May 19th
– May 25th 2014
Quiet and peaceful week. J. “enjoyed” 5 nights of work. On Monday
(described below) we came back from our trip to Denali and Fairbanks.
That same evening we met J.'s friend from work for dinner at popular
pizza/pub place. It was surprising (after I missed the hidden turn
and drove extra several miles) to see the place packed. We had to
wait about 30 minutes to get the table. It was nice and fun evening,
food was good as well. During the week there were some errands,
walks, school work, and reading. Very normal week. One morning,
driving from work, we saw moose just 12 week from the road. Somebody
told J. that real Alaskans consider seeing a moose like seeing a cow.
There are supposed to be plenty of moose in Anchorage but also we did
not see many (if any) cows. One of my walks was in Far North park and
it was nice one. After previous walks where I had troubles with
mosquitoes (they are bigger and more annoying here) I bought bug
repellent. Unfortunately I forgot to put it on my mostly bald head
and those damn mosquitoes used it as landing pad (very unpleasant). I
saw this bear warning sign in several places in the park, however,
the only animals I saw were dogs and mosquitoes.
The Far North park includes Campbell Landing Strip. There were some
information boards describing history (WWII) and current status. It
is not active strip but could be used in emergency. It is also
maintained (I would think there is enough active landing strips and
places for planes but …). For now there are miles and miles of
trails for all kinds of monkey business (skiing and dog mushing).
Real spring is here:
(As of now 5-26-2014) There is a wildfire in Arizona, between the
towns of Flagstaff and Sedona (Flagstaff was one of our assignments),
it is a place we drove through many times. This fire is well covered
in media. There are (at least) three fires in Alaska. One in the bush
(north of Fairbanks). One across the water (Knik Arm) – this one is
smaller one. And there is serious fire at Funny River in Kenai
Peninsula (it burned about 200 square miles so far). There were
already few days when we could smell the smoke and see it in
Anchorage. Apparently there are many wildfires in Alaska but this one
is a bit special because it is close to people and very early in the
season. It is hard to take a picture of the smoke but anyway:
