Wilderness Blues- Ramblings from the Great Land

For an isolated fishing village in Southeast Alaska, Hoonah has attracted quite a number of people down through the years. In the forty three years I've lived here I've seen a pretty diverse group. Some have come to give, some to take and some to try and hide out. There has been no shortage of transient folks, people who've come to take jobs at the cold storage or on fishing boats and in recent years filling the jobs at the cannery in the tourist industry. Once in blue moon we are graced with an individual of uncommon talent, such as the young lady pictured above. Her name is Christina Baal and she's a professional artist. She has a strong interest in birds and a desire to paint all ten thousand species. I hope that she lives long enough to see her passion fulfilled. I first saw an exhibit of her talent when I was working in the Forest Service building. The top photo of the Sockeye Salmon shows an example of her work. I was immediately drawn to it, in ...

  For most of the month of January we had rain. In my almost thirty eight years here, I've never experienced such a winter as this. Frankly, I was delighted that it was rain instead of snow, but honestly, waking up every day to the sound of pounding rain and the gloomy skies overhead was getting pretty consarned depressing. Yesterday the day dawned bright and sunny, and although much cooler than it had been, it was a welcome reprieve. After church I had almost no choice but to go on a walk out to the cannery. I took Jen and the dog with me. Usually Rigby likes to walk into the woods and sniff all the different smells. Jennifer on the other hand, never stops to smell the tracks on the ground. I'm kind of glad.Yesterday though, he was reluctant to get too far into the walk. He took a dump early on and, feeling that he had done his duty, started turning around trying to get back to the truck. We kept pulling him against his will to keep going forward. He...

    Back when I was in grade school, eons ago, we periodically would be given a paper with pictures of things that for the most part had something in common. Among the various things depicted would be one picture that wouldn't seem to quite fit in. We were suppose to circle the thing that didn't seem to follow the pattern of the other things. I'm not really sure how I did on those tests. I could always justify the odd picture being there  somehow. Frankly I don't know if there was even a correct answer to some of those tests. Even as a not so bright kid I felt like something was a little off in administering those tests. I guess I must have passed- they never came to get me for a psychological evaluation or anything and I managed somehow to make it through high school and even into the navy. When I was there they gave us the ink-blot test and asked us what each picture looked like. Is there a right or wrong answer? I don't know....

Before summer becomes too much of a distant memory, ( and before I lose the fact sheet that my grandson Kristian gave me) I wanted to do a post on the zip line, one of the popular attractions at Icy Strait Point. This isn't the best picture ever- I was shooting into the sun, but it was the only one I could get at the time. I was coming back from a days fishing earlier in the summer and I had a chance to get the most breathtaking, clear shot of the zipline- the wires were visible right unil they disappeared into the mist at the top of the mountain. It would have been a world class shot. I turned the boat around so I could get the best advantage, I turned on the camera and got just the right placement, and right when I pressed the shutter button, the battery died. Go figure. It was a classic Botts situation. After I got done swearing and a little time passed,I could see the humor in it. I still wish I could have gotten that shot though. Just looking at this picture is enough to make ...