The smell of summer by the Yukon River - wild, green, earthy with a hint of rose, spruce, raspberry and wormwood. I drop my bags beside the boat landing in Ruby, say goodbye to the agent, do a quick check for my bug spray and headnet (even though a nice breeze and an act of God seemed to keep the mosquitos away), and stop, at last, to look at the river-free flowing, meandering by. A Peregrine Falcon soars off to my left heading up for nesting grounds on rock cliffs below the Ruby cemetary,

Winds roared on the Yukon River last night with the arrival of yet another blizzard here and looks like it’ll keep snowing, at least for a little while longer. This year’s Iditarod Trail Invitational (the longest winter ultra race across frozen Alaska) is taking place right now and is worth keeping an eye on as trail breakers try to make it over Rainy Pass today. With “huge amounts of snow and no base or trail” trail breaking, skiing, biking and mushing over the Pass and then on toward Nome

        February rolled through the Middle Yukon River Valley this year, one blizzard after another following a chilling, but beautiful, January where temperatures, for the most part, hovered near or below minus 40. Sunshine, at least for the early part of the day yesterday, streamed in from the south/southwest over flat refuge lands and reminded us that March is on the way. Rays held a gentle heat, just enough to tease my senses and prod me to go down to the snow covered beach and fall asleep

        It is at the kitchen table beneath the gentle flicker of candle light that I find myself on this cool New Year’s morning (a warming minus 26 outside). Surrounded by my sacred kitchen space, I’ve been listening; listening for a moment to the static words of the world coming out of our AM radio before quickly pushing the power off, to the silence and then the crack of a spruce beam near the back of the lodge where guest rooms will be some day, to the pop of dry spruce burning bright in

River Travel

    We are deep into winter these days, teetering on the brink of solstice, with sunsets early in the afternoon and full of calming pinks, apricots, blues and purples spreading across our expansive sky. Happily, we're able to report excellent snow and river travel conditions for this time of year with short term forecasts continuing to include flurries. An excellent base for ski, snowshoe, snow machine and mushing trails has been building, and with temperatures hovering around