thoughts from the plane

The soreness from yesterday's hike is finally settling in. My legs, sore from the awkward gait of the snowshoes, are briefly relieved when I take off my BOG boots so I can move my feet as I like. My upper arms are also sore from supporting the weight of my pack and taking it on and off. Although I had forgotten my snowshoes, Ryan let me use his so I could see what they were like. soon, I was wearing them the entirety of our hike. I liked the bar I could flip up to use on inclines. I was pretty good at not stepping on each of the shoes, although I did wipe out a few times. Luckily, the snow was fluffy and I was bundled in multiple layers so the falls didn't hurt. The only time it came close to hurting was when I completely wiped out and my messenger bag whipped around and whacked me in the face. Other than that, the terrain was fairly boring and I was afraid we'd run into bears toward the end. I'd see what I thought were their tracks as it got darker and darker and insisted on holding onto Ryan's hand even though it made it more difficult to hike. We ran into the presidents of the ski club and despite being nice, we knew we were being lectured about punching holes into their precious groomed trails with our boots and snowshoes.

Other outdoorsy things we did included walking on a frozen lake (not for very long because I was nervous) and went to the beach to take photos. I will post photos from that soon.

home

And where are you from? The cashier asked.

Wrangell. I answered. Huh. I'm from Wrangell. I didn't even further explain that I recently moved from another state this time.

Are you visiting family then? she asked me.

I'm visiting my boyfriend. We met in Wrangell and then he moved up here for a job.

That was the first time I referred to Wrangell as "home". Previously, I had referred to my prior residence as home. I guess living two months in a new place is long enough for such a label. Another step in settling in.

ask and you shall receive

Just as I received my snowshoes and was waiting for the snow, it came the next day. This photo was taken today after coming home from work. Adam, most appreciatively, gave me a ride home and I was glad to use my yak trax in my walk to work this morning.

Will I get up that mountain and snow hike through that fluffy stuff? I hope so!

snowshoeing and other activities

When my snowshoes arrived, I couldn't believe I found something for me to wear that actually dwarfed the size of my head. After that first note of happiness, I also noted that the steel teeth on the bottom of said snowshoes were bada@@. These far above my mental image of tennis rackets strapped to my shoes or boots. These could tear up some stuff (like the inside of the box they came in, for instance).

Now for some snow.

Nearly all the mountains around here have a dusting of snow but it has not come down to sea level yet. Word is that it will snow down here tomorrow.

Liz and I hiked Mt. Dewey again yesterday. We had the day off for Veteran's Day and celebrated it by liberating her dog Burton to hike up and down the mountain. It's not a terribly hard boardwalk trail, and with Burton keeping us moving, we made it up in 12 short minutes. You can click here for pictures from our time together, as well as other hiking trips. Those pictures are roughly on the bottom third of the page.

The rest of the day was spent relaxing, doing laundry and cleaning up the apartment. A few weeks ago, Adam, Sarah and Liz all helped me paint my apartment a delightfully beige color named Nation and another reddish color for an accent wall in the bathroom. I will post more pictures once I finish taking them of the entryway and have a bit more bandwidth to spare. That's one thing I don't like about rural Alaska...internet data caps!