Packing, Arrival, Basketball, Exploring, & Ice Fishing

We have a lot to cover today, so have a seat and when all eyes and ears are on me we'll begin.

I was up most of the night packing (why do yesterday what I can wait until the last minute to do) and cleaning the cabin. Very little sleep makes a long day of travel even more exhausting. The flight from Fairbanks to Anchorage, departing at 8:10am, was smooth and quite enjoyable. I didn't manage to get any sleep, as it was crystal clear and I can never resist the urge to nerd out over the mountains, glaciers, and rivers. Lucky I did, as Denali was also clear so I had an excellent view of North America's tallest mountain, as well as the many glaciers flowing from it's peaks.

In Anchorage, Andy and I were split from the group of interns, as we'd all been on the same flight to ANC. We left for Bethel about an hour later - the longest and most excruciating leg of our journey: the flight was longest and we were scheduled for a 4.5hr layover before moving on to Russian Mission. On this flight, I slept almost the entire way, waking up only for the last 20 minutes or so as we flew across the delta. I had a great aerial view of many frozen meandering channels and oxbow lakes.

We landed in Bethel on schedule, and decided to take a cab into town for some lunch. A roughly 5 minute (and $7 each) Kusko Cab ride later, we went into Alba's Pizza for an excellent burger & fries.

After the burger we headed back to the airport for what we thought would be a 3.5hr wait for our flight to Russian Mission. Unfortunately our flight didn't leave until about 45min after our scheduled departure, and due to a state-basketball-championships-induced shortage of pilots and airplanes we had a few extra passengers and stops on our flight. Instead of flying direct to Russian Mission, stops were made in Mountain Village and Marshall, both of which are also Yukon River Yup'ik villages. This was, however, a scenic flight once we got a bit inland from the delta, and a very nice young woman from Marshall pointed out many of the interesting sights along the way.

We were the only ones on the flight going to Russian Mission, and when we arrived we were greeted by the school's counselor. The principal was still in Anchorage with the high school boy's and girl's basketball teams, as both had made it to the state championships. From the airport (if you've ever seen where planes land in a rural Alaska village, my use of "airport" here will surely make you lol) we went to the school where we were given the tour, and began making dinner. As the village stores were already closed for the night (it was after 7pm), all we had for dinner was Spam sandwiches and potato salad - which was fine by me! Although we wanted to go walking around, by the time we finished dinner it was dark and we were both exhausted, so we simply went to bed.

Both Andy and I woke up around 8:30 this morning, had some breakfast, and sometime around 9:30 we met the principal, freshly back from the basketball journey. We talked for a short while, then he unlocked the PE closet and returned home. Andy and I shot some hoops for an hour or so, then went out to explore the village on foot.

The village seemed totally deserted around this time (about noon), and we made it around a lot of the village before we even saw anyone else awake. We walked by the church, the post office, the clinic... and before we knew it we were on the outskirts of the village by the garbage dump. We then ventured down to the Yukon where I noticed a bluff with some rock outcrops... you can imagine my excitement! Upon closer inspection I realized there were at least 4 successive basalt flows (images and details to come soon).

After returning to the school we had lunch, then hopped on a snow machine and rode across the river to meet some locals who were ice fishing. Neither Andy or I had ever been ice fishing, and I have to say it was a lot fun! Andy caught a ~18" pike almost immediately; the only thing I caught was a 7th grader tugging my line when I was looking the other way. I had a great time, though, listening to some great stories, learning a little about ice fishing, and the history the village growing over the past 50yrs or so.

We've now returned to the school where Chef Andy is preparing fresh pike for dinner!