More, Please.

I flew out to my company's Bear Camp to help out for a couple of days, and as usual great times were had by all. There are bears everywhere out there, like this one that strolled through camp:
Whenever we would see a bear, my coworker Caprice and I would instantly fall into these bonafide safety positions- 'The Arrow to My Happy Place' and 'Back to Momma's Belly':
Back here on the other side of the inlet, the water in our river still isn't rising fast enough, so we kayaked up today to see how deep it is (the water is still 2 inches deep, dangit). Moma crowned herself Queen for a Day, and took over our kayaks in true royal fashion:
And then, and this is what I am dying to tell you all... I found a (slightly) mysterious abandoned cabin right near our lodge! For years now our coworker Gary has been telling us that he has heard there is an old cabin out by our place, and he was right!
After we arrived at the lodge we run, I was tromping through the woods, and first I saw this, an old trapper's cabin. They make them small because when you are trapping in the middle of winter you are just going to stay the night there, and the smaller space to heat up, the better:
So as I was walking closer to it to peek inside... I saw the cabin! Joy of all joys! I ran back and got Taylor so we could both explore it together (because that's obviously more fun), and even though the roof has fallen in, it's awesome, and it's ours:
All my frustration over the river's water level slid away, and my day sprang up happy, and all because of our Found Cabin.
A cabin! And I found it!

Taylor's Solo Journey to the North Pole.

Our transportation of choice to get us up the river to the lodge we run is a flat-bottomed jon boat powered by the mighty Go-Devil engine. Our current Go-Devil is getting old and cries a lot, so Taylor made a daring journey to North Pole, the Christmas-year-round town near Fairbanks to buy a new boat and Go-Devil from the Go-Devil Jedi of the World, Stu.
Here is typical North Pole street scene:
Here is Taylor's room at the B&B he stayed in. Crossbows, Swedish songbooks, Christmas trees, and Lord Fauntleroy figurines all together as one- I think the theme was 'Christmas with the Scandinavian Robin Hood':

And here is our new beauty, a 24-foot government-issue-only Go-Devil. The orange bucket is covering up the prop. The loverly landscape behind is typical interior Alaska scenery:
You may all think that we are getting pretty excited about nerdy things like new swamp boats, and you would be right. So of course there are going to be many more pictures of the two boats, both with fresh coats of paint and new names (the old Go-Devil, which has been bequeathed to me, by Taylor, is now named George Washington Hayduke).

Send Us Goodies...

...and we will send you something really great from up here!
Our mailing address is:
Taylor and Adalie Beckley
General Delivery
Sterling, AK 99672
Presented by another Classic Alaskan Moment.

Cool Cars and Buff Bods.

We've been taking mini excursions after work- on one we went with some friends to this great little lake to go canoeing. That sounds wonderful, and it was, but here are the details of that trip: Taylor was really sick with the beginnings of a bad flu (it's not like I made him go, but I like hanging out with him- so sue me...), we only had two paddles total between the two boats, it was extremely windy and our canoe almost flew off the top of our truck, and the wooden paddle you see in this picture snapped in half soon after- thus leaving us with 1 1/2 paddles and a wide stick to move around with. But how fun! We found an island and enjoyed the partial sunshine, and Moma is a natural canoe dog. Just look at that fierce little look in her eyes:Another day Taylor and I went on a hike to a nearby glacial lake. Taylor pumped some iron and got totally buff:
And then we found this super sweet hot rod and took a spin:
And so we're off to a good start of the season! Yippee!

Long Haulin'

We are now in The Future, and glad for it. The trip here was fine, without any serious incidences- and the only troubles we did have were with our silly little puppy.
The first night, she puked up a big mess onto Taylor's camp mat in the middle of the night- puke that was full of 4" long wriggling worms (needless to say, she's now on medicine for that).
The second day she fell through this frozen lake (pictured below), and had to squirm her way out of it, while we had a panic attack on the shore:
The third night I scared myself silly because all the trees around our campsite had fresh bear scratches on them, or so I thought. Taylor solved that mystery by realizing that they were made by a snowplow. I'm such a weenie:
The fourth, fifth, and sixth nights passed without incident. One of the best thing about the trip were Moma's games of Bull Fighting. She's a natural:

Oregon's State Beverage is Milk!

We're going North to the Future tomorrow from She Flies With Her Own Wings (if you know your state mottoes then you will know where we are going and where we are now). In honor of the fun we will most definitely have, here is a video from when we drove down last October, when we put our full faith in the Swedish powers of a 1968 Volvo (and the omnipotent powers of our God), and were rewarded in full:

Also, Oregon's state dance is the Folk Dance. I'm not quite sure how that one goes.

Curling Cornices.

Taylor and I have been knocking the stuffing out of the mountain this week. It has snowed every day, at least 6 inches a day- and it's light and fluffy snow, like in January!
Here are three different cornices we were jumping (and falling) off of. I am the first picture, and Taylor is in the other two. These cornices weren't that big or anything- the first one was 7 feet and the last one is around 11 feet- but oh it was fun!

Can't Every Weekend Be A Holiday Weekend?

Taylor and I just returned from a trip- him to visit his good friend Ross at the coast, and me to Portland to see my good friend Marie. I had the camera, though, so you will just have to trust me that Taylor (and Moma) had a pretty sweet time.
Marie and I went to a great thrift store, just chock full of goodies. She purchased this gem of a nesting-doll, showing Russian (or shall I say USSR-ian?) leaders through the ages. Can you spot mini Stalin?
Another thrift store we visited apparently decided that separating books based on the author's sex was the way to go. Do I need to mention that the store was run by a conservative Christian group?
We then headed up to Seattle and had what I believe could firmly be asserted as a marvelous time. The Sculpture Park there is really fun, and Marie and I could be heard to shout in glee, "Is that a Richard Sera? Oh my gosh! It's so great!" A wedding party and their photographer thought so as well:
A gathering of slightly blurry Whitworthians were seen at a party Eli threw at his lovely new home:
The childhood game of Jump Off The Swings is still great as an adult, we decided. From top to bottom are Marie and Matt, Jenene, Lars, and Marie and me.
And so, to end this post and this weekend, we have a shot of Marie's legs, flying high, wishing us well:

Steens! Alvord! Moma!

We left the town of Bend for the first time in 5 months yesterday- I guess our first cold winter in three years made us go into hibernation mode. As lifelong Oregonians, we felt the stateriotic (pride in one's home state) duty to go camping and experience nature in it's finest, specifically in the famous Steens Mountains of south-eastern Oregon. That whole area is a favorite of ours, and I was proportionately way too excited for the two day camping excursion- which I blame on not having left a 30-mile radius in so long.
The start of the trip wasn't too auspicious, because we left too early to take Moma on her morning walk, and she barked at us to let us know of her displeasure. Our ears rang:
But she soon wised up to the coolness of our destination, and once we got there, decided to help Taylor fish for rainbow trout:
Her help payed off, because he caught a big, old papa. Meanwhile, I took a lovely nap under an old teepee frame I found (was it built by Native Americans or hippies, we will never know). My pillow wasn't near as bad as Jacob's rock- a nice paperback book by Virginia Woolf. I like to think I soaked up some of her way with words into my dreams (which were bizarre, by the way):
Also, our campsite had been frequented by lovers of iconic '90's bands, as seen by these quaint engravings on the picnic table. The attention to detail in the backwards 'R' is my favorite part:
The next day we headed around the bend, so to speak, to the Alvord Desert, a true freak of nature in nature. Picture, if you will, mountains almost 10,000 feet high on one side and a huge flat desert miles across on the other- so great! You can drive no-handed and blind, and still be safe. If we could only figure out how to make the moolah out there, we would totally buy a big parcel of land and make it our home sweet home- a lack of crowds and a surplus of space equals count us in!
Moma and I had a race. It was a tie:
And then she faced the gusty winds, and tried to figure out just where the heck we were:
All in all, a good mini-excursion. Camping is ten times as much fun with a dog than without. And Moma had been so good on the trip that when we got home, she promptly ran off yipping and yapping after a herd of deer. Sheesh already.