Que pasa?

Much. Let's get to it.


Outhouse races, beer and "Oh yeah, I live in Alaska"

My last post was created about 20 minutes before I ventured to Chatanika Days with James and Christi. Chatanika is about 40 minutes northwest of town, but worth the drive for one event: outhouse racing.

James drove, which is good because we passed some awesome scenery and I would have rubber-necked us off a cliff. It's still amazing to me how you can drive 15 minutes out of Fairbanks and be dang near the middle of nowhere.

We assumed we had arrived when both shoulders of the road were lined with parked cars. We walked down to the Chatanika Lodge, the only building in sight (in fact, I don't recall seeing a road other than the highway we arrived on), and got a prime spot for the second heat of outhouse races.

The outhouses were set on skis and had pushbars on both ends. A person had to sit in the loo while four others shoved it down the highway (which doubled as the race track -- you can close off the only road into town when there's outhouse races, who would pass through and miss them?). One clever group attached a harness to its outhouse and had a runner pull from the front.

There was a slight s-curve at the end of the 100-meter-or-so track, and many outhouses toppled or went veering into the crowd. Because the right side of the curve was prime a prime target for out-of-control toilets, there were plenty of open spots along its edge. We took front row there.

Beers in hand, we whooped as the ouhouses skidded by. I was horribly underdressed and ended up with some grotesquely chapped lips, but it was all well worth it.

James and I were pondering joining the human bowling competition until we found out it was a parent-child activity. We were expecting to belly-flop ourselves down the lane.

I was dumb enough to forget my camera yet again. Christi is retro-cool enough to carry a Polaroid instant camera. That left the digital recording of this venture to James, who is always equipped with an iPhone. He sent me these shots:






And you can check out more at his Flickr page: http://flickr.com/photos/68679992@N00

The ground on ice and the sky on fire













I hit up the Ice Park for the third and final time to see the multi-block competition judging. The place was packed and I had to ditch the Kia about a mile from the park and walk the rest of the way on a narrow street that somehow had room for two-way traffic, a row of cars on one sholder and a single-file line of people. Honestly, the asphalt was only 15 feet wide and had snowbanks on both ends. This shouldn't have been possible.

But nor should have been some of the ice sculptures I saw. Some were tall, nuanced pillars with women or decor carved on the side. Most of the multi-block contenders were grandoise and complex. Some depicted scenes from stories (none I could recognize) and took as much ground area as a small stage.














To cap it, the aurora appeared as I was walking to the main stage to see the judging. I had to step into some trees to reduce light pollution to see it, but it was quite active that night (and much stronger when I headed to City Lights Boulevard later that evening).

I didn't stay for the judging because I couldn't hear the presentation over scraping sounds from sleds of kids being dragged around by their parents. I wasn't interested enough to stick around and figure it out.

I left later that night on foot to test the waters at some of the bars downtown. The aurora seemed to consume the sky when I passed through poorly lit areas. Luckily, it happened so often that I had my camera with me one of those times:

I'll have much better shots when I have a camera away from town.

Me and my big feet

Being a wuss and not much of an outdoorsy person to begin with, I've taken a light step into the world of winter recreation. Why snowboard or ski, when you can showshoe?

OK, because they're probably more fun, but you need balance and perserverance to slide down a hill. The good Lord blessed me with neither.

There's 13 hours of daylight and I didn't want to waste 'em in the middle of the city, so for now, I'm a snowshoer. I spent a couple of excursions plodding around UAF's North Campus area getting the feel for 'em:



I'd tested my maneuverability to the point that my shins were bruised from falling and having the front of the shoeslap aganst them. I was ready to move onto bigger, better things. That's when I found out that even showshoeing can kill me.

Well, not so much the walking part, but the driving to the trail part.

I wanted to try a 3-mile trail off Chena Hot Spring Road, about 48 miles out of town. The road winds a bit and is covered with patches of ice this time of year, so I drove slow -- much slower than anyonw with experience on ice would have. Unfortunately for me, those people with experience were tailgating me the entire time. I'd pull over to the curb and let them by, only to be followed again. I'd get ballsy and speed up, only to skid on the ice and nearly have aheart attack. By Mile 20, I said "**** it" and turned around.

No traffic on the way back. Odd.