Portage Lake and Glacier

This past Sunday, we joined some of our friends and made the trek down to Portage Lake.  We hiked about six miles round-trip across the frozen lake to get to Portage Glacier.  This glacier used to be visible from the visitor center, but within the past 12 years, it has receded so much that visitors now have to take a boat in the summer or hike/bike/ski across the frozen lake in the winter to view this awesome glacier!  It was a gorgeous day to do this hike.  Not too cold (when you were moving), sunny, and no wind!  Absolutely breathtaking!  We are so glad that we finally got to make this hike.

Portage Glacier.  If you look at the bottom of the glacier towards the center right, you can see some people.  That's how big that glacier is!

There were quite a few cracks in the ice.  Claire is demonstrating how she would brace herself if the ice started to seperate! 

There is a "Four-Corners" in the lower 48, but we also have several "four-corners" of our own!  Pilot Mike is modeling this for us.

Some little snow bubbles underneath the ice!





This is the view from our starting point.  The glacier is located behind the mountain on the right. 



Aurora Borealis

This past week, we finally got to see the Aurora Borealis, or the Northern Lights. We have been waiting years to see these! A lot of people may think that they are out and visible all of the time. Not true. The lights go in phases and we happen to be in the low part of the phase. However, there has been a lot of activity happening these past couple of months! A lot of people we know have been driving to Talkeetna, a tiny town about two hours north of us, to see them. Well, we haven't really been able to do that since we have a sleeping baby when the lights appear. I know we could just throw Joey in the car and just deal with it, but there's no guarantee that the lights are going to make an appearance. I haven't wanted to deal with the consequences of a sleep deprived baby when there was no guarantee of the lights...plus we still had a little bit of time left to see them.

This Thursday, the lights appeared right over our house! How cool is that?!?! They were the most amazing thing I have ever seen. Michael was in Fairbanks this week, so I called him immediately and told him to go outside. The photos above and below were taken by him. Our camera does not do these lights any justice at all!

A few of you asked me if I took pictures. My response was no. I had our small "cheap" camera. I knew that it wouldn't even take great photos of this phenomenon. Michael had our super nice camera and it didn't even take the best of pictures. However, our friend, Tim, has an amazing camera and camera skills...

Photo taken by Tim Poulsen

this was the photo he took of the lights the same night! This is really what the lights looked like to me. It was absolutely breathtaking! Definitely a "must-see" during a person's lifetime. 

 

P.S.- Sorry I have been M.I.A. on this blog!  Don't worry, though, I will be updating this blog a little more frequently now since we are trying to get through our Alaska Bucket List this year!  :)