Eureka!

I have truly found it...the perfect Alaska town, Hyder!  Pop. 100 during the summer, it dubs itself "Alaska's friendliest ghost town."  (As most mining towns, they empty when the mineral is vamoose.)  The remaining locals are so welcoming and open about their lives: comparable only to Key West in my book.  Didn't want to leave! 

In addition to outstanding humans, grizzlies abound when the Coho Salmon are running, which is NOW.  I got to see one up close and personal.  AWESOME. 

New photos, click here!

Youtube video of Miss Grizzly, click here!

So much more to explore, so little time...

Chicken, AK and Dawson City, Yukon are soooooooo fun!  I'm going back to Dawson some day.  With loved ones would be just
greaaaate - that's the kind of place it is.  I bonded with the locals at night (of course!), but daytime companionship was wanted to truly enjoy all there is to offer here.  I thought eleven days would be pleeeeeenty of time to leisurely make my way down to Vancouver from Anchorage.  HA!  Well, I think I'm about 1/4 of the way there, with 4.5 days' travel left.  You do the math.  ;) 

I'm in Yukon Territory for the last few momentos, then puttering slowly (but for many hours) on down the Stewart-Cassiar Highway with a little detour to Hyder, Alaska (just can't get enough of that place!).  And, get this!  Hyder is the one location in the US where you don't need a passport to cross the border!

YAAAAY for ADVENTURES!!!!

Click here for new photos!

Home Bound!

Had a wonderful time with the family in Anchorage this past week.   Grandpa O.K. Smith came up from Corpus Christi, Texas; Dad from St. Paul, MN.  Each day we discovered one or more of the many buildings Grandpa helped to build and the homes in which they lived.  Stories, stories, and more stories!  Truly awesome. 
Link to photos.

Now, I'm home bound: looking forward to meeting bro Dan in Vancouver.  Funny: I woke up with Willie Nelson's "On the Road Again" song in my head the day I left Anchorage...it stuck there all morning! Two days into the return journey now, exploring some new territory in the Wrangell-St. Elias National Park.  Really, really, really spectacular scenery absorbed and new friends made!
Link to photos.

I'm missing y'alls...looking forward to coming home!

I feel pressured to update this blog (my own doing).  No more!  I am missing out on opportunities to interact with locals, when I sit in a WiFi hotspot to upload photos and narrations in this wonderful historic Gakona Lodge and Trading Post.  Blah blah blah, is what I think when contemplating what to write next. 

New photos and map updates, though! Links to the left.

And, I am 200 miles from the final destination of Anchorage, AK.  Relaxing, preparing for a solo rafting voyage on the Gulkana River in the morn.  Then, family reunion tomorrow eve! 

Going to mix with the locals...bye bye!

Magnificent Geology and History Out West

If each picture is worth a thousand words, then I'll save having to write 180,000 words about the past glorious week!  Link to this leg of the journey, plus captions:  click here (the links are permanently on the main blog page, too).

I would like to share a Devil's Tower legend of the Kiowa natives:  "Eight children were at play,
seven sisters and their brother.  Suddenly the boy was struck dumb; he trembled and began to run upon his hands and feet.  His fingers became claws, and his body was covered with fur. Directly there was a bear where the boy had been. The sisters were terrified; they ran, and the bear after them. They came to the stump of a great tree, and the tree spoke to them. It bade them climb upon it, and as they did so it began to rise into the air. The bear came to kill them, but they were just beyond its reach. It reared against the tree and scored the bark all around with its claws. The seven sisters were borne into the sky, and they became the stars of the Big Dipper."

I like that story a tad bit more than the geological one. 50 million years ago, magma solidified under the ground.  Since then, and the landscape around it has eroded.  See what I mean?