My first winter in Alaska (so far)

This place fuels my addiction to adventure. There are so many trips to go do, both small and big. The long nights are quickly turning into shorter ones (it isn't even dark out as I'm writing this after work!) There was a time there when we only got about 4 hours of daylight, and the sun doesn't get very high in the sky, but because Resurrection Bay is oriented almost perfectly North-South the sun sweeps across the mouth of the bay and gives us our much needed dose of light. The snow hasn't been as intense as I was expecting, but it sure is icy. I fall down on almost every adventure, and often when walking to and from work. I know how to fall though so I havent had any injuries yet, just a few really impressive bruises. 

I am dying to get some turns in on my snowboard, but there is just not enough snow up on the mountains (it keeps being blown down by the winds.) But I did recently acquire some cross country skis - this is where I do most of my falling. I also have a pair of snowshoes now that got a little taste of powder, and have since been deprived of that delicious fluff. The snow has been very fickle and turns to ultra heavy slush the instant it warms up. I have discovered the joys of running around on frozen lakes, sliding, falling, snow angels, and hookie bobbing. Often if you're really quiet you can hear the 4-foot thick ice crack, heave and settle. When huge ice slabs shift under your feet it really reminds you how powerful nature is. I have some great adventure buddies here and my roommate who had only seen snow a handfull of times before coming to Alaska has adapted so well and is game for any adventure we can cook up.

I have taken most of my photos on my film camera and so I have no prints to show yet, but I have a few digital photos from recently to show. Most are from my phone so please forgive the poor quality.

The view from Lost Lake Trail. Seward is on the right side of the bay shrouded in clouds.

Mountains from the lost lake trail

Expedition across Engineer Lake. We went to a cabin for the night for  a birthday party!

Grayling lake all frozen over

Octopus love

Urchins in the touch tank

Surface Hoar at Leech Lake

More Hoar

Cutting down Christmas trees!!

Trying to XC ski, but there was not a whole lot of snow... just ice

The sunrise from work

OH! Also I finished my Bachelors of Science degree in Environmental Science with a concentration in Marine Ecology. Boom. This is kind of a big deal because I had to take my last course as an independent study from Seward, while also working a full time job, and adjusting to a new life here. SO, now school is done and I have a full time job (for the time being) and I'm so relieved to not have school to cloud my mind. Its official, I graduated!!

Back in Alaska

Well I made it to Seward, again! For those that may not know I was offered a job at the Alaska SeaLife Center working in the Aquariums department doing sort of what my internship was this summer. And I took the job!! So I am now an Aquarist I (entry level aquarist) I'm so pumped. Who'd have thought that I would have a real job so soon? I was fully planning on doing the post-college flail for at least a few months.

The work will be extra hard for a while because Seward had some huge flooding a couple of weeks ago so the center has some serious cleaning up to do but I have full confidence that the tanks and animals will be in top shape very soon, but it will take a lot of very hard work to get there. On top of a full time job I still have to finish school, which includes a big research paper on a restoration project, and also a big paper about my internship this summer. So after about 3 months of writing and researching and working I will have a college degree and a real job. Life seems to be falling into place just nicely.

I will be up here for a year and I wanted my car here so I can get out of town when it gets too small, so I convinced one of my best buds to drive up to Alaska with me. The ultimate road trip!! I left form Seattle on the 29th of September and picked her up from Surrey, BC on the 30th and the driving began.  We drove about 400 miles a day, sometimes more and camped our way up through BC, Yukon, and Alaska. After 8 days of driving, 2,831 miles, seemingly infinite stops for gas, two border crossings, tons of wildlife, a broken tent, sun, rain, snow and hotsprings we arrived in Seward on a beautiful sunny evening. It couldn't have gone more smoothly my car is still in one piece and I start work on Monday.

I shot film for the whole trip cause my digital camera was out of batteries and we had no way to charge it in the northern interior of BC/Yukon, so I dont have a lot of photos but here are some from the last bit of the summer internship and one or two from the trip up here. Enjoy!

Resurrection bay from Mt. Alice

Quatro the Giant Pacific Octopus

Oh and yes, I got to hang out with the baby walrus calves, they love to snuggle and are so adorable I can hardly stand it.

Wally #2 Mitik

Nap Time

Feeding Time

Devious... 

Beautiful sunrise at Nancy Lake

I caught a big one!

Bison on the side of the road

Getting a couple of casts in at sunset... no bites

We Made it to Seward!!

Junior Aquarist

I am finally updating you all. Its been a month...or two, but I've been a busy lady. I'm getting the hang of things for sure, and I am now responsible for my own areas of the aquarium. I have two exhibits, and two holding areas that are 'mine.' This means that they are on my schedule with maintenance and feeding, and I can make changes if I want, although to change anything I have to get approval first. This is such a sweet job, it definitely satisfies my nerd side, but it is also a really good lesson in planning, organization, and aesthetics. One of the Aquarists likes to joke that I've been bumped up to a "Junior Aquarist" position... akin to a Junior Ranger. And once I broke my intern badge he stealthily had a new one made for me with my title being "Junior Aquarist" - what a butt head. BUT its all in good fun and we had a good chuckle over it.  

Also I can fillet herring like a boss. 

a photo for starters

I have been giving Octopus Encounters almost every day that I work, and they don't seem to get any less fun the more I do them. I get to take people to our octo holding area, and teach them all about Giant Pacific Octopus, and then we get to feed one of the octos and the people get to interact with them. I often get the question "What do the octopus suckers feel like on your skin?" And really I never have a good answer, its hard to describe but it is such an awesome feeling. Whenever I'm having a bad day, getting to interact with one of our lovely octos always cheers me up. 

The Center also has two walrus claves right now. One is doing really well and the other is a messed up little animal and is more of a day-to-day struggle. But they are both as cute as can be, and ever so dapper. Baby walrus' need 24hr care and frequent feeding, they need to be snuggled with ans scratched and petted, so the rehab department really has there hands full with these two little guys. I might be helping them out a few days a week to take some pressure off of the people who have been working insane hours, but we'll see if my schedule fits theirs. If I do get to help take care of/cuddle a walrus I'll let you know.

A long time ago there was this thing called Fourth of July. Up here that's a pretty big deal, the number of people in town doubles in size. Everyone flocks here for the big race called Mt. Marathon. Its a race up this insane hike that is only 3.1 miles long but goes from sea level to 3022 ft. The top finishers are usually olympic skiers. This year the women's winner was a young gal who skis on the US Ski Team, not sure which event but regardless, she was fast! And very happy too.

A very happy 1st place Mt. Marathon finisher

Also, Gumby ran the race

We've been having lots of adventures, tons of hiking just outside of town, Tonsina Creek, Harding Ice Field, Lost Lake etc. So many pretty places.

Chum salmon spawning at Tonsina

The bridge at Tonsina

Get Stoked!

Cool mushroom on Lost Lake trail

The view from the small cabin half way to Lost Lake

Tree ladder by the cabin

Harding Ice Field

More Harding Ice field

My roommates and I also went out to homer for the weekend, Its a really cool place on the other side of the Kenai peninsula with a lot of really good food, and beautiful views. It was great to get out and go camping for a bit, and to get out of Seward, its great here but a change is always welcome.

First pretty stop on the way to Homer 

Sunset over Kachemak Bay

Camping on The Spit

Beautiful Beach

My roommates and I got to go on a boat tour to Kenai Fijords National Park and we saw so much wildlife, orcas, humpback whales, sea otters, steller's sea lions, tons of harbor seals relaxing on the ice chunks, dall's porpoise, and tons of sea birds. It was a nice sunny day with some thick fog outside of the bay. We went all the way out to Northwestern glacier which is one that doesn't get a lot of trips, it was awesome, and huge and it was calving a lot which makes a huge crashing noise and a big splash. What a lovely day out on the water. 

Islands in the fog

Orcas, they lead us out to Northwestern Glacier

A part of Northwestern

Glacial ice chunks


Until next time! Hopefully that will be soon...

Quite A Salty Workplace

Romper-Stomping!

What an adjustment. I had a day to sorta settle in and then it was off to orientation the next day and then - real job (minus the paycheck) from there on out.  I work a 40 hour week and I'm running around all day. My hands are in saltwater more than they are out, and I'm just covered in it by the end of the day. For those who know me, this is fitting. It's a super active job and I am learning so much. I think my biggest hurdle is that I have three different people teaching me the same thing and they all have their certain way of doing it. But really the method doesn't matter so much as that it gets done, so I am sort of making a patchwork of all the ways to do stuff and patching it all together to get my routine down. I've made a few mistakes, but who doesn't? All the aquarists and the supervisor have been really cool about it, and I'm learning from them, which definitely good. 

The best way to describe what I do here is to imagine taking care of a home aquarium. You know all of the fish in there, you feed them, clean the tanks, keep tabs on how they're behaving, if they're sick you take care of them, if one fish is bullying another you separate them. Well its like that only way bigger, with a lot more tanks, and a lot more fish and invertebrates. What I don't think I really knew about aquariums before this is that there are a huge amount of critters that aren't on display, we have 7 octopus in total and only 2 of them are on exhibit right now. There are countless tanks behind the scenes and more critters than I know what to do with. We all work as a team to keep the whole place working. There is so much to do every day, and we never get the whole list done in one day, but because the smart people who really run the place have it all figured out it is okay is we dont get it done all at once. Things stay stable, and we work through any issues that come up. These people really know the place, they know the plumbing and the water and the behaviors of all the fish. Their job is a hard one and they do it well. I am learning so much and am slowly gaining trust.

As you can imagine I am already behind on my photo a day attempt but here they are:

19.6.2012

20.6.2012

21.6.2012

22.6.2012

23.6.2012

24.6.2012

25.6.2012

26.6.2012

Extra

Extra

 Well there it is. I'll do some more adventuring and get back to you!

PS. As an update the baby beluga is doing well, it is sort of bottle feeding, but he is a very messy eater. (yep that's Jeff Corwin)