What are these water bugs doing in this muskeg pond and why haven’t I ever noticed them before. There must be too much grandeur in this high mountain meadow; too many stars to draw away attention. Aki still ignores them.

Watching now, I wonder how they disturb the pond surface by scurrying off without destroying the water tension that keeps them afloat. They don’t move far, just a few feet toward pond center as if they know their limits?

I’ve thought of many things as this trail lead me from meadow to meadow to forest and this pond: the battle between grass and muskeg made possible by man’s disturbing presence; how the thick loads of maturing spruce cones have assumed the color of dead needles; whether this abundance is produced by heathy trees or dying ones throwing their last strength into one last toss of the evolutionary dice; how beautiful the blue berries look when flooded in morning light. It’s easier to deal with the water bugs, the apparent masters of their three square meters of universe.

Later in the day I fish for salmon in Favorite Passage. We troll for two hours and catch one cod fish but no salmon. Then a pod of Dall Porpoise surround our boat, each black and white muscular bullet half flying out of the water. They don’t break the surface, merely rise and don a inch thick coat of water before submerging to continue the hunt. While they surround us a silver takes the Captian’s herring and we land a fine male silver salmon. The porpoise lasts long enough for us to boat another silver before returning to the dock.

Gasteneau Channel is almost flooded by tide on our way home. Only a long slip strip of one island remains, covered with several thousand perfectly white gulls shinning in late afternoon sun. In seconds the birds forms a quick moving cloud as their sanctuary disappears.

A forest of flowers crowds around the last house on Basin Road. It’s the one you pass just before the wooden trestle bridge. I welcome this offering of random color today with the clouds hanging so low into Gold Creek Valley that I could climb into them on the Perseverance Trail.

I’m alone today for Aki hikes with another dog out by the glacier. It’s a chance to discover whether she keeps the animals away on our walks. Yellow monkey flowers line this trail to the clouds. They take shelter from the rain beneath leaves, attached to their mother plant by a thin fiber. I’d expect a strong breeze could knock them to the ground but they thrive in this wind tunnel of a mountain valley.

Leaving the main trail I move into a thick forest where we often see sign of deer and bear. A squirrel passes silently in front of me then I am alone with the sound of Gold Creek the only thing breaking the silence.  No chittering, eagle complaints, or song bird melodies sound above the stream— a moist but silent dessert of sound. Maybe  all the birds are out by the glacier, hanging with Aki.

In Juneau Autumn wrestles with Summer for each August day. Summer is winning this morning, replacing yesterday’s rain and wind with sun. The gentle weather opens up convergence points. First we find a tumble of giant spruce snapped off or toppled by fall time storms. Nothing goes to waste here. Seedlings of future forests grow crowded together on the fallen trunks.

We move to an island of green light surrounded by thick forest. From deep in the woods this meadow promises a way home for the lost or at least a place to see distance.  From it edge this wet land offers little but a field of lighter greens caped by blue sky.

Further on we reach the beach where the ebbing tide offers a chance to stand almost surrounded by the sea and listen with closed eyes to the sounds of hunter, prey, and opportunists. On this place hearing produces more understanding than seeing. Spawn ripe salmon leap and slam into each other. Eagles and Ravens fight for position as one large black bird that flies over our heads, an improbably orange object in his beak. When he flies all I hear are wing beats.

Back in the forest we stop on last time by a small stream cascading over down wood. I listen. Aki drinks of the muskeg brown water while sun light turns a simple green water plant into beauty.