March 22, 2003
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Springtime
in Alaska
I’m not blind to the stark natural beauty in the image above. What disturbs me is that for me the outstanding feature there is the snowmobile trail across the muskeg. I’d love to just blissfully enjoy the scenery, but I get tripped up by the details.
They’ve been out there on the sparse snow, tearing up the vegetation, the sheltered rabbit runs and thickets where all sorts of little things hide and nest in summer. I felt like weeping when I walked out the cul de sac this morning.
This is “dedicated parkland”, a protected wetland that the developers who subdivided this old homestead couldn’t fill in and sell. They left strips of it among and adjacent to the big blocks of one-acre lots in this subdivision. No governmental agency administers or supervises these little parks. They are, I suppose, the common responsibility of us, the landowners here. However much I would have liked to have gone out there with the pump shotgun and run off those fools who strayed all over the place off the established trails last night, it seemed imprudent.
If I had called the troopers, by the time they came, the snowmachines would have been gone, and our troopers are spread pretty thin out here, with bigger fish to fry. The weekend snowmachine pack was just passing through, tearing up muskeg parallel to the highway for who knows how far. Koji barked and bristled the whole time they were out there, engines screaming up into the hypersonic range. They whined and buzzed around out there in the open area, then took off toward the railroad tracks and on…. …and my dog growled and woofed in here for a few minutes and then they were gone and peace returned. I didn’t give them another thought until I walked out there and saw the results of their brief frolic in our park.
I’m not sure if I’ve stated this in these bald terms here before, but I love this land. I love the ecosystem that exists here, and with some thought and soul-searching effort, I love the snowmachiners, too. I can relate. I look off along those frozen strips of wetland between the trees and think how sweet it would be to explore them. But on foot it’s too hard on me and any other vehicle is too hard on the land unless the snow is deep. This year’s snow is barely there.
Areas in the state and national parks around here, if they aren’t strictly closed to snowmachines all the time, close when the snow is too sparse to protect the land. This year, the Anchoraguans have a long drive before they even get here, about a hundred miles. It’s a much longer drive pulling those trailers on slick narrow roads, another 60-75 miles now, to find snow that is deep enough for safe snowmobiling.
When they trigger avalanches and bury themselves and their machines, Greyfox looks on the bright side. He says it’s thinning the herd. I see the waste, and I sympathize with their families.
But let’s not dwell on the torn up ground. Look up in the trees in this shot and the one above. I have never seen these woods this clean and thin. The wind pruned the trees and blew down every old leaf and a lot of the dead limbs. Way to go, Ma Gaia! The birches are all spruced up, so to speak. **snicker**
Snowmachiners are important to the economy in this valley. Two campgrounds, some general stores and gas stations, and a motel in our neighborhood are owned by friends of ours. We know how rough this season without snow has been. Nature messed with the recreational snowmobilers, too, making them drive higher in the mountains and farther north.
It messed with the bottom line for snowmachine dealers and mechanics in Anchorage because so many guys can’t afford the extra gas and time to go the extra miles. In normal years, there’s snowmachining within minutes of downtown. This winter, not within 150 miles. They stayed in town and rented videos or took the family to the zoo. Air quality in Anchorage, in consequence, is about as bad as it has ever been.
Roadside business all up the valley has sucked this winter. No snow, no dough, but we’ve had cleaner air and quieter nights. So the weather messes with the people and the people mess with the land and each other and the old leaning tree there is leaning a little more than before, and life goes on.
Comments (16)
When we lived in Tidwells it was kind of like that. Tidwells is kind of like a tiny little fishing village on the Machodoc Creek. Check this out:
http://home.us.net/~Cople/stjames.html
This is the church I got married in. My house was less than a fourth of a mile from it. See that bell next to the cross? They put a bench underneath of it and I would sit there a lot when no one was at church and look out across the creek. I truly loved that ecosystem. What burned me up is that richies from the city were tearing up all of the woods for their big houses. What to do, what to do. Sometimes I wish I could go back there, but other times I’m glad I’m not there to see what they’re doing to the place.
spring with snow still on the ground? chaos
Lovely stuff.
I understand the heartbreak of the snowmobile tracks. Every time I go into the mountains I see the patches of clearcut.
even here in good old kansas…selling off farm land to build more and more cookie cutter suburban subdivisions filled w/houses that only the priveledged can afford…and suv’s to suck up the gas. errrgh…
gaia…that’s the name of the camp my brother (the one i mention most often) goes to (and used to be on the board of directors).
It makes me think “trailblazer”!
Elsa, I don’t think you’re thinking very clearly.
I see a big difference between someone going through the woods and leaving “blazes”, marks on trees so he can find his way back or someone else can follow, and roaring all over, around and through an area, leaving a looping, twisting myriad of superfluous “trails” where the vegetation may never grow back because more idiots will come along after him and mistake his track for a true trail.
It’s far too late in these woods for “trailblazers”. There are established trails here that have been here since before either the railroad or the highway were here. The old trails are obvious because the land never recovered there. The new tracks will be obvious from now on. Who needs them? Those people were not traveling, not “breaking trail”. They were just playing around, doing to public land what they would not allow on their own private land.
That’s a shame that some people can be so callous and disregard the beauty of the land for what it is, to abuse it in such a manner. Sorry to hear, too, that the weather has played havoc with the economy up there. It’s funny that, here in Toronto, we’ve had the opposite problem: too much snow this winter, and it’s placed a burden on our budget for snow removal and street-clearing services…
SuSu – I am a victim (or you are a victim) of my own Mars Mercury.
First, I say the first thing that comes to mind and second, my always rarin’ to go side sees a machine and wants to ride it (fast).
I am sorry for the offense. Really. I hope you understand my IMPULSE but it does not mean I don’t understand the bigger picture.
PS and you know how self-centered Mars (Aries) is.
Oh, the shame.
No offense taken, Elsa. Just a far different view of things.
Aries…self centered? Moi? LOL
I cringe any time some sport bike or whatever ad is on TV showing happy riders joyously rampaging across some scenic landscape, while if you look closely you’ll see how deeply plowed up the “paths” are.
Personally, I enjoy this post as I have others on the simple level of seeing a different environment. Who knows, I guess I just like not only learning about different places but how people feel about those places, what those places mean to them. I think everyone could use a little more understanding of the different ways of the world and its inhabitants.
D-, explorer
Swami Brahmananda said, The world is so constructed, that if you wish to enjoy its pleasures, you also must endure its pains. I just happen to have that handy because I need to remind myself of it so often. Things like that pain me. I had a hummingbird hit my windshield this morning. It still bothers me and I’m looking for someone to blame.
The pictures are beautiful. We’re completely covered in snow here. I’m anxiously awaiting Spring’s arrival.
Well, I think Ohio got your snow this winter. We’d much rather that you had kept it. Maybe next winter we can work something out so that our reasonable expectations are mutually accomodated?!
Your observations are dead on. I am grateful to my father who taught me respect for wilderness. We made us crouch in the trail for hiking breaks rather than even just step off the trail or god forbid, sit in an alpine meadow. “You can see it from the trail or your kids won’t see it at all.”