Thursday, January 29, 2009

Lately...



Kat and I have been bumming around the state of Washington lately.  We recently made a trip to my parents house in Oroville and then went down to see my Grandpa in Kennewick.  We took the train from Seattle to Wenatchee and my dad picked us up from there.  Taking the train is a nice way to travel!  I highly recommend it.  You get comfortable seats, a great view, and you can walk around as much as you want.  

We also went on a great overnight trip in the Commonwealth Basin.  We only made it halfway up Red Mt, but the views were great!  I'm really going to miss the snow in Aussie so I'm glad I made it out there with some good friends.

Now we're getting packed to fly again.  Only this time we're taking a LOT more luggage!  I'm bringing my bike so I have the fun chore of boxing it up.  To complicate the matter I took a ride around Lake Washington yesterday without fenders.  There's a thick coat of Seattle grime covering EVERYTHING!

This is a view from my folks place in Oroville.  The lake is still very much frozen over!


Chris took this shot on Red Mt.  That's Kendall Peak on the left and Rainier in the distance.  That day it was 50F in the sun but less than 25F in those lower clouds!

Family time!  Me, Kat, John (dad), Smitty (grandpa), Jess (sis), Lorrie (mom)

Saturday, January 17, 2009

PICTURES!!! -- fixed

It took some time but I finally did it.  Between Kat and I we had a total of 7,748 pictures and videos.  I'm serious!  But I waded through them and picked out what I hope is a good representation of what we saw during our three months of travelling.  Please enjoy and if you're curious about something in particular I'm sure I have more pictures of it!

The links may not have been working for everyone before but I think they should be accessible by all now.  Please let me know if the links below are still not working!

Monday, January 12, 2009

Fun in Fairbanks!

Jeremiah decided to come visit me and my family while I was up north, and we had some wonderful winterland adventures. Well, actually, the whole time he was up here the temperature hovered between a balmy -40 and -50 degrees F, so we really couldn't do much of anything. The thing is, Alaskans are used to operating in cold temperatures, but for most of the winter "cold" means about -25. When temperatures hit the negative 50s things tend to shut down in a big way- mostly because cars literally get frozen to the ground. So, we had a lot of great family bonding time (in a house with 1 bathroom and 6 people) and took some excellent cold weather pictures. Alaskan winters really are beautiful, when the air gets this cold everything become crystal clear and sharp, and if you can get above the ice fog (created when the air layers condense due to the cold weather and all the car and people exhaust gets trapped, creating an intensly dense fog in low laying areas) the views are stunning.

We went for a short walk in Creamer's Field, a wildlife refuge right behind my house. At this time of year the wildlife consists of moose, foxes, hares, chickadees, and sled dogs. Sadly, we only saw the tracks of all of these animals, but it was fun to get out and enjoy the short-lived Alaskan sunshine.

As the weather got colder and stayed colder I monitored the progress of the ice growing on our hall window, and on my last day there it had almost consumed the whole glass. The temperature in our hallway hovered just below freezing, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised... :) My sisters and I made the mistake of storing beer in the hallway (Alaskan Amber of course!) and on the second day when I opened one the whole thing exploded, and almost all of the beers were frozen solid. Whoops.

We did see a moose from the roadside, and after driving up into the hills we were able to see a beautiful aurora. My family also celebrated a belated Thanksgiving because, except for my parents, none of us were together for the holiday. With some help from my sisters I created a Thanksgiving feast.

We are now members of the 40 Below Club!!!