A few weeks ago, I went up to the town of Kenai to drop a friend off at the little airport. Kenai is at the mouth of the Kenai River, on Cook Inlet. There are endless sandy beaches there, so I took a walk. I was accompanied by a black lab named Chuck, who I was dog-sitting.
When it’s clear, you can see 10,000 foot volcanoes across the inlet. I couldn’t see them, though. Here’s what one of them (Mt Iliamna) looked like last spring:
A braided river has a wide riverbed with lots of small channels between islands and gravel bars. The Matanuska River, the big river in Palmer, is a prime example. The best thing about these rivers is that they’re great for exploring. You can hop (or wade, if you’re brave– the water is icy cold) between the gravel bars. There are alder thickets, areas with small plants, areas with no plants, mud to play in, and rocks to smash.
During the evening after the Icefest, I had the chance to explore gravel bars on the Matanuska River. The Matanuska flows out of the Matanuska Glacier (who’d have guessed), so I was close to the headwaters. During the summer, the river is gray and chalky due to all the silt and runoff from the glacier. But in October, the river became a clear blue-green color, because the glacier wasn’t melting any more.
The Matanuska’s water level changes a lot, because it is fed by glacial melt and by snowmelt via the tributaries. If there’s a lot of melting, the water goes up.
Matanuska River and Matanuska Glacier
Bear tracks by the Matanuska River
Dryas seedheads. Dryas flowers grow on the gravel bars. The seed heads remind me of Albert Einstein.
Dryas closeup.
Fun times on the river bars. This is by the Knik River, in June 2012.
In September, my friend Maggie and I went to an Icefest, a weekend-long ice climbing class on the Matanuska Glacier put on by the Mountaineering Club of Alaska. Prior to that, I had been ice climbing twice. Once was with the Hampshire College outdoor program. We went to a roadcut overlooking the Deerfield River in February. I kicked myself in the shin with my crampon and spent more time watching the crazy drysuit clad kayakers on the river below than climbing. The second time was on the summer solstice this year. My friend Jason and I kayaked across Mendenhall Lake (hazards include icebergs, arctic terns, and park rangers that won’t let you eat sandwiches in the parking lot) and spent the day climbing on the Mendenhall Glacier. That was a lot more fun, and I was eager to try more.
Maggie picked me up after work on Friday night. We drove out to the glacier and pitched our tent in the group camping area. Saturday morning, we woke up, had a big breakfast, put on every layer we had, and headed to the staging area in front of the glacier.
Matanuska River and Chugach Mountains from the Glenn Highway near Chickaloon, on the way to the glacier
There were about 150 people at the festival. We were split into groups of 10-15 students. My group had 14 people. We had all been climbing once or twice before. We had 3 instructors on Saturday, and then 4 on Sunday. Everyone in the group was very friendly and eager to learn. As we walked onto the glacier, I got to know a wildlife biologist who studies walruses, a man from Finland, a dentist, a couple originally from Montreal, and a man from Wasilla (on Sunday, he told me that instead of camping he had driven home for the night and taken a bath). The group was evenly split between men and women, which was cool.
Walking on the glacier
We started by learning to walk in crampons on steep slopes. This is tricky because you have to be sure that all the points of the crampons are sticking into the ice. My tendency was to sidestep, which is no good because you don’t get a good grip.
Once we could walk around safely, the instructors led us to an icewall on the glacier. They set up three ropes, and we were able to climb to our hearts content. This was fantastic. I definitely felt like I was able to improve, because the instructors gave lots of comments and critiques, and because the amount of time I spent climbing let me practice what they suggested.
ready to climb
Tying into the rope with a figure 8 follow-through knot
All ready to climb
Climbing. I shouldn’t stick my butt out so far– it’s better to keep your weight over your feet
at the top!
Oodles of people on the glacier
People on the toe of the glacier. This area has so much mud and gravel on the surface that it’s hard to tell that you’re walking on ice
The second day was similar to the first, except that we climbed in a higher area with longer climbs. That was much more challenging. It’s tempting to use your arms to pull up all your weight, because the ice axes feel like they have a stronger grip into the ice than your crampons. But when I did that, I turned into a noodle halfway up the climb. So I had to work on getting good footholds and kicking my feet into the ice really well.
Base camp on the second day. Higher and steeper
migrating swans
climbing
September on the farm was all about harvesting. In addition to the regular harvests (Wednesday CSA harvest and the crazy Fridays where we worked until 8:00 at night to harvest all the veggies and load the truck for the Saturday farmer’s market), we had to pull all the root crops. The whole crew worked on the carrots, potatoes, and beets. At first, we only picked the largest, so that the rest could continue to grow. But as the season got later and we started to have frosts, we pulled everything. There were other root crops that ended up being mainly my job (though other people helped a lot): rutabagas, purple top turnips, and daikons. Some of the daikons were as long as my arm. The rutabagas were really hard to clean, because dirt would get stuck in their roots and they were too big for the root washer. So it was determined that the best way to clean them was with the pressure washer. So, I pressure washed every single rutabaga on the farm!
Weeding the greens mix
Harvesting potatoes. First, the soil is loosened. Then we scoot along the rows and dig the potatoes out of the dirt. It’s like a treasure hunt. We grow several different potato varieties in several different colors: yukon gold and yellow fin are yellow. Russet has red skin. Myrnas are yellow with red polka dots. Huckleberries are purple, as are Magic Mollies.
Kabocha squash curing in the greenhouse. We cleared out the tomatoes and peppers in the second week of October. After we removed the plants, we had to scour the beds for as much detritus as possible, so that it wouldn’t provide shelter for overwintering pests.
empty carrot beds
Pioneer peak and the farm truck and lots of full buckets of potatoes. There weren’t many potatoes this year as compared to other years because June and July were very dry and the potato field isn’t irrigated. Next year they plan to have a water truck.
A few weeks ago, my friend Darby and I drove to Anchorage to go mountain biking. Anchorage definitely feels like a big city, but they have a lot of great parks. We went to Kinkaid, which is a lot of forest, mountain biking trails, and ski trails by Cook Inlet.
Knik River Bridge on the Old Glen Highway as we drove into Anchorage.
We set off to find the trails that were specifically for mountain bikes, with lots of turns and places where really cool people do jumps. Instead, we found the Moose Vortex.
We were on a narrow trail. Darby in the lead, and me a few turns behind, focused on the bumpy trail and trying to keep up. Darby stopped suddenly. “We have to turn around. The biggest bull moose I’ve ever seen is up ahead.” I resisted the urge to take a look, and we quickly turned around and pushed our bikes back up the trail.
We headed in a different direction, on a different trail. Guess who we saw?
This happened maybe about four times. The last time, we felt confident that he didn’t care about us, and we walked close enough to take some pictures.
Here he is! I wanted to pet his nose.
After a few hours of searching (and a picnic), we got some tips from another mountain biker and found the mountain biking trails. They have names like “Middle Earth,” and lots of jumps and embankments. I went very slowly, but Darby was more fearless.
I made Darby go ahead so I could take pictures.
Matanuska Peak
Devil’s Club on the Mat Peak trail
Point Mackenzie is a vortex. Investors (mostly the Matanuska-Susitna Borough) have poured money into all kinds of huge projects into this spot on the southwest tip of the Knik Arm (here’s a map). These include:
–building dairy farms in the 1980s. The state spent about $20 million to clear land and put in power for 31 dairy and hay farms. Most failed immediately.
–building a commuter bridge to Anchorage
–Operating a ferry service to Anchorage. The borough owns a $78 million dollar ferry, but doesn’t have the money to store or operate it. They also don’t have anywhere to put it, so it’s in Ketchikan. They built a big ferry terminal, though. Interestingly, they are simultaneously pushing both the bridge and the ferry.
-building a prison
-building a rail extension
So my friends Kaija and Darby and I decided to go on safari and investigate the situation. We filled Kaija’s car with picture books and, armed with a timeline of borough improvements to the area (which conveniently included each improvement’s cost), we set out to explore.
It rained on and off
The end of the road
Point Mackenzie Reading List:
glaciers to gumboots 