Category Archives: Alaska

Alaska

Do I even want to “Social” anymore?

I’m having a problem with social media lately. I’m sure a lot of you feel similar. With the election coming up and the death of an iconic figure the posts have gotten ever more shrill. When you add that to the protests that enable violence, memes and arguments for this side or that, and the general feeling that I’m being told that I should hate myself, I feel like the dumpster fire is burning from a toxic waste dump.

Last week someone posted about how if you disagree with her on this, that, and the other point then you can pretty much F— off and die because you must be a horrible person. Just for holding a different opinion. And her last several posts were all about the masks she was making that proclaim “Love Wins.” I don’t think she noticed the irony. It makes me very sad to see that reflected in so many other people’s posts. How can love win if you hate yourself or those who THINK differently than you? And these are the people that the major platforms keep suggesting that I follow. I can’t do that. I cannot pour that much toxicity into my mind and emotions.

I’m just starting to feel like I’ve shed some of the mindset that was so harmful when I lived in Oregon. I’m just starting to feel relaxed and happy. I’m enjoying my job, not showing up for the paycheck… although money is helpful. Perusing social media brings that feeling back and I don’t think it is good for me. I need to cut it out for a while. But I still want to share.

Here’s my plan. I’m going to allow myself to open those apps once a day for the next week. The only reason will be to share a new blog post. I don’t know how well this will work, but that’s why I said week, not month. Give it a try. And this way I will own my posts, not a big company that might decide it doesn’t like the way I think.

And now for a cabin update!

As of today we have five 2″x 12″x 20′ floor joists cut! And a few 2″x 6″ x 20′ boards as well.

Have I mentioned that we’ve had problems with the sawmill? My friend’s husband Lance has a 1989 WoodMizer portable sawmill. He has brought it with him from Washington to Alabama, back to Washington and now up to Alaska. I know he’s milled wood for another friend to build a house with. He has big ideas for what he can do with his sawmill, but it sat outside through the last two winters and that took a toll. It needed a battery, a servo motor, new wiring, a new chain and a new bolt to mount it. The rollers for the head needed replacing. It seemed like every time one thing was fixed another broke.

Friday the sawmill was fixed. We got out to my property and pushed it into place by hand. Lance leveled it out and gave us all the safety lecture. Then he, Chris, and his 13 year old son loaded up the first log while I got the three younger ones occupied with building a fire in the firepit to warm up. They got to practice using the hatchet to chop up twigs and small branches to feed the fire. I also chopped some of the slabs that came from squaring up the log.

We got two joists cut Friday before dark. There would have been a third, but the belts running the blade were worn enough that they started to let the blade slip out of place. We had to shut it down and try to find replacement belts. We found one and that let them cut some more this morning, but I guess that other one is necessary. So there is progress, but we can’t put anything together yet.

The other thing worth sharing is how many moose I’ve been seeing lately close to home. Almost every evening there will be one or more in the fields along the road. Of course they show up south of town, but never up north of town where I’m driving the shuttle. I’ve only seen moose racks on trucks coming in from hunting up there. It might change as hunting season ends. I just want to be able to show my guests a moose.

I guess that’s enough for now. I have to leave some new stuff for tomorrow. I’ll probably share links all next week as I write posts, but if you want to hide from the social media toxic dumpster fire too then go ahead and subscribe so you get an email whenever I post. I wish I could tell you how to do it, but I don’t know how to see my site the way visitors do. Most of what I’m doing is faking it as far as I can and one day I might actually know what I’m doing.

Alaska, Stories

Let there be light…and stuff.

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Whenever people talk about living off-grid they think about solar power or wind power or some other magical source of electricity. Or maybe they imagine living like the pioneers did. I guess those are doable, but never underestimate the power of a generator. Just go camping for a week and tell me you don’t miss things like fans or lights, or a reliable way to charge your cellphone so you can share to social media or post to your blog.

The family I’m staying with has been off-grid for 5 years. They use an outhouse year round. They bring their water home either in 5-gallon jugs or 55-gallon drums. In summer the wash water comes from the creek. And even though there is a power line accessible a few hundred feet from the house they have their power supplies by a trusty Honda 2200 generator.

Being off-grid usually brings to mind a primitive cabin far into the wilderness. And in a way the life is a bit simpler. There’s no worry about riots here. It’s more likely you would be trampled by a moose. But these kids are far from deprived. They’ve been blowing through video games all week. The 9 and 11 year olds learned how to tame and breed animals in ARK while the 17 year old is beating bosses in Ori.

The generator powers lights when needed (with the sun literally up 24/7 there’s not much need now) and fans, TV and Xbox, an air conditioner, instapot, phone chargers, etc. In winter it keeps the oil heater running. All the kids except for the 3 year old know how to restart it when it runs out of gas. The older ones know how to troubleshoot and fix it when fuel isn’t the problem. The quickest way to wake up the house is for the generator to die.

When I get my cabin built I’ll take my friend’s advice and get a Honda. I asked about the ones we walked past in Costco and she says she’s tried them but they just don’t hold up to the constant use that they put it through. They’ll last a few months where her Honda generators will last for a year or more of constant use with proper maintenance. Of course I would like to add a battery bank so my electronics don’t die every time the generator runs out of gas. We’ll see how that goes. It would be nice to have some leeway.

Having said all this and knowing more, does it seem silly that I’m intimidated by generators? I am. I want to learn how to manage them and service them and maintain them because I know that’s a valuable skill. But I’m intimidated by them. Even so, I took the first step today. When I went out “around the corner” I heard the generator stop. If I waited I know one of the kids would show up and refill it and get it back on. I decided not to be ridiculous. I was right there.

It’s just like a lawnmower, really. Open the tank, take the cap off the gas can. Put in the funnel and pour gas until full then close it up again. Give it a bit of choke and pull the starter cord. When it starts running let off the choke and walk away. Easy. Now bring on the small engine repair lessons. If it’s worth doing it’s worth doing right and I don’t relish the idea of having one die at -°30.

Alaska, Stories

I don’t think I’d do it in winter…yet.

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I think today is the second day with no rain in the last two weeks. I keep getting told how unusual this is, but it’s still keeping me from working on my property. The runoff avoided a couple of the culverts and eroded big holes. We need to get the excavator back out there to redo some of the road before I can even bring materials to make my cabin. We have the sawmill available, but cannot put it in place to cut lumber. It’s all held up by the damaged driveway.

Erosion on the driveway that must be repaired.

Another blockage to progress has reared its not so ugly head. The person who knows how to operate the excavator and sawmill has been called back to work. He hauls diesel fuel up to Deadhorse on Prudhoe Bay to keep vehicles moving on the oilfields. When oil prices dropped they shut down some of the operations, but now prices have come back enough that they won’t lose money by working so they need fuel again. He’s back to work, running loads north from Fairbanks and coming back for more. I got to ride with him on a trip last week.

It’s 500 miles to Prudhoe Bay, crossing two mountain ranges and a lot of wilderness on gravel roads that are bumpy at their best.

We got started in the evening. My friend had just returned from a trip to Valdez and back, bringing a load of a different fuel up. He took a break and fueled up his truck. His daughter gave me a ride into town with a stop at Walmart for some snacks and drinks. We had to wait for his buddy to arrive and fuel up so it was about 11pm when they went to fill the tankers with their loads. We headed out of Fairbanks at about midnight, only to run into trouble on the first hill north of town. The other truck was misfiring and losing power. The guys debated for a while and ended up heading back to the yard to hook up another truck and leave the bad one for the mechanic. I went to sleep somewhere along the way and didn’t wake up until we were bouncing along the Elliot Highway.

Here’s what I very quickly learned about highways built this far north. Gravel is your friend. Asphalt is not! With the freeze/thaw cycles the roadway will heave and slump. Asphalt ends up having ripples in it that will bounce and jounce you and try to throw you out of your seat. Gravel can be the same, but it’s easy to run a grader over it to smooth out the surface again. I quickly learned to cringe when we came across asphalt and relax for gravel.

The Dalton Highway starts on gravel. I was awake enough to get out of the truck and stretch my legs for a bit before deciding the mosquitoes were too thick. I’m pretty sure there’s a photo of me in front of the sign, just not on my camera. I got my pic of it the next day on the way south. The highway was finished in the fall of 1974 to facilitate the building and servicing of the Alaska Pipeline and oilfields. The pipeline runs parallel to the highway and can be seen from the road for the most part. The farthest north section uses the pipeline miles as mile markers.

I slept off and on as far as Coldfoot, which is at about the midpoint. It was originally a camp where supplies were staged. When construction was finished and the supply camp was no longer needed a guy took the leftover pallet materials and made a building for a saloon and cafe. Now it’s a good place to stop for food and fuel and to take a nap or get a shower. The guys slept for a few hours while I got to eat and explore and sit to watch the show I had downloaded while I still had service.

I forget the name of this mountain, but every angle was different. I wish I could have caught the light shining on it like liquid gold.
Going up The Shelf. Looking up the valley to the left of the road. It’s easy to lose sense of scale up here.

I took a lot of pictures. Not many of them were good. It’s hard to get a good shot while cruising down a bumpy road with rain on the windshield. The scenery is impressive and I hear that the wildlife is too. I didn’t get to see any of the wildlife though, except for a few caribou just outside of Deadhorse.

I got to hear a lot of stories too. Various spots have distinct names, some for the nature of the challenge, some for events, some for people. Names like Beaver Slide, Surprise hill, Oil Spill, and others that I can’t remember. I got to hear stories about wrecks and near misses. And I got to hear about drivers who lost their lives to the highway. Anyone who drives this road successfully will have wrecks and mechanical failures. The code of the highway will not allow for anyone to pass by another driver who is stranded. They all know that they might be the one with whatever part or tool or bit of knowledge needed to get the other back up and running. They also know that they might be the next one in need. The highway and the weather can be unforgiving.

11 pm as we approach Deadhorse. The sun is nowhere near the horizon and never went lower. And these caribou were the most wildlife I saw on the entire trip.
Leaving Deadhorse. Heading south to the mountains again.

Deadhorse is not a normal town. Every lot is leased by one company or another. There are no houses. There are equipment yards, wellheads, shops, and hotels that look like mobile homes stacked end to end and three or four stories tall. Nothing was open when we were there, not just because of the hour but because of quarantine restrictions. Nobody needs an outbreak so far from civilization. It would interfere with productivity, among other things. We parked in the yard where the fuel was to be delivered, ate food that we had brought with us, and took turns sleeping in the back while the other day and watched videos on the phone or iPad. The sun was just as high in the sky at 11pm as it was at 3 or 5am. The only change was which side of the sky it filled. Midnight sun, indeed.

Fuel got unloaded, some minor maintenance on trailer brakes was done, and we were heading south by 9am. Apparently the level of road grit experienced can be bad for fittings. You have to know where to keep it clean. Heading toward Atigun Pass we passed a few cyclists. One was northbound on his own, another two were southbound. Both drivers were as courteous to the cyclists as they were to other traffic. If you can, slow down to 25 mph or slower to avoid throwing gravel and breaking windshields. I heard plenty of grumbling about tourists. The cyclists were referred to as “Meals on Wheels” by the guy who almost ran over a bear to keep her from prying his truck open to get to his food. One can only hope that the cyclists were well prepared and carrying more than bear spray.

It took almost 24 hours to make the trip north due to load, mechanical trouble, and rest breaks. The trip back took 12 hours. I managed to stay awake for most of it. I’ll admit that sleep is my favorite cure for motion sickness. I chose to nap through one of the roughest sections of road. I had to brace myself while I dozed, but it was better than bouncing around in the seat.

We only stopped a few times going south. Lunch, bathroom break, once for the dogs, and once for a paving crew on the Elliot Highway. For miles we drove through swarming dragonflies the size of my hand. They didn’t show up in the video I tried to take of them, but they covered the grill of the truck. I can only guess that they were hunting mosquitoes.

Rough roads and lack of sleep aside, I am so glad I tagged along on this trip. I got to see things in person that very few people get to see. I would gladly go again. I want to see it all in sunlight. I want to see the moose and bears and musk ox that hid from me this time. I only have one limitation. After hearing all the stories I don’t think I want to ride along in winter. I don’t know if I can handle that. Yet.