Archive

You know you’re staying with dog mushers when, just as casually as we might expect mail to come to our door, 3,000 pounds of dog food are delivered: Or when books like this dominate the [...]

Here at Milepost 22w, I’m set up with a lovely loft apartment and views of Pyramid Point and the surrounding 6,000-foot peaks of the Nenana Valley in Denali. A view out just 1 of 9 windows in the [...]

Ladies and Gentlemen: This is a shower. The kind of shower that you just turn on. And I am about to take one for the first time in 38 days.

[I don’t know what this fungus is called but I love it. Note the aspen leaves littered all around it. Two weeks ago the leaves were still on the trees. Now, the bluff trail is barely visible [...]

…And though you have written 6 new pages of fiction today, which you decipher averages out to approximately one page per hour. And though this does not include the long minutes during which you [...]

My new favorite color is Alaskan Twilight. Dusk lasts for hours here. Just as the “noonday sun” is not directly overhead, sunset this time of year is not your typical ball of orange dropping [...]

I’m the only person here and when I’m sitting at the desk, I don’t make a whole lot of noise. Last night, the thudding and thumping outside the west wall of the cabin was unmistakably not my own. [...]

Activities I have gone jogging and stumbled upon an airstrip. I have met strangers in the forest, heard bumps in the night, and dreamed of moose and bears. I have taken sauna showers and bucket [...]

I’ve been walking the bluff trail for 3 miles every day, getting acquainted with the views, charting the Nenana River, and scanning for wildlife. There aren’t any other cabins for a [...]

I intend for this post to be enjoyed as a long essay draft or to be read in fits and starts (hence the convenient sections). My first five days in Denali felt like living three lives at once: the [...]