Happy Birthday Ganik

It was Ganik's 11th birthday this weekend, what could be a better way to spend it than hiking Kesugi Ridge in Denali State Park. Here he is with Denali, the great one, behind him. Ganik has been a constant companion since I adopted him from the AMHL 5 years go. Happy Birthday Buddy!

Let Freedom Ring

Yesterday marked the 5th Saturday in a row we let Valley run off leash. Some Saturdays are good Saturdays for us, and some Saturdays aren't so good for us. All Saturdays have been great days for Valley LOL.

We head to isolated areas in the nearby National Forest or State Park and let her go. She's been really easy to catch. Finding her sometimes is the critical point. She has a very healthy prey drive and trees have squirrels LOL. In the tundra she's easy to spot.


When we let her loose she always runs forward, looks over her shoulder and gives us this, "Are
you coming?" look.









The girl has places to go. Stand back.













Hey, she's behaving better than that dog in the back LOL.












You can't imagine how stoked we are to watch her running off leash...She's happy and loves to run.

Look who's in the neighborhood.

Out for a walk in the rain today and found a visitor in our neighborhood. The dogs spotted her first. Mom was concerned and went back to the chore at hand.

Happy Birthday Valley

Its Valley's birthday so we decided snow cones were in order since
somebody turned up the heat today. Birthday girl's get what they want!


Valley is enjoying her snow cone.










Ganik is enjoying his snow cone.






















After our snow cones we decided to go out for a walk.

You Go Girl!

We took the bold move of taking Valley out and letting her off
leash. We tried that disasterously last year. This year she seems
alot more trusting of us, particulary me.

So we took her out on a foggy day and gave her a good day:

Mountain Grrrls.

Another fine weekend of hiking. Hot and sunny then hail :) Here we are down at Gilpatricks on the Kenai.

Surfs Up!

What's better than swimming on a hot day?

A Valley in the Chugach Mountains

:)

Fog

Its nice to see a fog out of my head once in a while.

We started the hike out and it looked like this, cloudy. If you examine the snow filled gully to the side of Valley's head, follow it up valley (Not *The Valley*) to the peak in the background, that was near our destination.

You can see the fog rolling in.












Wow, how about that, Valley taking a biscuit!





Where's Neal? click the picture to enlarge it and see if you can spot him.

Peak Performance

Nice day climbing Homicide Peak with Neil and the dogs. We kind of thought the forecast 40 mph winds might put a damper on things but the winds never materialized. Not much snow getting to the top, just had to walk on some on the road, then cross on the way to the south "face". Valley had a wonderful time.
\

relations

Lilly and her great aunt Nicki.

Sunstorms

Hiked up McHugh Peak the "lazy man's way" up Bear Valley. Nice sunny day requiring a bivy in the sunstorm LOL. Bring on Summer.

Hope for a Great Weekend

Drove the Vanagon to Hope for the weekend. Hiked Hope Point on Saturday, and out to Gull Rock on Sunday. Great hiking both days windy and cool but no precipitation. Incredible trailwork towards Gull Rock with lots of big trees blown down.

More Hiking

Joined the meetup group for a hike up the ridge leading to McHugh Peak. A bit of snow to get through near the trailhead but the ridge was fine. Still alot of snow hanging out.

Nice shot of Doug our leader.

Opening Day

Today was our opening day for hiking. A glorious warm day but windy on Turnagain Arm. Last week was the last day of skiing for the dogs. Today was our first day of hiking. Not many trails open but more by next weekend.

Another Day, Another $

Temps stayed low, freezing at night so another weekend to go after the money. skied out to the Lane on Sat, then over to the Nordic Ski Patrol Party. Sunday skied up to Green Lake and enjoyed the overcast day. Another fun filled weekend of skiing with the dogs. Day 81 for the funhog.

weekend fun

Back from 3 weeks of skiing and ski joring. figure I ought to put some pictures on here before they take this away from me LOL.


Here's Valley on the trail out archangel Valley.





















Here we are up Valley past the trailhead to Reed Lakes taking a short break before going on.






And finally back at the trailhead.

things are still below freezing at night but that won't last long. Which means the end of dogs on snow...another good season.

Full Evening Light

Lots of light in the evenings after work. Almost daylight till 9 pm. So when new snow falls like it did tonight, its great to get out on a tour with the dogs.

Ganik Today

Nice extended weekend skiing in sunstorm and starbright conditions. My face hurts me more than it hurts you. Highs in the 20s F, and lows in the negative teens. gotta love a dog who will sleep outside in the snow in those conditions :)

Why kids like Malamutes.

For one, they love to get towed while out touring.













Things don't always go well but we recovered.












He wanted to go faster but Ganik only has one speed. LOL.