An Afternoon Stroll

This afternoon, I went on a little stroll out to the building referred to as the Control Shed. It is in the BEO (Barrow Environmental Observatory) and has heat power and Internet. What more do you need? The last time I was in Barrow, I went out the the Control Shed a couple of times. There was a network component on one of the instrument towers which prevented data to be fed back to San Diego. I installed a temporary wireless bridge and SDSU sent up a replacement part. Today's trip was to install the replacement part and retrieve the wireless bridge.

There is a lot more water than there was on my last walk. But at least I can see where the trail is. Last time the walkway would just vanish under the snow and I was sort of on my own to connect the pieces. Most of the trail is made from these plastic egg-crate panels zip tied together. Occasionally, there are these wonderful wooden walkways. But only occasionally. I was hoping for some nice weather but I got some sleet on the walk back.

Unlike the last time I was here, I wasn't the only one around. There was a small research group working out here checking out there equipment and see what survived through the winter. I actually ran into a couple of tourists out taking pictures. A lot of birders visit Barrow as it's supposed to be a great place for bird watching. I spent most of my walk staring at the ground.

This is the Control Shed and I think that it was originally built by SDSU as part of their research project. Initially power was provided by a generator and someone would have to go out and refill it with gas. Now there is a very expensive power line running all the way out from the road. It's only a 2½ mile walk round trip but I'm ready for some Ibuprofen and a nap. I must be getting old...

Heading North

The road trip is over while I'm still in Anchorage. Right now, I'm sitting in the Anchorage airport waiting for my flight to Barrow. Even if I had left from Fairbanks I would still be sitting here waiting for the next flight. Alaska Airlines had cancelled the direct flight from Fairbanks to Barrow so the only option is to fly from Fairbanks to Anchorage, then Anchorage to Prudhoe, then Prudhoe to Barrow. A lot of legs for what used to be a 75 minute flight.  

This is a planned trip and since I was already in Anchorage, it made sense to fly out of here to Barrow.

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Road Trip

Today, we headed down to Anchorage for my nephews wedding. No Ural this time. The weather wasn't very nice for most of the trip down. Heavy fog between Fairbanks and Nenana and scattered showers all the way to Anchorage. This picture was taken just north of Cantwell. The mountains make it a wonderful drive at least as far as Trapper Creek. South of there is horrible Anchorage area traffic. Everyone seems to be in a hurry and way too many people. You may as well be in Seattle or Los Angeles. I don't see why anyone would want to live here. (Just my humble opinion)

Tomorrow morning I plan to visit the New Sagaya Market to pick up some Asian groceries.

Ural Delay Factor (UDF)

Tuesday as another sunny day. It seemed like a good day to wash off all of the winter grime as well as all of the bug carcasses from the Talkeetna trip. I didn't try to get all of the grease grime off as you never know whether that's all that's holding things together.

What's more logical after washing the rig then to haul trash to the transfer site. Unless you are in the city there is no home trash pickup. Everyone has to haul their own trash to one of the transfer sites around town. This is the third trip when Bridget came out wondering what was taking me so long. After all, why use the truck when the Ural takes three trips instead of one. Made sense to me...

While at the transfer site, a gentleman from the Ukraine came by and wanted to take a picture. He owned Urals before and was asking about reliability. He said that if you had a Ural in Russia it was "ride two days, fix one day. Then ride one day and fix two days". He had run into Mickey in Delta and was told that they were $20k for a new one in AK and he was flabbergasted that anyone would pay that much for a Ural. Just about every time you ride anywhere, people want to talk.