I am standing knee deep in soft wet snow wondering if this is what it is like to be truly lost. The wall of chest high brush surrounding this opening offers no easy way to freedom. Aki is not lost. She moves easily under the brush to follow trails of red squirrels and a deer that is probably near enough to see with a hunter’s eye. In a spruce tree thirty feet away a raven gives away the deer’s hiding place. He hopes to clean up the gut pile but I am not carrying a gun.

We aren’t really lost in this tangled triangle on the back side of Douglas Island. To my right the mainland mountains rise white above the forest. Ahead the waters of Stephen’s Passage crash on the beach. Still, it takes 49 minutes to reach the breakers. Looking toward Admiralty Island and a scene that could be painted in monochrome washes, I wonder why it doesn’t depress