Posts tagged #Life in Alaska

In The Rearview Mirror pt.2

 

Flashback Friday

    In regular fashion Alaska showed it's rollercoaster climate in 2016. We went with no snow, yes NO NEW SNOW from late December to March, a whole 105 days, until we received 4 inches early April, that of course disappeared by the end of the day. The 2015/2016 winter season was pretty mild, because we didn't really dip down to -40 that regularly, we stayed around -4 to -22 F (-20 to -30 C), which was welcoming. I think I was kind of done with cold winters in Alaska by this point, even though I miss it so bad now. 

April

    I received my green card, which actually went pretty fast! Life went on at the cabin, water chores, wood chopping but no shoveling...Just kidding, then we got snow, but it melted pretty quickly! I went out to into the field with the mega super large truck, that literally probably is twice my size. Ice was still on the rivers, thick ice. April also mean longer days. In the wintertime you loose up to 7 minutes a day, so come spring that is what you gain, every day. By April 22 you could see the sunset after 9.30 pm, and it would still be light out at 10pm at the end of the month. As always April turns into a wet and muddy ordeal as snowmelt starts, once you get passed the cold temperatures and new snow that is. We experienced the earliest bud burst in history, a whole week before the usual green-up. April also brought the first mosquitos...

 
 

May

    All of a sudden May had arrived, with a record breaking pollen outburst. Rain showers mixed with pollenshowers. A friend of mine and I decided to go to Denali for one last hurrah before both of us moved out of the state. This was also the first time I went biking in Denali without running into a bear, the only animal we saw was the distinct ptarmigan. Had my last day in the field and at the end of May W arrived, and I packed the red Subi and life went on, and on for 4157 miles...6690 km. We drove through Alaska, then Canada, and Canada and Canada. The journey through Canada was the longest, we drove about 1962 miles (3157 km) give or take, through Canada. From Bozeman we drove via Yellowstone and Cody all the way to Madison, a journey about 1360 miles (2189 km). Through Canada we camped until we approached the Canada/American border. I had a sandwich we made from our own stuff, with turkey on it in Banff, that had gone bad and got food poisoning by the time we passed Calgary, thank god we had already decided to stay at a motel that night. Then on to Bozeman and Yellowstone for some fieldwork before our journey continued.

 
 

June

    June 1st was our last day on the road and we finally landed in Madison by the evening, after 12 days on the road. One of the first things we did was to buy an air conditioner, which is how I survived all summer. Madison is so far south, it is actually on the same latitude as southern France so it gets very hot in the summertime, too hot for me, and for long haired cats. Everything is so green and lush in Wisconsin, and I went to the Botanical gardens on one of the hottest days. One day we were driving back from some errands and discovered one of the bike races in Madison, namely a naked bike race, looks extremely dangerous if you ask me. W went back to Yellowstone for more fieldwork and I explored Madison. I also received the very last package from mom around this time, didn't know back then that it would be the last one I would get from her. 

 
Posted on January 13, 2017 by Ann Rumbleinthearctic and filed under The great wide open, Flashback Friday, Rearview Mirror and tagged Alaska Alcan Canada Canadaland Wisconsin Yellowstone National Park Yellowstone Montana Home New Home roadtrip road trip fieldseason utlandssvensk utlandsboende Denali Denali National Park Spring pollen Budburst National Park rearviewmirror2016 2017 Summer Adventures Spring Adventures Fieldwork rearviewmirror Life in Alaska.

In The Rearview Mirror pt.1

 

Flashback Friday

First Quarter of 2016

    2016 went by so fast, but oh so slow. It is hard to find the balance between work, free time and also research time, at least for me. This year we decided that I should move from Alaska to Wisconsin, which meant I had a ton of things I needed to finish, ASAP. But I did and I moved. The first half of this year I spent in Alaska, the second half in Wisconsin, well, I guess technically 5 vs 7 months, but who counts?

January

    I went back from christmas celebration in Bozeman already in December and celebrated the new year with Tycho in my little cabin in the woods. On new years day Tycho got sick, and I still don't know what happened but he's alright now! January had lots of Aurora of course, as always. I skied some and also tried out fatbiking for the very first time. Other than skiing, biking and hanging out in the cabin by the wood stove I of course worked on my own research to wrap things up.

 
 

February

    More winterbiking, more aurora and more of hanging out at the cabin. Winters in Alaska can be rough but they are absolutely stunningly beautiful, and cold. I also went and saw the start of the Yukon Quest again, had more fika, and even a beer or two!

 
 

March

    Finally March arrived and our Green Card Interview! W came to Alaska and we went down to Anchorage for the interview, with a pitstop in Talkeetna for a skirace and also to Homer for a short weekend adventure. These interviews are somewhat ridiculous but absolutely serious. Like when the guard to get into the building asks W if he has a hand-grenade or anything alike on him. Situations like that just makes me want to make a joke and say "ooh gee, I do have one in my back pocket", since you aren't allowed to bring any bags or almost anything into the meeting. On the way back we got a text saying that they started the production of the card! 

 
Posted on January 6, 2017 by Ann Rumbleinthearctic and filed under Flashback Friday, Rearview Mirror and tagged Alaska Green Card Wisconsin move utlandssvensk Cabin Life_ fatbiking winterbiking Winter Adventures Tycho_the_earless_cat Tycho Alaska range Skiing Aurora Borealis Aurora Norrsken Northern Lights Cabin Dry Cabin fika Snow Deep Forest Winter Winter travels Talkeetna Ski race Ski Oosik Winter camping Homer Yukon Quest Mountains rearviewmirror2016 2017 rearviewmirror Life in Alaska.

Winter travels and the White Mountains part. 2

 

Flashback Friday

Winter Travels and Cabins

    Last year in late November W came to visit in Alaska and we went on a 3 day skitrip through the White Mountains. The White Mountains is about 1-2 hr drive from Fairbanks, and of course there was a snowstorm the morning of day one, of our adventure, but we still drove towards the White Mountains. I wrote a little text about part one here. We only did a small part of all the trails that are available. There is at least 100 miles of fairly untouched wilderness out there with cabins along the way. 

 
 

  Into the Wild ? 

    When you go into the backcountry in Alaska, well I would argue anywhere I suppose, you have to be prepared for anything. A big difference though between Alaska and most other places is that there is no cell reception (most of the time) when you go out into the backcountry, or very spotty. Even driving on the highway you can loose reception for big chunks of the time. There are a few trail shelters in the White Mountains that are first come first serve, but as the name implies it is only a trail shelter. The cabins have to be reserved online ahead of time, and they are all dry cabins of course. So getting water mean that you have to melt snow.

 
 

Cold Car    

    Our biggest concern during this trip was that my Subi wouldn't start when we got back to the car after two nights out, after all we had pretty cold weather during the night (around -5 F, -20C, or so could have been lower) and there was of course no plug in at the trailhead.  

 
 

Cabinlife

    We managed to get the cabin closest to the trailhead rented for the first night. It's a short ski (7 miles, about 11 km), and when we arrived the cabin was still warm from the previous visitors. These cabins are more like a shell, not too much insulation but a working wood stove and a place to sleep. You have to make sure that there is enough dry firewood when you leave so the next person can quickly start a fire when they arrive. Most of the time there are a lot of wood in the wood shed, but other times you have to get out and find some dead trees, saw some wood up and bring back to the cabin where you can split the wood. Most trees are black spruce so they are very thin and don't really supply that much mass, but they burn well. And you can't just go and chop down any tree, you have to find a tree that has fallen over and is dead. 

 
 

Firewood    

    A lot of times when snowmachiners are out they will have a chainsaw and prepare lots of wood, or even leave wood that they bring in from outside. It's incredible how much wood you sometimes go through if the night is cold and the cabin isn't that well insulated. 

 
 

Togetherness    

    Actually, you can fit quite a lot of people in these cabins too so a lot of people tend to do large trips with a bunch of friends. A lot of people also celebrate thanksgiving out at these cabins, but mostly they have at least one person who has a snowmachine, or they have dogs so they can skijour or pull sleds. 

 
 

Guest Log  

    Once at the cabin there are guest logs, which is awesome. It's great to read about other peoples adventures and what they saw and how the conditions were. We, of course, also left a little blurb there. 

 
 

Snowstorm    

    During the evening a snowstorm came in and it was very very windy. The next day we woke up to cloudy conditions and about 17 inches (45 cm) of fresh snow in some places...made for an interesting ski to the next cabin since not that many people are out there on a Sunday...more about that next time I write about the winter travels in the White Mountains. 

 
 

    Do you have any winter adventures to cabins like this one to share? What do you do for fun during the wintertime?

 
Posted on November 4, 2016 by Ann Rumbleinthearctic and filed under Flashback Friday, Alaska, The great wide open, Cabin Life and tagged Alaska 2016_2 White Mountains Winter Adventures cross country Skiing skitrail Dry Cabin Winter travels snowy cabin snowstorm snowmobile snowday Cabin Life_ Snow Mountains Winter travels and the white mountains Wintertime Wintertravels Life in Alaska 2016.