More stories

    Last week our work included things such as, brushcutting, visitor counts, campsite work, splitting firewood and other maintance jobs around our cabins.  Brushcutting is terrible, it takes atleast 2 hours to clear a mile of trail, slow moving isn't my favorite.  I also spent a day on the beach doing a visitor count, that made for a relaxing day. The rest of the work kept us pretty busy for the remainder of our working days.
    Some highlights of our days off including a short backpacking trip and a half day halibut charter. Me and Morgan set off on tuesday for just a one night trip. We went up and over Grace Ridge, the peak was at about 3800 ft. It was a hard climb and was made even harder because we started at sea level. The forest in the southern part of the park hadn't been effected by the spruce bark beetle so the area looked healthy and beautiful. We made it up in about 3 hours doing about 4.5 miles. We made it to the top around noon, so lunch was had then was followed by a solid nap. We also sat and enjoyed the clear views of the park for a while. We could see from Homer on one side and the icefields on the other side. Our original plan was to camp at the top but with all the daylight left we had left we started the descent. Our trip down was made easier with some boot skiing in the snow. After climbing down back into the forest we eventually made it to the beach. Adjacent to the beach we found an empty yurt. That is where we took shelter for the night after an awesome dinner with some local alaskan wine that I hauled around all day. The next morning we were picked up and eventually made it back to Homer.
   We also went on a half day halibut charter this week. That was a great success. The 1.5 hour ride out to the fishing spot was rough and fun. Spray splashed up and over the boat as we all ended up taking shelter inside the cain. A couple people were victims to sea sickness, I wasn't one. Then the fishing began, and the halibut were being reeled in almost immediately.  Trying to reel up a 25 pound fish and a 2 pound lead weight 150 feet up from the ocean floor is not an easy job. Also being in a boat filled with 20 anxious anglers lines were tangled all over many times making it even more difficult. I caught 3 and kept the maximum of 2, both were in the 15 to 20 pound range. I was left to hang out for another 30 minutes till everyone caught their limit and we headed back to Homer. It was an awesome time, fishing for halibut in the halibut capital of the world. We all left with good memories and a great amount of meat, I got around 10 to 15 pounds of it. About half I sent south for my parents to enjoy.
We head back into the park tomorrow for a short work period, we'll be back Friday!

-nc

More Adventures

We just finished up a twelve day stint across the bay working in the park. Needing some time off in Homer I decided not to do any hiking around the park and instead enjoy and explore the town a bit more. All of us went on a little backpacking trip before the twelve days of work. We had a three night trip planned out, and work hike into the lagoon to start work the next day. One of my coworkers ended up twisting and messing up her knee during our first day out from there it turned into quite the adventure. She was completely unable to walk the next day. So another guy threw together a sketchy stretcher and we were planning to hike her out to the nearest beach where she could be easily picked up. That was a struggle, we ended up running into the paid trail crew, who were out cleaning trails. From there after calling and talking to one of our bosses it was decided that a different mode of transportation was needed. One of the flying type, a helicopter was called in. Then after bushwacking for a couple hours we made it out to a river flat where the heli picked her up, our mission complete.  From there we were able to continue our adventure. We headed towards the glacier to camp out there that night. The glacier was amazing, we were able to walk out onto and explore the lay of the glacier. It was also the night of the summer solistice which was weird to witness up here. During sunset the sun dipped below the horizon and came back up with a 30 minute period.  Since we were behind schedule we were picked up later the next day by our crew leader, but only after a chilly and refreshing dip in the bay. The next morning it was time to start work. We were busy working during the entire twelve days. During the first couple of days we replaced three bridges in a swampy muskag area near the ranger station. Next we took the boat out to a campsite along the bay where we fixed up some tenting areas that day, tented there for the night and then logged out another trail. From there we headed back to the lagoon ranger station.  The next days we worked were spent logging out trails and a couple more night camping out on the trail. Chainsawing has been fun, but we are slowly getting into some brushcutting.  Brushcutting is a slow and tedious job that I'm not looking forward to getting into. 
  The salmon have came into the lagoon which has been exciting to see.  However the numers this year are minimal.  In total less than 10 fish have been caught in the lagoon.  I've been told that there used to be schools of a hundred salmon swimming around the lagoon. The biggest school I've seen so far was like than 15 big. I haven't caught any so far. My boss has snagged a couple. Let me tell you that you haven't eaten slamon till you've eaten some that's been caught the same day. Outstanding.
  Now we are hanging out and relaxing in Homer, we are off till Friday I believe. Two days ago we did a tasting at the local meadery. Mead, if you don't know is a honey wine, but they also include local fruits and berries. The mead was something that I enjoyed. Yesterday we checked out the local winery that's a couple miles down the road. That was also delicious, they also included many local fruits and berries into their flavors, something new for me. Today is July 4th, we have plans to cook out and we might make it to the parade. Hopefully I'll be able to upload some pictures onto here soon.

nc