Caribou Skull

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Arctic Bees

Bees are always busy, but they have to be especially busy during the short summer season here in the arctic.




I have seen them visit many different kinds of flowers but today the arctic daisies seemed quite popular.




I hate hornets and wasps but these honeybees are quite harmless. They are far to preoccupied with their work to pay attention to me.




They were all over this yellow stuff too.



Speaking of busy bees, it looks like these two bees are...ummmm....getting busy.

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Holy Crap!

The anuk has hit the fan. I leave the state for a little trip, all hell breaks loose back home and I have to read about it on the series of tubes. There goes all our pork.


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Squirreltail Grass

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Cotton Grass

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Headed to PDX

Tomorrow morning I head to Portland, Oregon on a work trip and I won't be back until Saturday 8/2. I will have intermittent access to the internet so I might not be able to post while I am gone. I will be taking a bunch of photos this evening and scheduling some posts to pop up during the week so that there will be stuff to look at while I am gone. If I can't respond to comments and emails while I am gone I will get to them as soon as I can when I get back.

What's For Dinner

For dinner I made baked salmon with sour cream and dill and I'm gonna show you how to make it.



First take one whole salmon fillet and place it is a 13x9 inch pan. Use whatever salmon you can get. This happens to be a Kotzebue Sound Chum salmon. Chum is usually considered a junk salmon by many fish snobs, but that is because they have never had chum from north of 66 degrees latitude. These fish are fat and firm fleshed and quite tasty.




Here's what you will need. Sour cream, dill, an onion, lemon juice and Mrs. Dash seasoning. I forget to put the Mrs. Dash in the picture. If you live in a place where you can buy fresh lemon without going broke by all means go ahead and do so, but I use the stuff that somes in the snazzy plastic lemon shaped bottle.




You will need to chop your onions up small. 1/4 to 1/2 cup is plenty, I usually use about 1/2 cup. Accidentally burning your cutting board on a hot stove top is optional.



Sprinkle the salmon fillet with Mrs. Dash and lemon juice.




Spread on the onions and place into an oven preheated to approx 370 F degrees.




Depending on the size, thickness and fat content of your salmon fillet you will cook it from 20 to 30 minutes. If you stick a fork into it and pull a piece of fish out and it looks done, then it's done. If you don't know if fish is done you can look at it and ask yourself a simple question "Does it look like I wanna eat that?". If your answer is yes, then it is probably done.




So, after determining that the fillet is indeed "done" you will now glop entirely too much sour cream onto the fish. Spread the sour cream all over the fish, just like frosting a cake. Add as much dried dill as you like over the sour cream then put the fish back into the oven for 5 minutes.




Here is the finished product. A fine example of Alaskan cuisine. It is quite yummy especially when served with instant mashed potatoes, canned peas and sailor boy pilot crackers spread with mayo. Hey, I said it was YUMMY, not HEALTHY.

You Decide

Either the city of Kotzebue won a federal grant to apply abstract art to 3rd Ave or someone in the public works department was sipping more than Folgers on their coffee break.

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There's No Place Like Nome?

And now for something completely different....here are a few aerial shots of Nome on my way to Anchorage the other day.

You People are Crazy!

You are, you really are! Never would I have thought that my life would ever be interesting enough for people to want to read about it once, much less come back day after day....but you do! Today I hit 20,000 page loads. Yeah I know that there are some websites that get 20,000 page loads in a day but this is me we're talking about.

So in honor of my 20,000 I went back and read all 268 posts that I have made in the last 489 days. I was amazed at how long it took. I can hardly believe how much stuff there is. This was probably my 10th attempt at a journal (paper or otherwise) over the years and my 1st attempt at a blog. I think what has kept me going is all of you. knowing that people come here looking for content makes me produce.

This blog started as a way to show pictures to my friends and family far away and let them know what was going on in life. Strange this is, over time new people showed up from all over the world and I have gotten to know some very interesting people. I even have a friend that I made through this blog that is coming to visit me at the end of August (even though her daughter is not convinced that I am not an internet weirdo). If it wasn't for people coming every day to look at this place I would probably have lost interest long ago.

So now I have a little favor for those of you who have made it through this post. I want to know "Who are you?". "How did you find me?", and "Why do you come back?". Come on fess up all you lurkers and newcomers alike! I am curious about you. You all are the reason I do this. You in Denver, and you in Bloomington, and you in Finland...and Spokane, and Boston, and San Diego, and Germany, and everywhere. Please satisfy my curiosity!

Wordless (almost) Wednesday- I Got Yer Pistil Right Here

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Bird on a Wire

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Beautiful Babies

Here's something I forgot to include earlier this month. Part of the 4th of July celebration here in Kotzebue is the Beautiful Baby Contest. Here are a few of the entries....





























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Iris

FYI- I will be in Anchorage until tuesday morning so the regular blog posts will be interupted. Instead I will schedule ahead a few posts to pop up while I am gone. See you later.

The iris is my favorite flower and there are plenty of them to keep me amused this time of year. Here are a few photos.















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No ESPY for Mackey

There is no ESPY award for Mackey AGAIN this year. Scott Smiley, an Army captain blinded in Iraq who later went on to climb Mt. Ranier won the outdoor category. While there is no ESPY for Lance, there may be a Mackey movie in the future. Warner Bros and Disney have both expressed interest in his story.



(Photo by Associated Press/Al Grillo)


Read the full adn article HERE


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Photo Friday- Flight

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Summer

People ask me if the lack of light in the winter bothers me. By the time you get sick of it being dark out the days start getting longer again. So no, the dark doesn't bother me, but in summer the light will drive you mad. All you want to do is go, go, go, and there are not enough hours in the day.




I have been busy lately. Busy working. Busy boating. Busy going to camp. Busy visiting old friends. Soon I will be fishing for salmon. This is a photo of Hugo Mountain on the Noatak River.




Here are some trees along the Little Noatak River. Trees are something we don't have in Kotzebue but we have in abundance along the river.




I have been busy enjoying the outdoors and taking pictures. Mostly of flowers lately.




Theses are what we call wild onion, but I guess they are actually some kind of chive. They are quite tasty.




These are arctic daisies. They love gravely soil and grow in clumps.




More bluebells.




Ummm....I'm not sure what this yellow stuff is.




And here is the ubiquitous fireweed. This stuff should have been the Alaska state flower instead of the forget-me-not. I love fireweed but it's coming is bitter sweet. It marks the beginning of the end of summer.

Wordless (almost) Wednesday- Bug Off!

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Wolfsbane

Monkshood, also known as Wolfsbane, is a flowering plant belonging to the buttercup family. It is a tall spiked cluster of hooded flowers deep blue to purple in color and green spiky leaves.




They grow in well drained yet moist areas near my camp on the Noatak River. All part of Monkshood, especially the root, are very, very toxic.

Fisherboy

We spent the weekend at Ivik. Ivik is a group of camps on the northeast shore of Kobuk Lake (Hotham Inlet). While we were there Uyaana did some fishing. He caught his first Northern Pike with a reel. It was a very small pike.




He is making this face because a mosquito landed on his face right between his eyes and he couldn't wipe it off.




Can you see the mosquitoes swarming around him in the pictures?

Dwarf Fireweed

Miss Arctic Circle

Sorry for the delay but here are a few more pics from the 4th of July festivities. These are from the Miss Arctic Circle and Miss Teen Arctic Circle Contest.




This contest is more than just a beauty pageant. Judging takes into consideration accomplishments, community service and knowledge of the contestant's native culture.




Miss teen arctic circle is open to girls ages 14-18 and Miss Arctic is to women age 18-25 who are at least 1/4 native (of a federally recognized tribe).




This contest is always a favorite part of the local festivities. Everyone loves to see these ladies dressed in their best traditional regalia, many of which are family heirlooms.



This year's winner of the Miss Teen Arctic Circle was Denali Whiting.




Here is Denali's mom, Northwest Arctic Borough Mayor Siikauraq Whiting (in pink), cheering in the bleachers.




This Year's winner of Miss Arctic Circle was Stacey Harris.




Stacy will go on to represent our region at the Miss WEIO contest at this year's World Eskimo and Indian Olympics in Fairbanks, Alaska.

Rural Alaska's Uncertain Future

When I ask you what you see in this picture you would most like say "I see a gas pump". When you ask me what I see in this picture I would say "I see the slow death of rural Alaska."




The first gas barge of the shipping season has arrived and the price of fuel for the first shipment has been set. The price at the pump is now $7.25 a gallon.

Crowley Monopoly Maritime Services is the only supplier of petroleum products to Kotzebue and therefore to most of the Northwest Arctic Borough of Alaska. We get our gas barged up once at the beginning of the summer and once at the end of the summer.




The gas is stored at Crowley's tank farm that you can see in the lower right hand side of this picture. That means that even though the price of fuel was already raised with this first barge shipment, the chances are when the second fuel barge arrives the price will be raised again.

The price at the pump is always more than the price at which you can buy fuel in bulk directly from Crowley. Prior to this first shipment gas was $4.20 a gallon and heating oil was $4.33 a gallon for a minimum of 53 gallons purchased. Before the barge came the price at the pump was around $5.50 to $5.70 a gallon depending on which store you went to. After the barge arrived Crowley increased their bulk fuel price to $5.80 a gallon for gas and $6.09 for heating oil. So basically it's $305 for 53 gallon drum of gas BEFORE taxes. That same drum filled at the pumps at the store pictured would be $384.25.

In addition to the increased price of gas and the more devastating increase in price of heating fuel locally here in Kotzebue is the increase of fuel prices that is affecting all of the United States and particularly Alaska. That increase is being reflected in the cost of food here at the stores. As I stated in an earlier post milk is $10.49 a gallon. A "cheap" loaf of bread is almost $3, 5lbs of potatoes is $7.99. We eat a lot of subsistence foods around here but that all takes gas to go out and get, and no one eats only caribou, fish, and seal anymore.

When I really sit down and think about it, I fear for the future of rural Alaska. If the price of fuel keeps increasing people are not going to be able to afford to buy food and heat their houses. I don't know about anyone else, but I my pay scale is not increasing to match the increased cost of living. The poor are going to be the hardest hit first. If things continue the way they are there is going to be a mass exodus of low income people out of rural Alaska and into the more metro areas such as Fairbanks and Anchorage.....and those areas just aren't going to have the infrastructure to handle such an influx of people. A crisis is looming around the corner waiting for the first cold snap of winter to rear it's ugly head.

2am

These photos were taken this morning at 2am.

Wordless (almost) Wednesday- Pokey

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Vote for Lance

For the second year in a row dog musher Lance Mackey has been nominated for an ESPY award in the category of Best Outdoors Athlete. The ESPY Awards is an annual sports awards event created by ESPN for individual and team athletic achievement.



Last year Lance lost out to somebody, can't remember who. For two years in a row Lance has won both the Yukon Quest and the Iditarod in the same year. If you would like to vote for Lance go to ESPN's ESPY Awards site. You have to sign in to vote but it only takes a few minutes and it is FREE.

See the vote for Lance Video

Thanks to Ish at Kodiak Konfidential for the heads up on the voting.

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Pain in the Foot

The blog has been quiet for the last couple days. I feel kind of guilty because I know people come and check here every day, but life interferes. I have been busy working on my Ugruk, cutting and drying the meat, rendering oil, and getting it all put away. Plus it has been so nice out that I just don't want to stay inside. AND....to top it all off is my foot.

On the 3rd of July I got a splinter in my foot. Nothing serious, just a little piece of wood. I dug it out myself, cleaned it up, put some ointment on it and slapped a bandaid on, end of story, right? Nope. Yesterday I had to have an abscess lanced on my foot. The local anesthetic for the procedure was one of the top ten most painful things I have experienced ever.

So, I apologize for my absence. I have a few posts in the works that will be coming up soon, including a couple more posts with pictures from the Kotzeue's 4th of July celebration.

I Love a Parade, Part 2

I think we left off with the girls on a firetruck. Here is another view of them.




Here is the Sisualik Float. It looks like Maija is trying to throw a handful of candy at my head.




Yay Sisualik!!



We got lots of candy from them.




This is the Kotzebue Electric Association's truck (KEA). I'm sorry KEA that my electric bill was only $48 last month. It is not my fault that there was something wrong with your meter. I am sure it will go back to the usual $225 a month now that you have changed the meter.




Here is the Kotzebue Fire Department's rescue boat. It can maneuver over ice and water. It is especially useful in poor ice conditions when other modes of transportation are unsafe.




This is the Northwest Arctic Borough School District's bus. Yep, Kotzebue has a school bus, however it is used only for children eligible for special education services. Everyone else has to walk or get rides from their parents.




Here is a truck from the Alaska Commercial Company (AC) store. You know, the place where we pay $10.49 for a gallon of milk, $11.39 for a 12 pack of Pepsi, and $8 for a bag of chips? Yeah, that place. Anyway, those are some of the Kotzebue High School's cheerleaders on the back with the Husky mascot.




And here are the Alaska State Troopers float. They are towing a boat full of kids and their furry mascot which loosely resembles a squirrel...or maybe it's a bear. You be the judge.




Here's the Park Service's truck. It was decorated to look like a tiger. Very cute. I LOVE the mammoth.




And here is the political message for the day. This is a difficult topic and it is hard to find unbiased information about it. As a matter of fact I don't think there is any unbiased info about the proposed Pebble Mine out there. It is a very touchy subject. It can be hard to balance the environment with the economic health of the state.




And here is the Native Village of Kotzebue's float.

Well that's it for the parade.

I Love a Parade...

...the tramping of feet,I love every beat I hear of a drum. La la la la I love a parade, when I hear a band...ok, so we have no band, but we have sirens! Lots and lots of sirens and a parade route a mile and a half long.




We staked out our usual spot over by the First Baptist Church. The tan building you are looking at in the distance is the "Eskimo Building". It houses the Native Village of Kotzebue offices and the Post Office. We like this spot because it has a nice view of the water and it is relatively close to the start of the parade which means the floats haven't run out of candy yet.




You can hear the parade for a long time before you can see it coming around the corner.




The parade was led by the Boy Scouts this year.




The Grand Marshal of the this year's parade was Elsie Adams. Elsie was one of the original city council members when the council was first formed in 1959.




Here is one of our lovely police cars, driven by one of our lovely law enforcement officers.




This is the State of Alaska Department of Transportation firetruck that is stationed out at the airport.




This is Maniilaq Associations's float. I swear it looks exactly the same as it did last year. Maniilaq Association provides health and social services to residents of rural Northwest Alaska.




Here's the back of the float. The girls you see in the fur parkas are contestants in the Miss Arctic Circle and Teen Arctic Circle contests. More on that later.




This is a firetruck. Yup.




I think that this is NANA Regional Corporation's float. NANA is the regional native corporation.




And another firetruck.



Ok, that's all for this installment. There is more parade pics to come but it is late and I am getting sleepy.


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Hot Town Summer in the City

It reached 80 F degrees today, I think I might die. Good grief was it hot. For us this is HOT. The sun is relentless. I burned to a crisp yesterday and again today for good measure. There's more of the same in the forecast.

Anyway....Happy Independence Day....or as we say around here "Happy 4th of July!". I took lots of pictures of the day's festivities, but due to heat exhaustion it is taking me a while to get the pictures ready. Hang in there, I'll have them up soon. I will probably have to spread them over a few posts because there's lot's.

ALASKA ZONE WEATHER FORECAST
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE FAIRBANKS AK
234 PM AKDT FRI JUL 4 2008
AKZ209-051345-
BALDWIN PENINSULA AND SELAWIK VALLEY-
INCLUDING...KOTZEBUE...SELAWIK...NOORVIK234 PM AKDT FRI JUL 4 2008
.TONIGHT...PARTLY CLOUDY. LOWS AROUND 60. NORTHEAST WINDS 15 TO
20 MPH.
.SATURDAY...PARTLY CLOUDY. HIGHS 70 TO 80. NORTHEAST WINDS 10 TO
20 MPH.
.SATURDAY NIGHT...PARTLY CLOUDY. LOWS AROUND 60. NORTH WINDS
10 TO 20 MPH.
.SUNDAY...PARTLY CLOUDY. HIGHS 65 TO 80...WARMEST INLAND. NORTHWEST
WINDS 10 TO 15 MPH.
.SUNDAY NIGHT...MOSTLY CLEAR. LOWS AROUND 55. WEST WINDS 10 TO
15 MPH.
.MONDAY...MOSTLY SUNNY. HIGHS 70 TO 80.
.MONDAY NIGHT...PARTLY CLOUDY. LOWS NEAR 55.

Bike Rodeo

Today was the Maniilaq Association Injury Prevention Program's annual Bike Rodeo. Here is Uyaana getting fitted for a free helmet.




Here are my friend Bree's kids, Jessalyn.....




...and Gage getting their new helmets.




Along with the helmets they did simple bike repair. Here Jason Dau from the Injury Prevention Program is tightening the chain on a bike.

Barge Order Time

The time has come to make the yearly grocery barge order. Buying stuff this way can save you several hundred dollars. Our monopoly main local store, Alaska Commercial Company (AC), gouges us on prices (oh yes you do, don't even try to tell me that you don't, you greedy bastards) so you have to try and save wherever you can.




This year I ordered 666 lbs of stuff. I would have ordered more if I had the room to store it. As it is I am going to have groceries coming out of the woodwork at my house. The barge should get to Kotzebue sometime the third week of September.





Haha...please don't check my math....I probably messed it up somewhere.




*UPDATE*
Thanks to this post I realized that I forgot to order a half case of Sailor Boy Pilot Crackers. That would have sucked. New total 681 lbs of groceries for $937.47


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Wordless (almost) Wednesday- Beach Peas

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