Skolai Images

Hey Folks,

Here’s another image, pre-bear, from Icy Bay. This afternoon I paddled my still inflated kayak over to this little island and hung out. Beautiful spot for a rest. The lupine just COVERED the island, it was really cool how much more intense the lupine ere on the island than everywhere else. They were awesome. As the afternoon grew, a big storm seemed to be kicking up to the southwest, and I grew concerned about being stuck and not making it back to camp - the boat is not really made for a paddle in rough water. So I packed up and headed back .. sure enough, the storm abated, and the evening grew calmer than ever, and I really wished I’d stayed out to catch some warmer light. But sometimes one takes what one gets.

This is another view of Mt. St. Elias from the Taan Fjord, Icy Bay, Wrangell - St. Elias National Park.

Cheers

Carl

Hey Folks,

So here’s the beginning of where this trip gets fun.

This is one of the last photos I took this particular evening. The day had turned into a gorgeous afternoon, and I had a blast. A nice supper round the corner from this point, with this view of Mt. St. Elias over the Taan Fjord of Icy Bay is pretty hard to beat. As the light got nicer and nicer, I was puttering around trying to make some photos. It makes for a long day here in the Alaska summer - this one here was close to midnight. My last 3 shots of the day were this one, a vertical composition of the same scene, and then a landscape image of this area without the boat. Then I went to bed. (more…)

Hey Folks,

As impressive a mountain as there is, in my opinion, Mount Saint Elias, as seen from Icy Bay, Wrangell - St. Elias National Park.

The mountain is actually on the border of Alaska and the Yukon Territory, Canada, so it’s not only the 2nd highest mountain in the US, it’s also the 2nd highest mountain in Canada. Mt Logan, 25 miles to the north, is the highest mountain in Canada. The peak of Mount Saint Elias is a mere 10 miles from the shores of the Taan Fjord in Icy Bay, which means the vertical relief, which I spoke about yesterday, is huge. (more…)

Hey Folks,

After a couple of days I was fortunate to have the weather clear up a bit. The place is pretty amazing. There were tons of birds in the area, gulls, oystercatchers, sea ducks, murres, murrelets, and more. Flowers were in full swing, and impressive stands of lupine were everywhere.

Most impressive however, is Mt St. Elias. I’ve been lucky enough to see a few great mountains around North America, and I doubt any of them are as impressive a sight at Mt. St. Elias. It literally soars skyward from the coast, towering over 18 000′ high. (more…)

Hey Folks,

So why go to Icy Bay? Well, firstly because it’s such an amazing place. The scenery is superb - National Geographic list Icy Bay as one of the world’s top 10 treasures. Secondly, I’m working on a book on Wrangell - St. Elias National Park and Icy Bay is in the park. Thirdly, I hadn’t been there before. 4th, the natural history of the place is so unique. Icy Bay is a relatively new place, with the recent retreat of 3 glaciers, the Guyot, the Tindall and the Yahtse, there are now 4 fjords, filled with the cool waters of the northern Pacific Ocean.

When the area was first explored by European ships 150-200 years ago, Icy Bay didn’t even exist. John Muir, the great naturalist and founder of the Sierra Club, visited the area a little over 100 years ago, and Icy Bay didn’t exist. (more…)

Hey Folks,

OK, here’s a landscape again. This one from a few days on the north side of the park, at Rock Lake. I had been cruising around looking for waterfowl, with little luck on this particular day, and headed over to Rock Lake because (a) I had seen ducks on it the day before, and (b) it’s a nice place to spend the night. There’s a little camping area just near the lake, and with a great view of Mt Sanford in the background (when it’s clear) it’s a sweet little spot.

I was actually in the midst of cooking some dinner when I turned around and saw this rainbow. At first I thought, ‘oh no, it’s just another rainbow’, and paid it no mind. But it became more and more intense. The colors were about as vibrant as any rainbow I’ve ever seen. So I grabbed my gear and ran around to the end of the lake to take some images. I didn’t have my ultra-wide angle lens with me, because it’s still getting repaired, but made do with what I had. I ended up liking some of the tighter frames, like this one, but wish I had a real wide lens, because at times the entire half circle of the rainbow was clear. Maybe 10 minutes later, it was gone.

Cheers

Carl

Hey Folks,

Here’s an image I shot a few weeks back, of a ridgeline of Steamboat Hills - their real name is Hanagita Hills, but everyone I know calls them Steamboat Hills. I converted the image to black and white on the computer, using Photoshop.

Cheers

Carl

Hey Folks,

Here’s an image from last September - I was basecamped in Skolai Pass, and one morning had some nice light to shoot a variety of images. Skolai is an amazing place with a variety of photographic subjects that is seemingly without end. Wildflowers can be amazing there, landscapes as grand as the immense Russell Glacier and Mt Bona and Mt Churchill, 16 550′ high Mt Bona, and 15 638′ high Mt Churchill towering in the background, ice patterns and crevasses in the glacier, lakes, waterfalls, streams and cascades, shorebirds, raptors, songbirds, and mammals ranging in size from tiny voles and arctic ground squirrels to foxes, marmots, Dall sheep, caribou and grizzlies. I’ve even see wolf tracks along the air strip up there. Hole in the Wall is a massive escarpment of peaks similar to Moraine Lake, only bigger and Hole in the Wall feels more primordial, with no trees, the moraine and glacier are still intact, rather than the revegetated montane alpine country and the deep blue lake of Wenkchemna. Hole in the Wall has 7 peaks, rather than 10, and they stand almost sentinel like over Skolai Pass. (more…)

Hey Folks,

Here’s another image from Chile, the Futaleufu River. This rapid is called ‘Casa de Piedra’, which translates in English as ‘House of Rock’. See that big huge boulder smack in the middle of the river? The one with 4 small trees growing on top of it. THAT’S the rock. It’s huge - I’ll try to dig up an image that might give a sense of scale here - the rock is easily bigger than a regular house - a huge boulder that crashed down to the valley floor centuries ago, and now resides in the Futaleufu River.

Casa de Piedra is a Class V rapid, and a really technical run. Guides would often not let some guests run the river, if they weren’t strong enough paddlers - once you enter the rapid, from just upstream and to the left of the rock (which would be ‘river right’, facing downstream), it’s a non-stop run for over 200 yards of holes and waves and pour-overs. Usually we’d stop a few miles upstream, and decide who wanted to go on, and if they were up to it. If we cold round up a boat full of people, they’d consolidate into one or 2 rafts, and head off downstream. The last few miles were pretty sweet whitewater, with Más o Menos (’More or Less), a huge wave train of Class IV and V water, some smaller rapids, and then Casa - the wickedest rapid on the lower (more…)

Hey Folks,

I’m sure you’ve heard of the volcano eruption in Chile this last week - down at Chaiten, a massive eruption has devastated the towns of Chaiten and nearby Futaleufu - ash up to 12 inches deep covers much of Futaleufu. Geologists say the volcano hasn’t erupted in nearly 10 000 years. The volcano is still erupting, a week after the initial explosion, and wind is carrying the ash and dust east and over the town of Futaleufu. The poor little coastal town of Chaiten has been totally rocked, and Futaleufu is hurting - so far all but a few people have left town. A National Geographic vulcanologist has said this particular type or eruption is the worst kind, and could easily continue for months. (more…)