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Showing posts from August, 2012

Alaska-The Great Land-Action Plan

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Some Day Is Today /* Ocean Blue Navigation Theme for Blogger */ :root { --deep-ocean: #003366; --ocean-blue: #0066cc; --sea-foam: #66ccff; --wave-white: #f0f8ff; --anchor-gray: #4a5568; --coral-accent: #ff6b6b; --nautical-gold: #ffd700; } * { margin: 0; padding: 0; box-sizing: border-box; } body { font-family: 'Georgia', 'Times New Roman', serif; background: linear-gradient(135deg, var(--wave-white) 0%, var(--sea-foam) 100%); color: var(--deep-ocean); line-height: 1.6; } /* Maritime Navigation Header */ .blog-header { background: linear-gradient(90deg, var(--deep-ocean) 0%, var(--ocean-blue) 50%, var(--deep-ocean) 100%); padding: 1rem 0; box-shadow: 0 4px 20px rgba(0, 5...

Salmon Fishing- Reeling In The Years

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There's a fine line between fishing and just standing o n a bridge looking like an idiot unless you are in Alaska holding a salmon  It is truly the king of fish I have been fishing all season but not for the fish, but what the wild salmon symbolize--- the Pacific Northwest's natural splendor. The 1000 year-old salmon run is alive and well

Wings Over Misty Fjords-Flightseeing

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More like Blue Sky Fjords  205 inches of rain a year and not one drop today. A unique Alaskan experience— We took off from Ketchikan Harbor Seaplane Base,  and the self-proclaimed Salmon capital of the world---the place where people don't get old, they rust...and rust never sleeps. Up in the air for 30 minutes on the single engine "flying boat" and the small remote mountain lakes  we saw below would be next to impossible to reach on foot, a reminder that most of this area is still wilderness and accessible only by small boat or plane.  In the heyday, I could imagine how snail mail (US) delivery runs must have been done this way. Hey Hey, My My Yet they were spectacular by air, like waves  each one  more powerful than the next. Pilot Jeff Carlin, picked out one of the lakes, landed the "puddle jumper"  and  JC turned off the noisy diesel engine that was a reminder that we left  the  the buzz of everyday life...

Tongass---No Rain, No Rainbow Falls

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The way I see it, if you want to see Rainbow Falls, you gotta put up with the rain. I think salmon fish in the package is nice, but then I think that rain is wet, so who am I to judge? Many consider the Tongass National Forest to be the "crown jewel" of our national forest system  One thing for sure- It's a  Watershed Moment---A point in time when nothing after will ever be the same as before when it comes to my appreciation for precipitation. It's no longer  the path of moist resistance. I like the rain. I finally got my bearings...

Tongass---No Rain, No Rainbow Falls

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The way I see it, if you want to see Rainbow Falls, you gotta put up with the rain. I think salmon fish in the package is nice, but then I think that rain is wet, so who am I to judge? Many consider the Tongass National Forest to be the "crown jewel" of our national forest system  One thing for sure- It's a  Watershed Moment---A point in time when nothing after will ever be the same as before when it comes to my appreciation for precipitation. It's no longer  the path of moist resistance. I like the rain. I finally got my bearings...

B.E.S.T. Bears Eagles Salmon Totem Poles

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If you're a bear, you get to hibernate. You do nothing for six months. I could deal with that. Before you hibernate, you're supposed to  gorge yourself stupid. on salmon I could deal with that too.  Bears are a proud people, although they're not people per-say. They're animals. Bears derive their name from an NFL football team in Chicago. Bears have been known to attack man, although the fact is that fewer people have been killed by bears than in all of World  Wars I and  II combined, and probably World War 3. Note to self:“Always respect Mother Nature. Especially when she weighs 400 pounds and is guarding her baby.” Come On Dog, Mush!

B.E.S.T. Bears Eagles Salmon Totem Poles

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If you're a bear, you get to hibernate. You do nothing for six months. I could deal with that. Before you hibernate, you're supposed to  gorge yourself stupid. on salmon I could deal with that too.  Bears are a proud people, although they're not people per-say. They're animals. Bears derive their name from an NFL football team in Chicago. Bears have been known to attack man, although the fact is that fewer people have been killed by bears than in all of World  Wars I and  II combined, and probably World War 3. Note to self:“Always respect Mother Nature. Especially when she weighs 400 pounds and is guarding her baby.” Come On Dog, Mush!

In The Sky-Wings Over The Inside Passage

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And the vagabond wind, whispers over the bay and the songs and the laughter, are carried away in the sky Anywhere there is blue on the map you can find them. Seaplanes don't need runways.Taking off and landing in water has a romantic fascination because float planes  can go places that you can't get to otherwise.  De Plane, De Plane

S E Alaska-Here Comes The Sun-

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And I Say It's Alright 5 days a year there is pure sunshine, the rest are liquid.  The Ketchikan-Misty Fiords Ranger District encompasses over 3.2 million acres of temperate rainforest, mountain peaks, glaciers, alpine tundra, muskegs, lakes, rivers, and streams. Time to take a hike and listen to The Beatles... The first tune I learned  to play on guitar was “Horse With No Name”, the second, "Here Comes The Sun” . It’s light and simple and my favorite George Harrison song. The song is in A chromatic-minor with an A tonic major chord.[2] The refrain uses a IV (D chord) to V (E chord) progression (the reverse of that used in "Eight Days a Week" ). The melody in the verse and refrain basically follows the pentatonic scale from E up to C♯ (scale steps 5, 6, 1, 2, 3.Now where is my guitar..oh yea--- Gently weeping. YESterday was cold and rainy But Here Comes The Well -Deserved Sun

Tongass Rain Forest-On The Waterfront

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If people concentrated on the really important things they'd be a shortage of fishing poles.  Carpet Diem means fish of the day around here. Pinks and Silver-Ko ho salmon. Fishing is actually boring, unless you catch an actual fish, and then it is disgusting I Hear Invoices   I am thinking of that movie with Brando " I coulda been a contender." the central theme of the coulda, shouda, woulda crowd. At sea, however,  we have no CNN effect  nor 57 channels  to tell us our dancing, singing and comedy  is not good enough as American Idol-click- or DWTS-click, TMZ-click or Reality TV. The Way In Is The Way Out It's all self referential which ends up being the way out of the Contender Syndrome and  America’s culture of envy, and wanting be, do, and have more. The disease of more is  really an indictment of our  own judgments that we haven’t accomplished enough. Reaching our potential comes from a discrepancy ...

Tongass Rain Forest-On The Waterfront

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If people concentrated on the really important things they'd be a shortage of fishing poles.  Carpet Diem means fish of the day around here. Pinks and Silver-Ko ho salmon. Fishing is actually boring, unless you catch an actual fish, and then it is disgusting I Hear Invoices   I am thinking of that movie with Brando " I coulda been a contender." the central theme of the coulda, shouda, woulda crowd. At sea, however,  we have no CNN effect  nor 57 channels  to tell us our dancing, singing and comedy  is not good enough as American Idol-click- or DWTS-click, TMZ-click or Reality TV. The Way In Is The Way Out It's all self referential which ends up being the way out of the Contender Syndrome and  America’s culture of envy, and wanting be, do, and have more. The disease of more is  really an indictment of our  own judgments that we haven’t accomplished enough. Reaching our potential ...

Misty Fjords-Active Rain

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Back in Ketchikan, Its Tlingit Indian name, Kach Khanna, means “spread wings of the eagle".  and I have seen many of them. I am within minutes by float plane from Misty Fjords and the Tongas National Rain Forest. Timber harvesting is all but over, and the environmental narrative is about this place, while not being  as bio-diverse as The Amazon, Tongas  is denser and the largest rainforest  in the US,at 17 Million acres Among the salmon and deer and black bears, and trees

Seattle- I Have My Reservations

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Doing some eco-tourism in Washington State and meeting people that work for Boeing, Microsoft, Amazon ,those bio tech firms and of course Starbucks.But I would have really liked to talk story with Chief Seattle.Here is his take on real estate. It is not just location, location, location:"Every part of this earth is sacred to my people. Every shining pine needle, every sandy shore, every mist in the dark woods, every meadow, every humming insect. All are holy in the memory and experience of my people." "Will you teach your children what we have taught our children? That the earth is our mother? What befalls the earth befalls all the sons of the earth. This we know: the earth does not belong to us but man to the earth. All things are connected like the blood that unites us all. Man did not weave the web of life, he is merely a strand in it. Whatever he does to the web, he does to himself"

Alaska,,Where Mother Nature Lives

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If a man speaks in the forest and there are no women around to hear it, is he still wrong?  I, the land I know I have the best of time and space, and was never measured and never will be measured. I tramp a perpetual journey, (come listen all!) My signs are a rain-proof coat, good shoes, and a staff cut from the woods, No friend of mine takes his ease in my chair, I have no chair, no church, no philosophy, I lead no man to a dinner-table, library, exchange, But each man and each woman of you I lead upon a knoll, My left hand hooking you round the waist, My right hand pointing to landscapes of continents and the public road. Not I, not any one else can travel that road for you, You must travel it for yourself. It is not far, it is within reach, Perhaps you have been on it since you were born and did not know, Perhaps it is everywhere on water and on land. Shoulder your duds dear son, and I will mine, and let us hasten forth, Wonderful cities and free nations we shall fetch as we...

Glacier Bay-WWJM(John Muir) Do?

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Have a nICE Day “The world is big and I want to have a good look at it before it gets dark.” -JM Same Ship Different Day I had a similar epiphiny in the Norwegian  Geirangerfjord- Mother Nature and Father Time Are Effing Special. “I'm past the point of no return,” Mother Jones Before, Norway, Earth Goddess was just a yuppie  salad dressing you could buy at Whole  Foods. I never thought  that people died. They just went to organic health food stores... and  that Japanese guy who always wins the hot dog eating contest is the anti-christ. Today as I kayak in the fjords and observe the sun, the water,  the green and everything in flow, I say to myself  "Yes indeed, all this belongs to me!". and, more than that,I play a role in its appearance. As I get a glimpse of the deeper, random, chance  encounters of my 3 pound  universe (brain), with Mother Nature and Father Time being demoted from actual realit...

The Chilkoot Trail-Miner For A Heart of Gold

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Finding Alaska is easy. My eyes mint gold. Nothing shines so brightly. The scenery  paints itself. I'm just the middleman.  You can't create experiences like this, you undergo them. You can mine for gold or you can sell pickaxes Being born in the US is like being kidnapped and sold into  entrepreneurship   on Planet Pick Axe. My universe is made of stories, not atoms: land, air and sea travel and the power of now. If I wanted to be a multinational soul, and  monetize  my best asset,me, I couldn't do it in cities where I taught English like New York or Los Angeles, Paris or Tokyo alone-I needed to get consecrated by sailing on the oceans.It's a wonderful thing to get rid of everything and everybody and just go some place where you don't know anyone; where, as Melville said,"God's one and only voice is Silence." All Ashore-Traquility Base, The Ego Has Landed Skagway Today Living on a ship, might be summed up as monotony tinged with hysteria.  It's no...

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