Morning Snow

Started snow again this morning, all is turning white. This is one of the earliest snow falls on record.

Alaska DOT have a great website to check on the road conditions before you head out. Click on the blue diamonds to go to that area of the road, webcams are there to.
Area Road Conditions

Looking out my office window this morning.

Thanks all this morning

Laters
Ed

Snow!

Soooo, at about 5pm it started to snow. Let the dogs out so they could play a bit in it, they came in all covered in white.
First snow here in Alaska. I know it won’t stay, but what the hell, YAY.

Laters from da white land

Ed

Weather n Such

So now that I have my weather station up and running again, I’ve been adding other goodies to it. This morning I added links to Recent Earthquakes in Alaska and Aurora (northern lights) forecast. While searching for a good map to use for the earthquakes, I saw that we had a small magnitude 3.0 earthquake yesterday quite near by.

Earthquake Map

As with most websites, my weather site is a work in progress. I’m not really happy with the maps I have, guess I’ll just have to keep hunting. I just don’t care for the color graft type maps. If anyone has some ideas, let me know eh.

Me getting a job news is, nothing yet, though I do have an interview next Tuesday. I have applied for about 12+ opening in the past week, guess I just need to be more patient, it’s only been 1 week.

I completed our log bed yesterday and we slept in/on it last night.

Here’s a photo I took a few days ago. I think it’s a 1947, I know it’s a Jeep Woody. It was taken shooting into my side view mirror while at a stoplight.

That’s it for now.

Laters
Ed

Just Stuff

Not much going on today. Finished varnishing our log bed with a third and quick fourth coat. Looks great now! The other thing I accomplished was getting my weather station up, running and posting to the web again. YAY. –> Weather At The Nephler’s

Tomorrow I’ll check out the bed to see if it’s good and dry, if so, piece it together and get it upstairs.

Anyway, just a quick note of what went on today.

Laters
Ed

Stuff Around The House

Today Jan headed off to work so I dug into our log bed, it was about time I got this done. The day was quite nice again, sunny in the low 50s, but I needed to get working on this bed. I gave it one coat of varnish then ran to the store to pick up some bits and pieces we needed. Came back home to give the bed another good coat. Looking good, should be done with the varnishing tomorrow, one or two more coats should do it.

That’s about it for today, though I did enjoy working on the bed, I really like doing that kind of stuff.

Foot & Head rails

Side support rails

Main support posts

That’s all folks…

Laters
Ed

More Exploring

So I got up today and started sanding down our log bed that I yet have to finish, Jan started cleaning the house. We both got to a point where we needed a rest, sat down for a bit, then I asked; we should go up to Hatcher Pass to let the dogs run. We got dressed warm, we knew it would be cool up there, and headed out the door with the dogs.

Driving up there were lots of cars heading up and down the pass road, it seemed like every spot to let the dogs run was taken. While driving up we passed a small dirt cutting off to the right called Archangle Rd. We continued up Hatcher Pass rd. to where it ended, for the season anyway, and turned around. There were quite a few people with sleds and skis hiking up a bit further to the snow. Anyway, while heading back down we turned onto Archangle Rd to see where it went.

Well, Archangle Rd is one bumpy ass, potholed road, but wow, was it beautiful. The road passed a couple old gold mining camps and follows the Archangle River. We drove to just about the end and got out. We were at 3400 FT and above the tree line. The area we were at was in a bowl, sort of, and didn’t have any snow, but it was all around us. So we started walking up into the open area with the dogs, man what a wonderful area. The whole area was floored with berries. We walked for a bit then I realized I had forgotten my camera, damn. Walked for a bit more but the sun was starting to go behind the mountains so we desided to head back home. No mater what, we will be back up there come next summer.

Only a few photos today due to me forgetting my camera up there.

Looking down to Matanuska Valley, where we live

The end of Archangle Rd.

Heading back down

Guess that’s it for today
Remember…Do what you love, love what you do

Laters
Ed

Day Trippin’

Today we finally took the time to do some sight seeing. We had a great day, nice and sunny with highs in the 50’s. Couldn’t be much better. Our first idea was to head up to Hatcher Pass, but I looked online this morning and found that it had been closed as of Friday the 26th (yesterday) due to snow, so, we headed out to the Glen Hwy.

The Glen Hwy. runs through the Matanuska Valley and traces the receding glaciers responsible for this rugged part of Alaska. Some of the peaks reach heights over 12,000 FT as you drive along the Matanuska River. The views were spectacular, in both directions, it would have been way too long a drive to make the circle through Glennallen, Delta Junction, and up to Fairbanks and back. Anyway, along the way they are doing some major road constrution, as in blasting through some mountain sides, so we had some waits along the way. Was well worth it though.

We turned around at Sheep Mountain. This area is part of a volcanic system, where molten minerals surfaced in specific places about 150 million years ago. Right here at Sheep Mountain hydrogen sulfide and hot water mixed with limestone and created Gypsum. This gives the mountain it’s colors.

And on to the photos from today.

Views along the Glen Hwy

Matanuska Glacier

Sheep Mountain

… Up Close

Guess that’s it for now
’till next time
Laters
Ed

p.s.
Thanks Eric and Norm 🙂

Getting Oriented

Little over a week has passed sense we arrived in Alaska and time has been flying. Been spending most of our time exploring the town area for shopping and such. No real time for doing the sight seeing thing, hopefully tomorrow we’ll do some of that. I usually don’t have problems know north, south, east and west, but here seems different for some reason, slowly I’m getting my bearings. My home office window faces northerly towards the Talkeetna Mountains, once the leaves fall, I should have a great view.

We’re mostly unpacked and settled in, though a few things remain in the trailer and have to be sorted. I still need to finish our log bed before it gets too cold for the varnish to adhere. I have my weather station up and running, but I do not have it posting to the web yet, something more that needs doing eh.

Speaking of weather, it’s been mostly nice and sunny during the day, but right around 5 PM it seems to cloud up and rain for just a little. Temps have been in the upper 40’s to mid 50’s during the day and the mod 30’s at night.

These are a couple photos I took today of Wasilla Lake facing toward the north and Talkeetna Mountains.

Guess that’s about it for now, ’till next time
Laters
Ed