Summer 2023

Glossing over the bad, and concentrating on the good, we have had a really good summer.  Madeline participated in a total of seven summer camps this year, from Fine Arts Camp to rock climbing.  We made our usual trip to Washington for 4th of July with family, and this year my mom flew out from Minnesota to join us.  We look forward to this every year it is so much fun.

Samish Island 4th of July

Our friends the Bjorklunds brought their sailboat up to Sitka from Seattle, and as soon as we returned from Washington we set off together on a boating vacation around SE Alaska.  More than a week in Glacier Bay National Park, followed by several more weeks of just wandering around enjoying the scenery and each others company, made for a wonderful summer vacation.  I’m including a small selection of pics from the trip, to give an idea of the stunning scenery and how much we enjoyed ourselves.

Sea Lions in Glacier Bay

The Fairweather range with 15,000’ Mount Fairweather

Ice berg ice sculptures

M in front of Johns Hopkins Glacier

The kids collecting glacier ice

Lots of bears on the beaches

Sea Otters

Orcas up close

Lots of time spent fishing

Beautiful Anchorages

 It was great to be back out on the water for an extended trip.  Add to that being able to share the time with another family that will put up with us for multiple weeks, it was a real joy.

Now we are back in Sitka and Madeline has a couple weeks of 5th grade under her belt, so we are settling back into our school year routines.

2019

In my last blog post I mentioned that we had just purchased our new boat, which was located in Seattle.  In early November I flew back down to Seattle, spent a bunch of money on fuel, spare parts and food, and headed North to bring the boat back to Sitka.  Our friend Steven decided to come along for the ride, and after a fairly uneventful 18 days, we pulled the boat into our new slip in the marina, just in time for Thanksgiving.
While I was lazing around drinking coffee and driving a boat, Nicole and Madeline were packing and organizing so we could move out of our apartment at the end of November.  We lucked out in that we were house-sitting for friends for November and December, so we had a place to stay while packing up.  We made it out of the apartment on time, but ended up with a storage unit full of stuff, a truck full of stuff, and lots of our things in the house were were staying at.  December saw us continuing to organize and pack, slowly moving things on to the boat.  Of course, there was also that holiday thing happening.  We skipped our usually trip back to MN and had Christmas in the house, then feverishly packed to get out of the house and move onto the boat before the end of the year.
By December 31st, we were on the boat, with now two storage units, two trucks full of stuff, and a boat crammed with boxes and bags.  We are hoping that by the end of January we will be down to one storage unit, have most of the stuff out of the trucks, and find some semblance of order amongst the stuff on the boat.  I had hoped we would be getting out with the boat on the weekends, but until things are stowed properly it is best to stay put.  Nature reinforced that thought when the harbor froze over last night.
For now we are warm and dry and comfortable, if not a bit cramped, in our new home.  Hopefully there will be some nice winter boating pictures coming soon.

Ventana

We originally set up this blog to share our experiences on the water, cruising and living aboard our sailboat Baraka.  During our first year of full-time cruising we wintered over in Sitka Alaska, Nicole got pregnant, and six years ago our daughter Madeline was born.  We contiued living on the boat for another year, did some more cruising, and decided that even though our boat was perfect for crossing oceans, we might not want to go that route, at least not any time soon.  We sold Baraka, and our blog has focused more on Madeline over the past few years.  Earlier tonight that changed, and hopefully this blog will once again feature our experiences on the water, along with a large dose of Madeline.  At dinner time we signed papers, and are now the proud owner of a 42’ Kadey Krogen named Ventana.  Hope to see you out on the water.

2018?

Pretty sad that I go to check on our blog and see that it has been more than a year since I posted here.  Not sure if anyone is still following this or not.  Instead of going over everything that has happened in the past year+ (there has been a lot), I am just going to post this as a teaser.  Big news coming in the next day or so.

Otter

If you are one of my Facebook friends, you might remember a while back I posted that we had purchased a boat.  If you are not on Facebook, yes, we bought another boat.  Instead of me making excuses as to why we are not out on the boat more, and more importantly why I am not doing more blog posts about our boat, I'm just going to post some pictures of the trips we have taken so far, and then I am going to get stuff ready to go out on the boat this weekend.  Maybe I'll write something about it and post some pictures when we get back.

Our new boat "Otter"

Our first overnight in the new boat

Boating with friends is even more fun

Moab

Breakfast at the Moab Diner

I tried to do a blog post about our recent trip, but Blogger doesn't seem to like my writing, so it decided to just delete most of my post.  I am struggling to write so it wasn't one of my best posts anyway, and it really wasn't much fun to do.  When I tried to rewrite the post, it wouldn't let me add pictures, then when I finally got past that it scrambled the pictures and lost several of them.  I'm giving up for now.  I'm just going to post of bunch of pictures from the trip, and maybe fill in the writing later.

Exploring Onion Creek Road

Little Wild Horse Canyon

Little Wild Horse Canyon

Little Wild Horse Canyon

Dinosaur museum

Canyonlands

Horseback Riding

Birthday Dinner

Hiking in Arches

Anniversary Celebration

Outside Zion National Park

November

Many of you have probably heard of "Movember".  If not, it's an event meant to raise awareness of men's health issues.  You can find info here: https://us.movember.com/
There is also an event called "No shave November, similar idea but focused more on cancer awareness.  Info for this here: https://no-shave.org/#fundedprograms
I haven't signed up to participate in either of these events.  There was some talk about me looking a bit too much like a 70's porn star with just a mustache, and honestly I wasn't sure I could take the itching for a month to go without shaving at all.  That doesn't mean I'm not trying.  I put away my razor at the end of October and will see how things turn out in the next couple weeks.  Stay tuned for pictures.  Because I didn't sign up for any of the organized events I can kind of blaze my own path here.  I would love for people to take a few minutes and do something for the folks in your lives that are struggling with health issues, or have lost a loved one unexpectedly.  If you feel like you have a couple extra bucks, donate it to a good cause.  If you can't afford it, call a friend or family member that shares a connection to the person you are thinking of and just say hi.  Sometimes a quick call is more important than you might imagine.  If you need an idea, or want to help support my newly adopted cause, try this: https://donatenow.networkforgood.org/1440060
I know that growing a beard is really no big deal, I live in Alaska so its really more of a surprise that it has taken me this long to try it.  The big deal is that many of us need some sort of excuse to donate to a good cause, or show support of our friends and family that are struggling, its just a reality of our way too busy lives.  Make this your excuse, do something good, and have a good laugh at the end of the month when pictures will reveal that I still can't grow a decent beard even at this stage in my life.

Lastly, if this does inspire you to do something, let me know.  The interface on this blog sucks so unless you already know how to post here don't bother frustrating yourself, just let me know on the cross post on Facebook or send me a message or email.