REALLY. So as you know, we've seen charismatic mega fauna here and there throughout our Alaska adventure. But for the first time, this week we had a moose on the loose at our front door. It turns out she comes to live in the forested park across from our house every winter. Our neighbor had the unfortunate experience of getting his small dog, Hobbes, stomped on by Mama moose when Hobbes ran out for an exuberant roll in the snow before his walk last year (he sports a scar, of which he is undoubtedly proud, but is otherwise unharmed). This year, Mama moose simply grazed on our few deciduous trees and dead fireweed stalks before galomping off to join her two calves. Oh, and her peak in the window scared ZigZag kitty, who was spending a relaxing morning taking in the scenery, half to death - he dropped to the floor in a kitty-freak-out stance, hissed, and retreated to the farthest corner of the house for the rest of the day, despite copious treat-bag shaking and lap patting. Video (Subscribers: click on the Alaska Adventure at the top of the email to bounce to the blogsite to see it) and pictures follow...
Nibble nibble.
The whatchacallit under my neck is elegantly called a "bell."
I spy, with my little eye, TWO moose.
This, of course, sparked a very nerdy conversation between J and me about moose and the various natural history tidbits we thought we knew about them. Which, of course, sparked some vigorous internet research about antlers, sexual selection and other biology goodness. Of note: Antlers, unlike horns, are made of bone and are grown and subsequently shed annually by the males of the species. The older the boy moose, the bigger his antlers and the sexier he appears (we're talking a six foot span from tip to tip - ooh la la). As ridiculous a protrusion as this may seem, there is actually some logic behind the large rack beyond just the duke-it-out factor; it takes a ton of nutrients to support such quick and big bone growth (feel free to let your inner-seventh grader laugh at this), so the male moose must have done pretty well for himself in the foraging department. Thus big antlers really are a true gauge of a male's level of fitness and ability to make ends meet. (Ladies, don't let those moose driving flashy sports cars fool you...)
A little visual of the antlered animals a la http://thenaturalworld1.blogspot.com
THE BAKERY. The Moose is Loose bakery in Soldotna, Alaska is one of my and Indigo's favorite spots to stop when we're out and about in the civilized areas of our home state. From road kill cinnamon buns (imagine a big old sticky bun getting flattened and then re-fried and sugared - now that's ooh la la) to moose-themed toilet seats, this bakery has it all.
A "chocolate moose snack" doughnut compared to your average lower 48 variety.
Breakfast.
Well Indigo decided she wanted to take matters into her own hands and create a bakery of her own. And so Indigo's Fancy Cookie Restaurant was born, complete with signage, menus, candle-lit tables and, of course, cookies. Mind you, this is a little different than your neighborhood lemonade stand out in the sunshine with many a driver by. No one was randomly strolling past our home at the end of the road in a blizzard in the dark. We had to put the word out via the phone lines and hope for the best. And what do you know, small town holiday spirit prevailed. On this very snowy afternoon, a total of six customers braved the storm to
come get cookies at the whopping price of three cents a piece. Tables were full, orders were placed, and Miss Indigo sold out. A good deal indeed.
Working hard to fill to-go orders.
Rosemary, our youngest patron, checks out the menu (luckily it had pictures).
Chris and Lindsey enjoy a respite from the storm at Indigo's Fancy Cookie Restaurant.
LAND. Unlike other American towns we've lived in, Kenai does not appear to have any Christmas trees for sale. No Rotarians, smiling and waving from within their sawhorse compounds. No light bulb-lined parking lots, tree branches slowly unfurling from their blankets of mesh. Apparently, we have enough wild trees that everyone just goes out and chops down their own. Being particularly law abiding citizens (stop your chuckling), we actually looked up the rules and found that national forest land, wildlife refuge land and state park land all allow a single tree to be cut per family, as long as it is cut 150 feet from a road, trail or waterway. Got it.
Success!
And from J's school newsletter:
NURSE'S CORNER
Winter is here! Please make sure your children have hats, gloves, boots, coats and snow pants with them each day. Students will go out for recess daily unless the temperature reaches
below –10.
FYI, today was indoor recess. One other recess thing of note is that every school on the Kenai Peninsula has sculpted their playground land to include a mellow but large sledding hill, and all the kids park their sleds (with Sharpie marker names boldly written on the top) outside their classroom doors. J says the kiddos don't make a peep about the cold - they just play up a storm (on the "warm enough" days, that is). For the record, J doesn't make much of a peep either, continuing to ride his trike everyday (-10 be damned) in the December darkness. He almost biked into a moose in our neighborhood last week, but escaped unscathed. Ahhh, the Alaska Adventure.
SAND. No more fish, no more bones... just icebergs. I've read all about spring "breakup" when ice on the Alaska waterways begins to move downstream, but I didn't think through the freezing end of the story in the fall and winter. Well our Kenai River is slowly becoming a chunky white highway complete with epically loud smashing and crashing as football field-sized sheets of ice smash into others and the river's edge, ultimately spitting out at the mouth and sloshing up onto our beach. Doubtless this will only go on for another few days or weeks before the river is so frozen solid that stillness reigns until the thaw. So Indigo and I decided to go on an iceberg hunt. (Grandparents: stop reading here.) We went down to the beach and starting climbing on the stranded bergs along the frozen sand. After we got pretty familiar with the scene, I suggested that we climb on the biggest one around, right near the edge of the water. After several minutes pretending to be penguins and polar bears and dancing about, I noticed that the water had surrounded the iceberg and it was going to be a very adventurous exit. Several wet boots and one air born child later, we were safe back on the beach. We sat on a frozen driftwood log, sipped our thermos of hot cocoa and watched as "our" iceberg drifted back out to sea. Whoops. Forget about mauling, brown bears, it's the adventurous parents you have to look out for in Alaska.
