It’s 49 degrees above zero at home when head out north to hike the Eagle River trail. With the streets ice free I am tempted to take the bicycle out for a ride and leave Aki. As if she senses such thoughts running through my brain, she takes up station at door to whimper. Soon we are driving to the trailhead, snowshoes in the trunk.

A marine layer of clouds forms over us as we drive north.  Twenty miles out we find black ice on the highway and fresh frost covering the roadside willows. Winter is already returning to Upper Lynn Canal. The trail takes us along the edge of a muskeg meadow populated by stunted Mountain Hemlock and Shore Pines. The crust allows freedom of movement for both Aki and I. We take this rare opportunity to walk ground usually viewed from afar. I take many pictures of the pines covered with bumps of frost that now glow in filtered sunlight.

The freeing crust reminds me of the way snow on the tundra would set up every clear night in later winter. I’d hitch up a team of six or eight husky dogs to a sled filled with camping clear and head for places unmarked by trails. The dogs would fly over the frozen crust until midday when the sun softened it. Then we either had to camp or find a packed snowmachine trail.  Daylight stretched until 9 or 10 at night that time of year allowing plenty of time to set up camp, secure the dogs and cook their dinner on a gas stove. They would watch the ice melt in the big pot we used and then stir when I dumped in the food. Then they would howl. The noise dropped each time I placed a full bowl of feed in front of a dog.  A brief period of noisy eating came next, followed by a profound silence only found on a vacant tundra.

With the chores done we’d build a wood fire and pick out constellations until the moon rose. Then the dogs would howl. Sometimes I’d join in just to feel the relief of release—the casting off, if for an evening, of my civilized coat.