Sorry little dog. I really misjudged the tide. Aki is not impressed with my apology. But then, she is not impressed by our predicament. We are caught on the downriver side of a rocky point now poking out into the Mendenhall River. The path around the outcropping was open when we walked around it a half-an-hour ago. I figured we would have enough time to slip down to a big sand bar downriver and be back before the tide flooded over our path home. But there were just many distractions to slow us down.

            There were the two seals riding the flood tide upriver, eye balling us as they floated by. I had to stop and muse about some pink clam shells that decorated the sand bar. Aki needed extra time checking out a scent she found in the beach border grass. Then there were the noisy Canada geese. They stirred and fussed on a shrinking sand island. I burned up time waiting for the tide to force them into flight. When it did, the geese flew away rather than toward us. Now the little dog and I have no choice but to scramble up a little ravine that bottoms out on the shrinking beach on which we stand. Like the geese, we will soon have no choice but to rise above the tide.

            The ravine would have been impassible last summer when the thorny leaves of devil’s club plants blocked the path. With a little care I am able to slip between the bare devil’s club stalks and climb up to a short, but steep section of the river bluff. After lifting Aki over the little cliff, I start to climb a series of exposed spruce roots to the top. Halfway up, the geese fly over our now drowned beach honking hysterically. Disappointed by not being able to photograph their passage, I follow Aki back to the car.