Becoming An Outdoor Woman

Alaska Fish & Game has this very cool program called Becoming an Outdoor Woman, where women learn outdoor skills that men traditionally learn from other men, but are not perhaps the best people to teach those skills to their female life partners. I spent a weekend at Lost Lake Boy Scout Camp learning how to fish and identify animal tracks and enjoying the outdoors.

I learned not to listen to wildlife biologists when they say a hike is easy. After dinner I climbed with some other women to a lookout point over the Tanana River. It took an hour to go up and twenty minutes to come down. This is about 10:30 PM in late June.

Oh and I learned how to do this too. If you don't know what this is, that's okay. Just smile and nod and be impressed with my specialized knot tying skills.

Moose

This is a wee baby moose that was probably only a few weeks old, peering into our living room window. When you turn around and are looking a moose in the eye from about ten feet away, it is quite startling. Here he's about the size of shetland pony with legs three times longer.

He and his mother meandered around our neighborhood throughout the summer, here's another picture in early September. His body mass is about that of a good sized horse with longer legs. He won't be full grown for another few years.

Easy Alaskan Hikes Part I

Way back in May we climbed part of Ester Dome. I had a broken toe, and I thought I was going to die. Great views of Fairbanks.

And we're back

We didn't disappear, we just had a busy summer in which we took a LOT of pictures. First up - a visit to the WORLD FAMOUS MALEMUTE SALOON. Surely you're heard of it? No? Its an authentic gold rush saloon featured in literature. Performances feature the poetic stylings of Robert Service, Bard of the Yukon.

(<--not actually Robert Service, he's dead)







And songs that will make a goldminer blush.










Probably not appropriate for the under 8 set.