I have a penchant for exploring seldom-visited, off-the-beaten-path natural destinations, and since most of Alaska is inaccessible by roads, there’s no shortage of adventures I can dream of. Enter Spencer Glacier. I’ve had Spencer Glacier on my radar since we moved to Alaska. It sits 60 miles Southeast of Anchorage, but you have to take…
Currently living/working: As the summer season draws its curtains, I would say we more than earned our keep jam-packing the season with multiple jobs (guiding, cleaning, writing). I guided 15 trips in August, and Justin 18, making for the busiest month for both of us thus far! Current mood: I always mourn the loss of…
We’ve had most of our immediate family for a visit over the last few years since we made Alaska our permanent home, but we had our first set of FRIEND visitors! Pat is one of Justin’s buddies from high school, from the famed Seton Hall Prep Framily, which means that these 2 have been friends…
Currently living/working: We are in the trenches of a very typical Alaskan life: juggling multiple jobs in the long twilight days of latitude 64. Justin guided 16 trips this month! All while squeezing in a press trip and a smattering of cleanings when he could. Meanwhile I guided 14 trips!! And I took on the…
***This blog post is WAY delayed & was supposed to go up in May, but that was when our website broke!*** Justin & I used to consider ourselves avid bikers. When I first moved to Phoenix in 2002, I was living with 5 others and sharing 1 car, so I opted to bike the 2…
Currently living/working: I guided 9 trips this month, which is almost as many as Justin’s 14. I typically guide less than him since I’m managing the Airbnbs and cleaning, but he was away for a week for Telluride, so I was filling in for him. By day 7 in a row of hitting the alarm…
We have a limit on the number of visitors we can host during our work-heavy summers, so people need to “claim their spot,” ideally by November. Justin’s other sister was next in the line of family visitors, and we loved introducing them to our home–especially our 9- and 10-year-old nephews. They stayed in the yurt…
***You may have noticed that my website got hacked for most of May into June. My website guy said there is no rhyme or reason for why I was targeted, but “they” (not a real person) installed a pretty vicious malware virus that kept self-replicating. Then the backups to the server were taking crazy long…
Currently living/working: Neither Justin nor I had any deadlines in April, nor any virtual presentations, nor much cleaning, nor any hours working at the library, so it felt like we didn’t work since we didn’t get paid! But, we were pitching and prepping for future projects, which is a very important piece of the freelance…
Currently living/working: I mentioned last month that winter freelance work has been busier than any other winter—between writing projects, virtual presentations, pet-sitting, cleaning, and my library gig. We are grateful!! But I’m personally trying to slow the roll a bit for April, knowing that summertime means double time productivity. I wholeheartedly believe in off seasons,…
Justin & I spent March 9-12th in the tiny village of Shageluk volunteering as “trail crew” for the Iditarod, and it was fascinating as last year’s experience, which I chronicled here and here. I think no two experiences while volunteering for the Iditarod will ever be the same. That’s actually our goal, and why we…
Currently living/working: Petsitting/Writing/Virtual Library Presentations/Cleaning. That’s basically the summary of our work this month—a little of everything, but a lot of staring into the glowing screen. Current mood: This month, we spent an amazing 8 days in Hawaii (blog posts coming), where we eschewed the to-do list and stayed out of touch with calendars and…
I mentioned in my last Currently posts that we have a “temporary cat” (aka, cat sitting at our cabin). We’re more than one month in and are in love with Ted, so I thought I’d do a proper intro since she (yes, Ted is a she) will be with us for a few months! So…
HAPPY NEW YEAR! Currently living/working: We’ve spent nearly the whole month in Alaska, and it’s been so incredible to settle into winter routines at home after so much fall travel. I’ll be honest, this month has been less about paying work and more of a mix of life tasks, relaxation and play during this holiday…
(I’m catching on a past event!) I like when visitors trickle in during our off season, as we certainly have more time and energy to host. So we were ecstatic when Justin’s sister, Jamie, decided to take an impromptu trip to Alaska in October! We hadn’t received any significant snowfall nor the true drop in…
As hiking guides, Justin and I are always trying to expand our knowledge. It’s easy to be a connoisseur of trees, since we only have 5 types here. We’ve also been gaining traction on wildflowers, although with more than 650 species, we will probably only ever scratch the surface. Mosses, lichen, birds and mushrooms seem…
Currently living/working: Our season came to an abrupt end on Sept. 5, when Justin ended up in the hospital! Life went from warp speed to a snail’s pace. But in general, we had a very fulfilling summer and y’all know how I love stats, so here they are! Justin led 61 trips for Traverse Alaska…
Many people are already aware about Justin’s Crohn’s disease, but we’ve been fairly quiet about it on the blog for the past 4 years because there hasn’t been much to say! His doctors proclaimed he was in remission in April 2021, he’s been on a maintenance infusion since 2018 and he continues to do all…
Currently living/working: Summer work (guiding, Airbnbs) will wrap up next month, but August was still bananas! Current mood: I’m still in fired-up summer mode, but I can definitely feel myself physically and mentally slowing down. Currently excited for: Ready to trade chaos for calm and to take a break from fulfilling the needs of tourists!…
Currently living/working: We are still in the go-go-go stage of the typical boom and bust arc of Alaska life. For me, it’s a juggling act of managing our yurt, cleaning other people’s airbnbs, guiding and writing. For Justin, it’s mostly just guiding (like 6 days a week) and writing. Figuring out when Justin & I…