Icewind's Ramblings

It is great being back at work again and I am getting into the grind of putting bids out to get projects done around Alaska this summer.  The group that I am working with are great and now that my official State of Alaska email is up and running I have started to receive emails 'welcoming' me to DPS and 'congrats' on the new job replacing a long time employee who is retiring at the end of the month. My first email this morning was from one of the troopers who sent this to me so I know I will fit in just fine with this bunch of characters.  Missing Wife Found by Alaska State Troopers The day after his wife disappeared in a kayaking accident, an Anchorage man answered his door to find two grim faced Alaska State Troopers. "We're sorry Mr. Wilkens, but we have some information about your wife," said one of the troopers. "Tell me! Did you find her?" Wilkens asked. The troopers looked at each other. One said, "We hav...

I had a great weekend with my friend Mark Evans in town after his long motorcycle ride from Texas to Alaska.   He made it all the way up past the Arctic Circle and on to Deadhorse in Prudhoe Bay at the top of the world a feat many people will never experience.   Congratulations Mark, driving a vehicle is tough enough but doing it on a motorcycle is a feat in itself! We met up on Wednesday and I took him to see Sarah Palin’s house on the lake and drove up about an hour where we enjoyed lunch in “Beautiful Downtown Talkeetna”. We wandered the streets and airport seeing the crazy sights and listening to all the sounds of a busy tourist season.   We drove back to the cabin he was staying in Wasilla where we enjoyed sitting on the porch of a two room cabin built in 1931.   Totally rustic with a gas lamp and outhouse we sat on the porch for hours talking and getting to know one another after communicating on FB for several years. Sipping from bottles of Jack & Crow...

“I can see myself it's a golden sunrise Young boy open up your eyes It's supposed to be your day. Now off you go horizon bound And you won't stop until you've found Your own kind of way. And the wind will whip your tousled hair, The sun, the rain, the sweet despair, Great tales of love and strife. And somewhere on your path to glory You will write your story of a life.” (Harry Chapin) It seems like this happens more and more these days as I received the call yesterday afternoon that one of my good friends and co-workers had died of a heart attack.   We worked on multiple projects together over the last three years and traveled around Alaska with the shared goal of building water treatment plants and clinics making life better for the communities and villages we worked in. I know this last winter had taken a toll on him with his family but things were working it self out getting back to an even keel.   We talked Friday and now in another instant he...

Why do musher’s seek the challenge of the Iditarod? If you listen to them, they'll tell stories of experiencing the serenity of a beautiful day on the trail, dog team and musher working as one.   They'll talk of the intensity of the experience.   They'll talk of the challenge of meeting the demands of the world's last great race. On the early morning flight from Anchorage to Kotzebue and then to Nome the other day the last person to board the plane was an old haggard looking man who sought out a space to put his items in the overhead space on the plane.   He looked the part of what I would call the Alaskan Old Timer who had on his flannel shirt, Seal skin hat and bushy beard with thick glasses.   He was not a big man but rugged in every sense of the word. He sat down in the seat directly behind me and started talking, and talking, and did not stop from push back, deicing, take off to Kotzebue, landing and the hour turn around time to head to Nome and only quit ...

I have not been writing much lately for several different reasons.   With the extreme cold this winter I could say it has been “brain freeze” but that would only be a small part of it.   Things have been quite busy for me in a non-busy way if that makes any sense.   I have been traveling a bit around the state so it has been very cold and isolated going out to the villages preparing for new projects this season or checking on ongoing projects from last.   At work it has been busy with so many things going on with new work and dealing with the logistics of such remote places to get people, equipment and materials to the jobsite.   Around town it has been a time for reflection and throttling back a bit from going a hundred miles an hour.   In that sense I guess I have become a semi-recluse.   What is a recluse, really?   Well, it's someone who chooses to live a life of solitude.   This kind of lifestyle isn't for everyone, obviously.  ...

Traveling around Alaska with my job I have the pleasure/pain of flying all over the state in various aircraft.   Most days I have an early morning departure from the main Anchorage airport, Ted Stevens International Airport flying Alaska Airlines from my base in Anchorage to one of several ‘hub’ airports.   It has been from the southern end of the Alaska in Ketchikan, Sitka, or Juneau to the “island”; Kodiak or out to the delta area of western Alaska to Bethel or Dillingham.   For my trips farther north it has been to Fairbanks, Barrow or Kotzebue in the arctic regions of the state. Once I arrive in a hub airport I go over to one of several smaller carriers which are the typical “bush” plane operations which may use both float planes and more conventional small aircraft.   Some carriers use turbine engine planes which carry more passengers or more cargo depending on the pilot’s mission for that particular flight.   Most days the pilot will make multiple flig...

Its cold too early in the season for these temperatures so it seems somewhat strange that everyone has pretty much shut themselves inside the home hunkered down to stay warm.   Blankets are about and coffee or hot drinks available. It’s still in November and we have had several days with below zero temperatures and for the last several days’ extreme high winds which lower the wind chill factor and also create many problems with flying debris downing power lines.   There have been many communities without power from the winds. People seem to be staying indoors and not heading out to the normal activities usually seen on a weekend.   The area downtown is mostly barren of the throngs of people who hit the several restaurants and bars close to Town Park.   There are still the few protesters who have a small wind break tent to take turns warming up between carrying signs along 6 th Avenue. Internet activity is quiet tonight as I think many people are just happy for...

There is a funny scene in the Tom Cruise movie, “RiskyBusiness”  where Tom Cruise has his father’s Porsche 928 out for a drive with his “girlfriend” and sinks it in Lake Michigan.   I had an incident Thursday where I felt much the same way as I realized I was not where I thought I was and ended up falling through the ice on an ATV with a passenger, with me.   Well sort of the same way as T.C. minus the girlfriend and the Porsche. It’s quite funny now writing about it but in the darkness, cold, and blizzard conditions it was not.   I would not rank it in the ‘deadly serious’ category as no one was in real danger (or seemed to be) but gives me another reminder that the arctic can be deadly if not prepared or ready for anything. Here’s what happened starting the night before the early morning incident. It was nighttime in Kipnuk Alaska, the coffee pot was almost empty and the conversation between several of us was pretty well finished.   I had arrived earlier...

The Small Bus does not go that far down this road. That’s a great line, especially if you deal with people.   It is a Southern term that sometimes brings smiles to some faces or possibly frustration to others.   I guess it depends on the situation and how much exposure you have with the other person.   Sometimes you come in contact with someone . . . it may be at the mall or in a social gathering and possibly a co-worker or other individual you observe over a period of time from which an opinion is formed. You cannot quite put your finger on it but something about the person is just not exactly right.   The elevator has left the basement but has not reached the top floor . . . and may never reach it. I’ve said many times over the years . . . “He or she is a few sandwiches short of a picnic.”   It goes along those same lines. “The lights on, but no one is home” is another way to express the frustration of dealing with someone who cannot understand what you...

They are starting to take flight all over Anchorage signaling colder weather to come. It’s September now and in the parks, lawns, and bodies of water all over town the Canadian Geese are scrambling for that last meal before they take flight and head south.  When I returned to work at lunch time it reminded me of several scenes from the movie Fly Away Home . The resident geese are taking over the skies around here and are they noisy!  There they were several hundred in various groupings in their awesome “V” formations.  You can’t help but look up as they pass overhead (hoping they won’t crap on you or your car as there are so many of them).  You can see the white turd bombs falling from the formation it is an almost funny sight as long as it is not zooming earthward towards you.  These Canada geese have begun their journey southbound from the farther north land locations for the coming winter.  It’s amazing how they use the “V” shape formation so they c...

The days are getting shorter now and winters on the way, there’s whispering on the winds telling us it’s that time to pray.   Pray for a quick winter and a return to our beloved summers. We are almost at that time when the frost is on the windshields of vehicles not tucked away in a garage and the time to return to using the auto-start on your rig to warm it up before you get in for that drive to work.   I originally came from the South and I have been surprised that no one there has started selling vehicle auto-starters for the use in summer to cool their vehicle before getting into them in the near 100 degree heat.   Could do well there I bet with a little promotion.   Not I mind you as I could not take the heat full time unless I was on one of the tropical islands somewhere with a drink in hand.   Jeff Foxworthy made famous the “You might be a Redneck” jokes and along those same lines we have our share of Alaskan humor that is a little different than the...

This summer I travelled to several remote villages in the Yukon Kuskokwim Delta area of Alaska or the YK Delta as it is know locally.   Many of these trips start we me leaving Anchorage on Alaska Airlines’ 737 and flying to one of the hub cities like Bethel, Dillingham, or Kotzebue from which I change planes to a smaller single engine or twin engine airplane. I spend time in Cessna 206, 207, and 208 aircraft along with the Piper Navajo which are the workhorses (taxi’s) to travel into the bush communities.   Many times over the course of the summer I fly over literally a million small lakes scattered across the tundra as I visit my project sites.   I find it interesting to see the different wildlife that calls these lands home.   There may be caribou herds transiting the area as they free range never stopping or hardly slowing down as they drop there babies who quickly keep up with the groups.   I have seen a few mush oxen that usually stay within a 10 to 15 ...