Arctic Adventures

New Goggles Oren has really been crawling around now. He goes anywhere he can crawl, kitchen, bathroom, laundry room, bedrooms, and pantry. He has finally mastered the art of backing up, so now he doesn't really get stuck anywhere either, nice for all parties involved. Now we don't have to get him unstuck every thirty seconds. New Toy He is starting to pull himself up onto things too. The chairs in the kitchen and his little rocking seat are his favorites. He can pull himself up, but the whole concept of gravity isn't quite there yet. Trying to Stand He will just let go randomly. Most of the time he falls on his butt, but hes had a few face plants too. The morning time when I am getting ready he just follows me around crawling as fast as he can, and then complaining when I go somewhere else. Again His favorite toys are anything but his toys, Kayla's school books, Cabela's fliers, the garbage can, pots, the mitten box, and shoes. I think he will have a blast when it...

Hmmm, What Toy Should I Play With Now? For almost the past month here the "downtown" part of Noatak has been on limited or no draining. The power went out for a couple days and the pump at the lift station froze up. Then when the pump wasn't pumping the line from the lift station to the sewage lagoon froze up. They have been working on the line for the whole time it has been down, they just keep running into problems. First people kept draining to fast for the lift station to get drained out to work on the pump. We went almost that whole week with no draining. Finally they got the the lift station emptied and the pump fixed. Then the line to the sewage lagoon froze. We had limited draining for that week and a half. The sewage got pumped from the lift station into big totes and then hauled by snowmachine and sled to the lagoon. We were back to no draining for a couple more days and now it is limited draining again. Rumor has it there's some more guys coming tomorrow to...

Into Town It's Saturday! Which means either fishing, trapping, or both. There is enough daylight now that I would have time to go fishing after work, but it seems as if the last few weeks have been so busy that I haven't had the chance. I headed out for daybreak again which isn't until about 10:30 am. It was an absolutely beautiful morning. Fishin +20 degrees, scattered clouds, and a nice bright sun rising high up into the sky. The fish didn't cooperate as well as past weeks, but I still ended up with about 10 trout and half that many whitefish. I fished for a lot longer though. Days Take At about 2 I packed up to fill in my trapline with a couple marten sets in the trees. I brought my .22 along to sight in too. I figured after last weekend I had better get that into action if I wanted any edible small game. I made two marten sets, a couple snares sets for otter, and one more lynx set. Too Warm for the Parkie When I was making the lynx set I heard a moose cracking thr...

Packed Up Saturday. I am up early, getting ready to head out to set some traps and do some fishing. It is supposed to warm up throughout the day, so I take my time a little bit. The sled is loaded down with traps, extra gear, bait, a hand auger, and my fishing tackle. Ten AM finds me a couple of miles down the trail towards other Ikpiks or Quatouruk (I've heard it called both names). There is a smaller creek down there where I want to make a set for lynx or wolverine. Snow in the creek is not drifted too badly so I am able to follow the creek bed quite a ways. I just cruise for a little while to see what there is too see. Finally I reach a point that to go any further there is an increasing likelihood of getting stuck. Since I'd rather not have to dig myself out I decide to turn around. I make the set not far from where the creek joins the big river. Headed Out After making this set I head a little ways upriver towards Quatouruk to make another set. It is a small spring creek w...