from the Denali NATIONAL park. He was only off by 90 miles. So it was pretty late by the time we got to the state park campsite. And also raining. So we set  up our little blue tent and heated up a pre-cooked chicken and rice dish, went to bed and heard raindrops thunk against the tent fly all night. 

BETTER HOMES IN GARDENS

And now let's pause for a moment of science.  Our readers who work  -- or have worked -- in the building trades may find this especially fascinating, if not humbling.  There's a little mammal up here called the Hoary Marmot, cousin of the more common Groundhog of weather prediction fame. 

Despite what it's name might suggest, Hoary Marmots are quite civilized. When they construct their homes, which are underground burrows, they always include a separate room which is basically a bathroom. When nature calls, they go in there to take care of business, thus keeping the main chamber, the living and dining area, clean and fresh.

A big danger In the blogging game is that you can get bogged down in tedious descriptions of meals and restaurants.  So we'll just say in that regard that we are conducting something of a survey of clam or fish chowders in the region.  Had a great one last night at an upscale (for Fairbanks) eatery called the Chena Alaskan Grill.

The rivers up here are swollen silly from all the rain. This is Jim's excuse for catching no fish so far in a place where it's not easy to not catch fish. I did catch one several days ago at a little stream on a private campground. It must have been upwards of three inches. Some kind of trout, but too small to tell exactly what kind.

More exciting fishing reports to follow so keep it right here.

Let sleeping bears lie

WED, AUG 3

As you know, it's legal to hunt bears in Alaska. 

But it's illegal to wake a sleeping bear to take its picture.

We're holed up in a Super 8 in Fairbanks after a longish and very wet hike to some more funny rock formations. This one was through some pretty wild feeling terrain, including some super-soggy tundra-like bog at first and then upwards through some wet young aspens whose wet leaves deposited water all over us as we brushed them aside.  Also, it was raining.  And yet, still fun in an adventurous, sick, demented kind of way.

Saw a lot of moose droppings along the trail, but, alas, no bears, sleeping or otherwise.

OMISSIONS AND ERRORS 

A few things we previously got wrong or forgot to mention:

-- Wrangell St Elias National Park is only six times bigger than Yellowstone, not ten.  To better picture this, that's roughly a third the size of New York or 40 percent of Illinois.  And about equal to the size of Spain.

A few things we left out before:

-- seen four moose thus far crossing roads.

--In Seattle, there's a tent city for homeless persons on the lawn of the county health services building.  There's a lot of tents, and they are all pretty new, so thre must be a public program to make them available.

Tutu Tootsie, Goodbye!

Tuesday, AUG 2

Hey, did you know Alaska is the most northern U.S. state?  Of course you did.  Everybody knows that.  

But you didn't know it's the farthest WEST and EAST, did ha?  Yep.  The state's Aleutian Chain of islands extends so far west that it crosses the International Dateline.  So it's as far as you can possibly be both east and west.

We're camped about 40 miles north and east of Fairbanks on a road that ends four miles from here.  Drizzled rain all night and raining hard now, at 5:30 pm.  Not too surprising, since they've had record rains here all spring and summer.  In fact, here were the two front page Headlines from yesterday's Fairbanks paper, The Miner:  

"Record Rain Continues to Drench Fairbanks"    And

"Mud Made up of Ancient Volcanic Ash blocks Denali Road"

It cleared up for most to the day though, so we enjoyed a cool little hike to some rocks overlooking the Chena River valley. A steep uphill haul but only a little less than two miles up, so  our aging bodies weren't abused too badly.

And Regina had a fashion epiphany.  There was an 18 month or so girl hiking on our trail, with (pretty obviously) her parents.  A really cute kid and avid young adventurer.  Her trekking ensemble included calf length rubber hiking boots and a pink and purple tutu.  So Regina is planning to hike in a tutu later this week, if one can be scrounged up.

ACTUALLY STILL SAT, JULY 31

If you're ever in Alaska, don't pick any water lilies or Lilly pads. It' against the law.  The reason: the Lilly pads are critical habitat for an unusual creature known as the Wood Frog. Which brings us to the famous baseball player, TedWilliams.  When Teddy Ballgame died, his son, you might recall, tried to have Ted, or maybe it was just Ted's head, frozen, with a view toward bringing Ted back in some distant future.

Well, the Wood Frog, which needs lily pads, actually freezes during the long Alaskan winter.  Then it more or less returns from the dead in the spring.  So we need these Wood Frogs if for no other reason than maybe we can unlock its cryogenic secrets and thus bring back Ted Williams, or at least his head.

Anyway, took two short hikes this morning after camping near the boundary of Wrangell-st. Elias NP.  First one gently downhill through fir forest on mossy trail to a bluff overlooking a glacier-fed river.  Scenic as always.

The second was to see some Mud Volcanoes.  The mud volcano site, when you first arrive, looks like a round, flat patch of mud about the size of a soccer field.  It contains, however, Little potholes filled with water, and the water constantly bubbles. The bubbles, it seems, are caused by escaping methane gas from a coal seam underneath.

After that, yet another scenic drive (yawn), north toward Fairbanks and directly through the middle of another massive mountain region, the Alaskan Range.  Camped at a state park site fifty miles  or so outside of Fairbanks. Enjoyed a delicious camp dinner of reheated pre-cooked ham, crackers, carrots and cocktails.

Actually July 31:

Today's amazing Alaska fun fact:  in Alaska, it's illegal to whisper in someone's ear while moose hunting.  

Hey, google it.

Anyway, yesterday afternoon (sat, July 30), we drove our rented Chevy Traverse LT from  Anchorage east and north to Wrangell-St. Elias National Park. It seems hard to imagine a more scenically spectacular drive.  Great waves of glaciated mountain ranges rolling off into the distance in all directions.

The above-mentioned national park was pretty incomprehensible too.  It's the largest of u.s. Parks, about ten times the acreage of Yellowstone.  The acreage of glaciers within it would cover Connecticut.  It has nine of the highest 16mountains in the u.s.  And so on. It is virtually roadless and trail less, and we didn't quite have the time or equipment or energy to venture very far into it. Even so, quite worth the drive.

Here's just one final amazing thing we learned at this park.  Millions of dead salmon carcasses lay around in the rivers, because they die after swimming sometimes hundreds of miles uphill to spawn. But the carcasses are GOOD for the rivers. Besides providing food for bears and others, their decaying bodies provide a lot of nutrients to the rivers, which would otherwise be pretty sterile.  These nutrients are ingested by tiny life forms, which are eaten by bigger life forms, etc. , including the salmon babies ("fry") .  A most interesting lesson in ecology.