Juneau

I left Juneau on Wednesday but not without touring the National Weather Service office, who hosted the meeting I had attended,



and seeing Mendenhall Glacier one last time. You've gotta love that glacier blue!

Memorial Day

On Memorial Day I had to fly to Juneau for a meeting that was starting the next morning. Since I hadn't been to Juneau before, I decided to take a morning flight out of Fairbanks, which would put me in Juneau around lunchtime and give myself a little time to explore.

I started my tour downtown where there were five cruise ships and all of their passengers. I didn't stick around long for fear I would run someone over with my rental car. There were people everywhere! If you look across the Channel to Douglas, you get an idea of the surroundings I was in (minus the people and humongous ships).

After exploring around town, I headed north as far as the road would take me. I figured that it wouldn't be too far because you can't actually drive to Juneau. You have to arrive via boat or plane. The beaches and views north of town were amazing, and there was a lot more pavement than I anticipated. If I remember correctly, the road was about 30 miles or so.


It started gettinga little later than I anticipated, and I still had to eat dinner, so a quick trip to Mendenhall glacier finished up the evening.

Anchor Point

Thursday completed our calibration in Anchor Point, Alaska, where we had been weathered out on Monday. It was a beautiful day, and everything went perfectly with the work that we had to do. I think the highlight was not only having the work go smoothly (even though Andrew got to go out in the boat again while I spent the day in a dark cabin) but seeing how they launched the boats into Cook Inlet. They literally used a tractor to haul the boats to the water’s edge. I’ve never seen such a thing! I’ll just let you view the sequence of pictures to see what I mean.






After the work was finished, we went to see a nesting bald eagle that the boat operators told us about.



Somedays the Alaskan experiences never seem to end. Anyway, another work trip down…check! (I meant that to be a check mark, not a payday check.)

Sea Week

Spending the night in a schoolroom, we awoke Wednesday with a day full of presentations ahead of us. It was Sea Week in Nanwalek, when the school has a week full of ocean-themed lessons. Andrew and I were due to present physical oceanography lessons to all of the grade levels, K-12. The school has the students divided into four age groups: K-2, 3-5, 6-8, and 9-12. All of the students were very polite and interested in what we had to tell them. In fact, I can’t say enough about how special everyone is in Nanwalek. The entire village is always super helpful and just the nicest people in the world. You can’t pass someone without them smiling and saying hello and asking if you need help transporting your gear. After the school day ended, we returned to Homer to spend the night and prepare for our next day of work.

Nanwalek Calibration

Tuesday morning began with another trip in the ‘little plane’ (mentioned in a previous entry) over to the village of Nanwalek, where we did an antenna calibration. For the actual calibration, Andrew got to ride in the boat...


...while I sat watching the computer in the four-wheeler shed where we house our electronics. Somebody has to watch the computer screen to make sure we are picking up the signal from the boat.


The weather was beautiful. Lucky Andrew! However, I did find some time to enjoy the sun after we were finished.

More Field Work

This entry begins a series about a work trip I took to calibrate ocean surface current data. Unfortunately, on the first day, we we were met with strong winds and a small craft advisory for Cook Inlet, which meant that we couldn't go out in a boat as planned. Since we couldn't have the boat drive around with our transmitter, we put it in Andrew’s backpack and had him walk around the beach during low tide. He couldn't get as far offshore as the boat, but it was good practice.


In the end, it didn’t matter because our GPS didn’t record the data correctly. What a waste, but at least it helped to kill the time.

I apologize if you’re confused by all of my work verbiage. Everyone is. If you have any questions, please feel free to ask.

You know...

You guys know that if you click on the pictures they get bigger, right? I was talking to someone who didn't realize that, so I thought that maybe I should tell everyone. Most of them are much easier to see when viewed at their original resolution and size.

Spring Field Work

Last November, we set up a couple of field sites in south central Alaska. Part of this process involved standing some antennas along the coast, but with the spring thaw, those antennas have begun to sink into the wet ground, so Andrew and I took a trip to right them back up again. One of our field sites is Nanwalek, Alaska, which is a beautiful Alutiiq village in lower Cook Inlet.


The only way to get there from across the bay is by plane...a little plane that costs about $100 round trip.


It's amazing, really. There is a string of villages along the coast each with thier own 'airport' where people find shelter as they meet the plane to pick up the mail, see what random packages have been sent over on the plane, send things out, or catch the plane themselves.


The trip was a success and didn't take much time at all. We left with antennas intact. Although we will return on Mother's Day to spend a few days calibrating our instruments and giving some oceanography demonstrations at the village school. It should be fun.

No trip to the Homer, Alaska, area is ever complete without seeing a bald eagle, or two, or twenty.

Just because...

My friend Ellen sent some pictures that she took from the bluff above our campsite on the Tanana River, and I like them so much I thought I would share.