On a winter's day...

January.

Mid-winter.

Saturday afternoon.

Severe clear skies.

Temperatures around zero.

Perfect.

Everywhere I went today, people were out enjoying the things winter has to offer.



Chugach mountains reflected on the water and ice of Turnagain Arm at slack tide. Ten miles to the right of this picture is Alyeska Ski Resort, and certain to be packed with skiers and snowboarders on a day like this.



Now a docile creek near the Hope cutoff, in the summertime Sixmile offers up Class V rapids.



Sun glistens through the hoar frost on birch and cottonwood trees, upstream at Sixmile Creek.





Fishing on both sides of the Kenai River in Cooper Landing, humans on the left, bald eagles on the right. See them? Eagles in the trees on the right, the human below them across the river.


How about now? On the right, top of the big cottonwood. A couple miles down the highway, mushers were hooking up dog teams for a trip along the Resurrection trail, and into the mountains.


The trumpeter swans are still hanging out at the mouth of Kenai Lake.



Then at Trail Lake in downtown Moose Pass, skaters and hockey players enjoy the winter sunshine. I'm sitting in my truck taking this picture--on the ice of the Lake. I'm not on solid ground, and neither are the vehicles you see. Snowmachiners take a right turn here, travel up to the headwaters of the lake, gun it up steep Trail Glacier, and find themselves on the icefields and glaciers on top of the mountains.



A tired hockey player.


Another view. It's up that way the snowmachiners travel.


Around the corner, these snowmachiners have returned from a steep climb to Carter and Crescent Lakes.



A few miles further away, my neighbor circles for a landing in his Super Cub.




Closer, closer, checking wind direction (the Follett Field wind sock hangs limply) and making sure no one is skiing or walking on the runway.


And, he's down, right in back of my house.




As for me, after I finished delivering the last of the mail, I backed up to the woodstove and watched the sun kiss the mountain ridge from the comfort of my living room....


..looked out one of my kitchen windows to see if there would be a sunset to photo....

...then took a nap on my living room couch. "I'll be safe and warm on winter's day..." (with apologies to the Beach Boys and the Mamas and the Papas).

January.

Mid-winter.

Saturday afternoon.

Severe clear.

Temperatures around zero.

Perfect.

And something for everyone.


(I need to get out of the house more often. Apparently my muse has been out there playing along with everyone else, leaving me bereft of words for days at a time. I haven't even been able to reply to e-mails. I just sit here at my computer and stare at the Galapagos Islands calendar I got for Christmas. ;<) )