The Eagle Lady...is Gone...

Over the past year and a half of living in Homer I have heard the name "The Eagle Lady" bandied about. I didn't know who she was, what she did, where she lived, or anything else about her. Two weeks ago a friend and I were out skiing and she mentioned the Eagle Lady, and two days later, Jean Keene, the "Eagle Lady", had died. It is only now, having read about her life in the local papers (see http://homertribune.com/ for a wonderful account of her life), that I begin to understand what an impact this lady has had on Homer.This afternoon at a ceremonial eagle feeding in memory of the Eagle Lady I had tears in my eyes and my heart was heavy even though I hadn't known Jean. I don't agree with feeding wild animals, still don't understand why Jean was allowed to when no one else is, and yet I couldn't help but feel the significance of the moment and I appreciated this gesture--a ceremonial feeding--for people to come and see what Jean did, and in a way, to say good-bye to her. Part of my tears and heavy heart were for my husband's grandma who died this week and whose funeral was just this morning. My thoughts turned to legacies that some people leave behind. Jean did, as the Eagle Lady, just as my husband's grandma did, with her indomitable, fiery Irish Catholic spirit. The papers say that Jean Keene put Homer on the map, that people would come visit Homer just to see the eagles, that she helped the local economy by drawing people here time and again. She also forged relationships, connecting with people all over the globe. I can't shake the feeling that there was something special going on here, as much as I intellectually resist the implications of feeding wild animals.

The eagle feeding has attracted hundreds of people to Homer over the years (thousands, perhaps?), many of them photographers. Today the photographers were lined up, tripods, microphones....all the fancy doo-dads. It was almost as interesting watching them as the birds. You could tell some people were there for the birds, some people were there for Jean, and others just hoping for a good shot with their camera. I took Denver out of curiosity: I wanted to know what all the fuss was about. Was this really as neat as people said it was?
Reports say 300-500 eagles show up for this event, and as 3:00 neared, I looked around and every lampost, every building top, every perch within sight of the Eagle Lady's trailer at the end of the Spit had an eagle or two, or six perched on it. There were, literally, hundreds of eagles perching, swooping, flying, scrawing. Usually people are not allowed to get out of their cars during the feeding, but for this one time they made an exception and allowed everyone up to a cordoned off area of the beach.
Ten minutes after they started throwing the frozen herring to the eagles, many people began to wander away. Jean threw fish to the eagles here on the Homer Spit nearly every day of the past 30 years. That is a dedication and tenacity that I deeply admire and respect. And despite the phalanx of photographers and those vying for a position of honor in Jean's fenced-in yard, I found it to be a special moment--a moment of reflection on people and nature, life and death, brevity and legacy. I was glad to be there to share this moment.

Quake II

Just as I was putting together the previous blog post, everything on my desk started hopping and shaking and there was a hollow noise like Denver pounding up the stairs. It took me a few seconds to realize that it was an earthquake, but by time I ran down the stairs the worst was over. Our houseplant leaves were still quivering madly, but the roar was gone and other things weren't shaking. The leaves continued to quiver for another 20-30 seconds before they finally stilled.

This is only the second quake we've noticed since being here. The first one I barely noticed (was like the feeling of a heavy truck driving by outside), and it was a 5.0 with the epicenter in Homer. This one was substantially longer and stronger, so I'm guessing it was a 6.0. I'm heading in to the Islands and Oceans Visitor Center right now for a Family Fun Day, and they have a seismograph there so we'll go check it out!

Later....Guess Islands and Oceans doesn't have a seismograph (maybe I saw one at the Pratt Museum??), but the lady at the desk had the following website up (http://www.aeic.alaska.edu/recent/sub/index.html) and kindly let us look it over. When you follow this link, you'll discover there have been dozens of quakes in the past few days, but this one was by far the largest (most were 1.0-3.0; this was 5.73). One of the ladies was at the Visitor's Center this morning during the quake and she was scared because the cables that were attached to the beams holding up the large glass wall were twanging, something she's never seen before. They were afraid it was all going to come down! In my house, one cup fell over in the cupboard and that's it. No damage to the Spit or anything. It was bigger than usual, but still pretty mild. Of course, at our house we were a good 70 miles from the epicenter (48 miles from Homer), and it was also 62 miles deep. WOW! Amazing that we could feel it at all!

I've been reading up on the 'Quake of '64 so I am somewhat mentally pschyed for a big one, though I don't think anyone is ever truly ready for an event like that.

And More Ice Skating....

What is normal a little puddle with grass pushing through 1/2 mile from our house became a nice-sized pond with our recent thaw and rain. I'd been eying it each time I drove by it the past week, but it wasn't until Denver and I were out walking yesterday and we discovered that the ice was very smooth that we decided to try it out skating. It was wonderful! The ice was nearly as smooth as what you get at a skating rink, it is protected by trees so we didn't have a wind, and no one else had been on it, so it was fresh, unmarked ice. Joy!
The big pond by our house has water levels that vary quite a bit, and it is deep as well, so it is not as safe to go out on. As you can see from the picture to the right, that ice is all broken up now, and wasn't even frozen in places. So until it snows again, we have a new local skating pond!

Ice Skating on our Driveway

Yep, that's me ice skating on our driveway. Two days of rain has turned all side roads into, literally, skating rinks. When 100 mph winds and flooding closed the road past Ninilchik today and the school district forbade anyone from participating in school activities, Doug and the kids couldn't get to Anchorage for the robotics competition tomorrow. Doug had the ice skates in his vehicle, so the moment he pulled in, I got them out. I headed down our driveway (I'll admit, I slid down the first part of it on my backside; it's pretty steep) and then skated about a 1/4 mile to the neighbors house and back. With the headwind and uphill it was quite a workout. The warm weather is holding, but it has finally stopped raining. The ice won't last long at this rate. We had a glorious sunset and now the stars are out. This weather is just leaving our heads spinning! Personally, I prefer the cold to the wet & icy.

Break from the Outdoors: Bay Club Time!

I walked outside today and said, "Yuck! Rain!" Yes, believe it or not, that cold snap has suddenly turned warm and our snow is disappearing quickly with rain, rain, rain. Thus, rather than hit the ski trails today, I headed to the gym (Fancy that--subzero, I'm outside skiing, but rain? I head inside!). I peeked into the pool area and saw I had the whole pool to myself--joy! It redeemed this yucky-weather day.

The Bay Club is our local gym. It is twice the price of our gym in Michigan, and maybe slightly nicer. We weren't sure it would be worth it, so just signed up for 6 months last year. When we arrived back home after a summer of traveling, we discovered we did indeed miss it, so in the gloom of fall, doled out a large amount of pocket change and joined again. This time around, it feels like we are using just about everything they've got!
The climbing wall is the kids' favorite. Both Aurora and Denver look like they were born climbing, so I took the class, got my belay card (the person on the bottom who holds the ropes and keeps the climber from falling) and now the kids climb a couple times a week. They climb at the high school also, but that is a straight wall. The Bay Club's wall has ins and outs that one must climb around, so is more challenging.

The swimming pool is another favorite. Every Sunday we go to church, get some lunch and then head to the gym. The kids swim and Douglas and I take turns swimming with them and working out. It is a fairly warm pool, so it is a fun one for playing in--you don't start shivering after 10 minutes!

I personally love the racquetball court! At our gym in Michigan we had to pay $12 per person each time we played even though we were members ($24!!). Here it comes with the price of membership. Doug and I manage to play racquetball once a week, and we appreciate the awesome workout we get doing it! The kids come on in and play too, which is just a blast with the ball bouncing crazily off all the walls. Denver, especially, likes hitting the ball against the back wall so that it goes and hits the front wall.

The gym has the usual plethora of weight equipment, treadmills, ellipticals, stairsteppers and rowing machines, all of which we use. The best part of it is the view out the window, seen from any machine or the pool: the Homer Spit, Kachemak Bay, the Mud Flats and the Kenai Mountain Range, as seen in the picture above one morning a few weeks ago. It is so easy to count my blessings when I am rowing along, gazing out on such a glorious panorama with bald eagles cruising by regularly just outside the window.

All the exercise classes are free, though we have yet to take advantage of any of them. Yoga, Pilates, spinning, tai chi, etc. They are well attended, and we can always tell when there's a class because the parking lot is full. The sauna and tanning booth are in regular use too, but we don't use those since we usually have the kids with us.

The other big difference I've noticed about the Bay Club compared to our gym in Michigan is how people dress. In Michigan many females would be in scantily clad workout shirts or tight shorts. Here many women wear long pants and t-shirts while working out, and skimpy isn't something I've seen, so it doesn't feel like a pick-up place that I'm embarrassed to have my kids hang out. The locker rooms, on the other hand, see a lot more flesh than Michigan (I know, this is strange) and feels a heck of a lot more liberal than our gym back home. I'm not sure why this is. I keep expecting to get used to it, but the difference in dress and attitudes of patrons continues to strike me often.

Overall, belonging to the Bay Club is a welcome place to spend some time when we're in town, and it is an important part of our lives. We still get out skiing, ice skating, and play basketball, but it is nice to have a place to take a shower and head to work after the workout--and it is a great place to have some family time too!

Cold Snap

Wow! It is above zero today! I am so excited, and amazed at how warm 10 above feels, after weeks of below zero weather.
The main challenge for us with this cold snap has been having our bathroom pipes freeze each night. The sink is on an outside wall, and though the pipes are in the house, and the house is 65 degrees, if we don't keep the water running at least a trickle overnight, we have no water from the faucet come morning. A few minutes of hairdryer on pipes thaws them out, thank goodness.

New Years Eve we went to church in Ninilchik and the heat had gone out, so we had a very quick 30 minute service, with our gloves on and hoods up. That day it was around zero, but we weren't dressed for the cold weather. The chill didn't leave me for hours, and I appreciated every bit of warmth in the house when we returned home.

Amazingly, we have gotten out cross-country skiing nearly every day throughout this cold snap, which started a few days after Christmas. The kids get out too, but they're not good for playing outside for as long, and I keep an eye on them. When Denver starts getting white patches on his cheeks, I know we've been out a bit too long. I find that the cold is very tiring, and I am more worn out from the same amount of skiing. Skis just don't slide as well in cold weather, so I can walk right up steep hills on my skate skis, with no kick wax! Guess the added workout is a good thing--keeps me warm!

We are blessed that both our cars started right up, even when parked outside in sub-zero weather. From what I've heard, AAA in Anchorage had 250-300 calls a day (compared to their normal 10), and car battery sales have been awesome recently. Firewood is precious, and one man in the bush is burning logs he had planned on using for a new cabin.

The effect of being on the ocean is quite pronounced here, as you would see if you look at the weather map of Alaska. Homer is warmer than Ninilchik; while both are on the water, Homer has Kachemak Bay on one side and Cook Inlet on the other. Ninilchik just has Cook Inlet on one side. Just heading a few miles inland, such as in Kenai or Soldotna, means the temperatures are about 20 degrees colder than in Homer. So when our temperatures are at -10, we can guess Soldotna, 2 hours north, is at -30. This was the case Thursday when we drove to Soldotna. It was -4 when we left Homer at 8 am, and it was -26 in Soldotna at 10:00. Brrr!

The one thing we are very thankful for is that with this cold it has been completely calm with not a breeze. A wind would have plunged the windchill beyond tolerable, but at least when it's calm it is bearable! The Kenai/Soldotna area always seems to have frost-covered trees, which are gloriously beautiful, as you can see from the photo above.

Alyeska Ski Vacation

I have heard about Alyeska for years since my aunt and uncle and their family have spent some time here, so when airline prices went up, up, up, our vacation to Colorado got shelved in favor of something closer to home. Doug and the kids had never downhill skied or snowboarded before, but the kids were enthusiastic about a ski vacation, so we set up a 4-day trip to Alyeska.

Alyeska is located in Girdwood, which is about 30 minutes south of Anchorage on the Turnagain Arm off Cook Inlet. The top of the mountain, at 3,939 feet, gets 635 inches of snow each year, while the base gets, on average, 197 inches. We are used to having more snow where we live east of Homer than just about anywhere else we visit on the Kenai Peninsula, but they do have more snow in Girdwood than we do at home, and it felt like a truly beautiful fairyland driving the streets of the village, with lamplight shining on snow-laden spruce trees and the snowbanks piled high.

Day 1: Douglas and Aurora took snowboarding lessons, Denver took alpine lessons, and I bopped around and got a feel for the lay of things. I have my own skis that a friend gave me (thanks, Lorraine!), and my lift tickets came with the room, so I was free to ski all I wanted. It had been 18 years almost to the day that I last downhill skied in Colorado at Keystone, but the snowplow turn felt like second nature despite all those years. I was still a bit tentative on the green (easy) slopes, but enjoyed the long, gradual Blueberry Hill and Sitzmark runs. After a couple runs, I decided to take the tram to the top of Mt. Alyeska. It was a cloudy, overcast day, but just a few hundred feet up we went through the clouds and broke out into the glorious sunshine which you see in the picture above. It was a different world up there, and though Turnagain Arm was covered with clouds, the mountains all around the Arm soared up, creating a stunning vista. It is above treeline, so it was all snow, snow and more snow. It made me kind of nervous thinking about skiing down it since I could see just how far I had to go. I was used to Keystone (the only other place I'd ever downhill skied), where it was 4 miles from the top to bottom and there were plenty of trees to break things up. I took the tram back down, feeling slightly embarrassed to be carrying my skis back down the mountain rather than skiing it.

Day 2: Douglas and Aurora took the Level II snowboarding lessons, and Denver and I hit the easy slopes. After 2 runs down, Denver beat me to the bottom every single time. Picture what the alpine ski racers look like, crouched down in a tuck and on a single-minded focus to get to the bottom of that mountain as fast as possible. That's exactly what Denver looked like in his cute blue snowsuit that is patched up with duct tape. "No fear" comes to mind as I watched him, and my mother instincts on one hand wanted to yell at him "Stay in control!" every single run, while on the other hand I wanted him to feel the confidence and joy of skiing well, which he was. Three hours of skiing tuckered us out so we were ready to hit the hot tub. Meanwhile, Aurora and Douglas learned the "S" turn on their snowboards, each of them at one of the two "Magic Carpets"--conveyor belts that take beginning skiers and snowboarders to the top of their practice area.

Day 3: Douglas and Aurora practiced their snowboarding technique for a couple hours. In the afternoon I took Aurora down the Blueberry Hill run, and was totally impressed by how well she did. Day 1 saw her falling a lot, but she managed a decent sized hill 2 out of 4 times without falling. Again, my mother instincts were to be protective and "Oh my gosh, she's going to fall!" but Aurora popped right back up again and on she went. Since I know nothing about snowboarding, all I would be able to do is help her up anyways, so I was really hoping she knew what she was doing. I am in awe of that girl, though!
Douglas didn't feel like attempting a bigger hill on his board, so he watched each of the kids as I took the other out. Denver was a kamikaze skier again today. More awe on my part. Never mind that he's only skied a couple times--I was learning from him! He has naturally great technique and got the telemark turn down pat. How does he manage to be so good? I am jealous! I think part of it is just that lack of fear that I once had--and that got me in plenty of scrapes.
The big accomplishment of the day was by ME! I took the tram up to the top first thing when the slopes opened at 10:30, determined to ski down. There is a blue star route--one level above the green easy slopes--that goes from the tram on down to the bottom. Since I learned to ski when my boyfriend at the time took me to the top of Keystone and said, "Ski down," I figured that I should be able to ski an easy slope. I hardly got a wink of sleep last night I was so keyed up about it. It was one of those things I wanted to do simply because I feared doing it. I am a firm believer in "Feel the fear and do it anyways." So, I felt the fear and did it anyways, and I am here writing about it, so I obviously survived!
There were a few major challenges for me on this run down Main Street, The Weir, Ego Flats, Cork Screw, Switchback, Klondike and Cabbage Patch. First of all, I was the first one down the slope that day! All the other people who had gotten out of the tram took the more difficult runs, so here I was, trying to figure out where the runs went in fresh, ungroomed snow. It would be one thing if I were an experienced skier, but I am not. When I last skied I was with someone who told me where to go, what to do, etc. I just had to ski. This time I was all by myself with no one to guide me. In one place I followed the sign that said "Switchback", but it appeared to be pointing in a narrow trail through the woods. That didn't seem right, so I skied back out of the woods, and further down I saw my turn.
My second challenge was that my legs got incredibly tired. I was using way more energy than one needs to, partly because I was so tense and partly because my technique was terrible. So by the time I got down to the Klondike, my quads were shaking from fatigue, and the final run, the Cabbage Patch, was the steepest part of the whole run. Well, I made it down to the Day Lodge in 17 minutes from the time I started, and let me tell you, it was the longest 17 minutes I've been through in quite awhile. Denver was raring to go when I finally found him, so I managed another 3 hours of skiing for him before I begged off to head to the hot tub.

There were no lines at the lifts, the slopes weren't very crowded, the weather was perfect, the staff were nice, and besides Chair #3 on the easy slopes breaking down for an hour on Day 2 (very frustrating for Denver), it was a good skiing/boarding experience. Aurora is now plotting how she can earn money to buy a snowboard, and Doug thinks he'll actually "ride" again sometime. Alyeska Resort is at the base of the tram and Chair #7 which takes one over to the main slopes. The beds and pillows are immensely comfortable, which is not something to take lightly! The hot tub is delightfully huge, and the pool is nice. There is a beautiful, posh exercise room which I was too tired to check out, but which tempted me each day. The greatest disappointment was that the resort advertises a skating pond right outside, but they weren't maintaining it, so we'd hauled our ice skates here for naught. There are also cross-country ski and snowshoeing trails all around (50 kilometers worth!), but again, I was too tired after skiing the slopes to torture myself like that!

Overall, this was a nice, comfortable vacation, and was less than the price of 2 plane tickets to the Lower 48. We were each happy with what we did, and we're already trying to figure out when we're going to come back again.