Alaska | Plastic Farm Animals

TRIUMPH

Camille Armantrout — Thu, 11 Aug 2005 13:48:33 +0000

A small triumph spotted outside Glacier Bay National Park August 11, 2005

So many of the places we frequent offer evidence that man has succeeded in overcoming nature, that even the most preoccupied find themselves cheering when nature rears its head in triumph over the man made world. A few radical souls actually look forward to the day when the current civilization crumbles and nature takes back her turf.

You can safely say you are on the side of nature if the sight of a spectacular sunset reflected in the shards of a broken window causes your heart to beat faster. Or perhaps the word, “justice” popped into your mind when you first heard about the tsunami a few months ago.

You are not alone if you take solace from daydreams about the end of the oil age forcing humans onto another, less destructive path. Ken Avidor is one of those, and he likes to draw pictures of his fantasies. Check out his depiction of the Mall of America after the Oil Crash on his Roadkill Bill site.

At the very least, our wish for nature to prevail causes us to revel in our time spent outside in the sunlight listening to the birds and breathing the sweet air exhaled by the trees.

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ALASKAN SKY JUICE

Camille Armantrout — Mon, 25 Jul 2005 13:31:36 +0000

Water comes from heaven. This fact is often obliterated by the convenience of tap water. When we were staying on Ambergris Caye in Belize 9 years ago, many of the restaurants proudly advertised “sky juice” or rainwater on the menu. They all had zinc roofs with gutters that emptied into rain barrels.

Today, I discovered the joys of Alaskan sky juice.

Our friend, Pamela invited us to stay with her for a month in her home outside Gustavus. When we arrived, the water pump was cracked and Pam was hauling household water from the stream in two 5-gallon buckets. It took about 4 buckets a day to handle the three of us.

We didn’t mind. Trips to the stream were a good excuse to go for a little walk past the red squirrel burrows and look for moose prints and cowslips. At the house, we used the water straight to pour down the toilet, or boiled it and filtered it for drinking and cooking.

Then it started raining. Water began spilling from the roof gutters into the rain barrel. Water so clean it only needed to be boiled and not filtered, too! It was amazing how convenient this felt! With a silent thank you aimed at the heavens, I plunged into a myriad of projects requiring water.

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LEAVING THE IGUANA

Camille Armantrout — Thu, 21 Jul 2005 13:22:54 +0000

For a number of reasons, Bob and I are no longer managing Casa Iguana on Little Corn Island. Most notable of those reasons was being on call 24-hours a day with little or no uninterrupted time. A secondary factor was our inability to adapt ourselves to the role of hospitality hosts. And then there was the parade of temporary staff, not all of them able to figure out how to fit in and carry their share of the load.

We took our good friend, Pamela, up on her generous invitation to stay at her home in Alaska and moved on. We are going to take advantage of the peace and quiet over the coming month, using it to plan the next phase of our adventure together.

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