Category Archives: glacier moraine

RIP

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To get to this pocket grove of old growth spruce, Aki and I had to cross recovering ground. More than 200 years ago, it began rebounding after being crushed by the Lemon Glacier. The Lemon retreated into hanging glacier status but since then someone clearcut most of the old growth that grew in its newly freed earth. Alders and berry brush choked the slashed land until new hemlock and spruce trees managed to rise above the tangled mess and form a second growth forest. The canopy of these thickly packed trees now blocks the light needed for understory plants.

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Perhaps because they rooted in a hard-to-reach stream valley, the collection of spruce that now surround my little dog and I have stood since America purchased this land from Russia. In a tiny glade formed by the big trees, a bald eagle died and its body was devoured by forest recyclers. Aki tentatively sniffs the corpse—-now just bones and feathers, talons and beak, then backs away. The bird lays on its back with wings splayed out, head upside down. I hope it chose this peaceful place to die after a long life.

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Icy Taunts

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It’s almost March. Tomorrow or the next day a Pacific storm will likely hammer Juneau with heavy snow or worse—rain. But this morning, on Mendenhall Lake, it’s almost desert-warm. Someone has set a five-kilometer track on the ice, which we follow toward the glacier. Aki dashes from her other human and I, stopping occasionally to take a cooling snow bath.

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It’s hard to concentrate on anything but sparkling snow, the blue-green glacier ice, and the saw tooth ridge of mountains that rise out of the Juneau ice field. I think about  To Make A Poem by Alberta Turner, a book that urges poets to tap into the subconscious for inspiration. But my subconscious can’t complete with all the natural beauty. Only when I complete the apex of the track loop and turn my back to the glacier, can I yield to the meditative slide and slide rhythm of Nordic skiing. But I sense the glacier leering behind me, ready to strike a stunning pose if I turn around. On a rising north wind, I can almost hear the river of ice taunt, “I’ve calved more metaphors than your sad little subconscious will produce in your lifetime.”

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New Land

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Aki porpoises through the five-inch layer of new snow covering Mendenhall Lake. She doesn’t smile, like some dogs, but her body language—ears flapping, front legs extended—conveys joy. Me too, I think. The lake extends for miles from Skater’s Cabin to the glacier. The handful of skiers already on the ice are lost in dissipating fog. I can almost believe that we are the first to use a new borne land.

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Usually the weather or crowds punish us when we ski on the lake. Cold, often assisted by wind, numbs my hand and face, fogs my glasses. On sunny, windless days, the ski trails can fill up like ride lines at Disneyland. But, when we start today’s ski, it 32 degrees. No wind makes it feel colder or banishes the fog that glistens in morning sun. The temperature climbs as we approach the glacier. The snow starts clumping on my skis. The fog fades.

 

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In an hour, after they have enjoyed a good Saturday sleep in and a fry up breakfast, Juneauites will fill up the parking spaces near the campground and skater’s cabin. There will be squeals and shouts of appreciation. There will be lots of selfies. None of them will capture my little dog flying over five inches of still-crisp snow.

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Place of Pride

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All the birds we see during this walk on the wetlands are jumpy except this eagle. I hear, rather than see a gathering of Canada geese after something flushed them into the air. Every golden eye or mallard duck flies across the Mendenhall River when I point the camera in its direction. But the eagle remains roosted on the top of a driftwood stump, even when a brace of bird dogs runs toward it. Even after the Alaska Airlines flight from Seattle slices across the face of the glacier behind it.

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Earlier I lead Aki away from the dog walker trail toward a little-visited slough. Snow from last night’s storm covered the ground. Bent over strands of beach glass formed golden swells on the sea of while. Behind us, the glacier towered above the Pepsi bottling plants. It back-dropped the body shops, boat yards, and the other blue color businesses along Industrial Boulevard. Only in Alaska would a welder’s shop have such a place of pride.

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I Can’t Resist

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The little stretch of cold weather we’ve enjoyed has opened up trails normally thanks to the beavers. Flooded sections and those usually sticky with sucking mud are firm. A few nights worth of frost on the glass slick trail ice allows traction. Only the sound of moving water will draw the beavers from their mud and stick dens. All is frozen and quiet on the moraine.

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We work our way from Crystal Lake to Mendenhall through a forest of stark-white trees, all killed by flooding after the beavers built their series of fifty foot dams on one of the moraine streams. The dead trunks barely diminish our view of Mt. McGinnis.

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Before arriving at Mendenhall Lake with its unimpeded view of the glacier, I vow not to take any more pictures of the river of ice. But seeing it underlined by the lake sparkling with undisturbed frost and backed by mountains and blue sky, I click away, driven as if a shot of happiness is being released in my brain each time I depress the shutter button.

Surrendering to the Rain

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I used to think that a willingness to lean into the winter wind was the primary requisite for surviving an Alaskan winter. After today, I wonder if you really need is the capacity to surrender.

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Aki and I slip and slide over the paths through the Mendenhall Campground. It’s raining, like it has rained for a couple of days. Before that we had heavy, wet snow. My jacket is already soaked through and water drips off Aki’s fur. We don’t turn back to the car, just take extra care not to slip on the water-skimmed ice. We surrender to the rain.

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This must be what it would be like post apocalypse if you and I were the sole survivors little dog. We are alone, maybe even a little lonely. No one comes out of the bathrooms or carries firewood to their campsite. No children play, no dogs bark, no cars purr as their driver looks for the perfect campsite. With this weather, we have no reason to expect help or even company.

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Blue Blink

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Wind blown rain whipped across Chicken Ridge when we headed out to the western edge of Mendenhall Lake. Aki and I drive through rain, heavy and light, along a Gastineau Channel flooded by the tide. We have little hope of dry weather and no reason to expect sunshine. The weatherman calls for four more wet days. But the glacier makes its weather without consulting meteorologists.

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Near the glacier, ice covers the lake and all available trails. A skim of fresh rainwater makes everything super slick but the little dog’s sharp nails and my ice grippers allow us safe travel. We have the place to ourselves so no one else sees the sunlight wedge open a crack in the cloud cover. At first only a tight shaft slides through to hit halfway up the glacier. As we walk along the lake edge, blue sky replaces gray and the greens of spruce covered hillsides warm towards yellow. We turn back into the woods and don’t notice blue’s disappearance. Under occluded skies made more acceptable by the short, but rich taste of spring, the rain returns.

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Snain

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We were going to take a wooded trail but the glacier chose today to wear its bluest cloak. Lets just sneak down to the lake, take a few shots of the thing, and slip onto the East Glacier Trail. Aki, who considers either path equally rich in dog sign, trots along without complaint.

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Tendrils of fog form on the ice to draw me closer and closer to the glacial until we are practically at the falls. When the fog dissipated we turn towards our first choice.

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Snain, a nasty combination of snow and rain, thickened as we complete the backtrack to the East Glacier trail head but Aki still darts onto the trail. Crusty snow and ice make travel for me difficult and I miss the views we had near the lake. But for what the forest lacks in drama, it makes up for with quiet and solitude. We cross beneath the Slide Creek Falls, which each summer resists attempts from sockeye salmon to leap into upstream spawning waters. Black bears chomp down salmon discouraged by the falls.

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Tne forest is littered with glacial erratics: large granite rocks dropped by the retreating glacier. Most have thick moss capes. Today all are covered with snow. If I had spent my childhood within easy bicycle reach of this forest, I would have spent my free time wandering and building forts with what it offered.

Beaver Scent

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The little dog and I walk between two channels of the Mendenhall River on a trail only passable after stretches of cold, snowy weather. If she wasn’t such a brat about it, we could follow it all the way to the lake and loop back on a trail rich in dog signs. But Aki disappears across the river and into the woods whenever she sniffs a trail to her preferred route. She doesn’t care about solitude or silence or the reflected views we have of the glacier and Mt. McGinnis. She wants some same-species interaction.

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I crunch ahead, breaking through the thin crust covering the snow pack except where the wind had stripped the trail down to bare ice. We find what looks like a miniature bobsled course that runs from the river’s edge to a thick forest of alders. My suspicion that it is a beaver’s logging ice road is confirmed when the little dog rolls on a portion of the run with a goofy smile on her face. She does love beaver scent.

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Winter Feed

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Aki is already wet from the snow. It falls in fat flakes that soften the edges of the glacial moraine. But the storm that delivers the snow has grounded planes and apparently discouraged the guys at the firing range. It brings silence that lasts until we are within 30 yards of the Mendenhall River when a raven croaks twice. At this point I am tired from a mile of slogging along the soft trail and ducking under trailside alders bent over with snow and ice. So, I am unprepared for the cloud of ravcns, bald eagles, and magpies that form on my right as I tried to photograph the river.

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Around the corner I spot blood on the snow and a deer skeleton. Its rumpled skin is nearby. The eagles escape across the river but the cabal of ravens hold station in some nearby trees. Only two magpies return to the carrion, picking the deer bones while the presence of Aki and I keep the bigger birds away. In this time of famine along the river, I can’t justify remaining near the bones. When we pass the raven sentry on our way home, it croaks the all clear.

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