Midwinter sun at high noon over Denali Highway Cabins at 30 below

Here, for contrast, are some photos taken in a different month:

At this time of year, with solstice still over three weeks out, I know which season I would choose…..

Turkeys don’t reach anywhere close to Alaska, however. Another member of the order is, however, the State Bird – the willow ptarmigan. Common to abundant in our tundra; we easily can find these large grouses as close as a few minutes away, as soon as we’re out of the taiga spruce and into tundra vegetation. On one occasion, a few Decembers ago, we had some ptarmigan show up on Swan Lake, but I don’t expect that to recur.
Here is a courtship pair in mid-May. Neither bird has completed the transition from wearing full-white winter plumage to the wonderfully cryptic summer feathering.
Here, another mid-May cock, on the left, is actively stalking a hen on the right.
By mid-October, the birds have regained their full-white feathering, other than some minuscule color near the eye.

Overview of the Paxson region

Here we very definitely are showing both tundra and taiga. This is from one of our favorite sites; it provides a magnificent overview of where we live. We are looking almost directly north to the Alaska Range; the defile is Isabel’s Pass, through which pass migrating birds and mammals, early human inhabitants of Alaska, gold miners on their way from Valdez to the 40-mile country and later to Fairbanks, Alaska’s first road: the Richardson Highway, and since the 1970s, the Trans-Alaska Pipeline.

On the top right of the photo you can see a small amount of the Gulkana Glacier, which used to drain into Summit Lake, the prominent water feature below it and Isabel Pass; in recent history, however, its outflow has swept north to drain through Isabel Pass and north into the Yukon drainage.

The straight stretch of asphalt in the right foreground is the Richardson Highway. The sinuous trace that leads left out of the taiga spruce into the tundra shrubbery is the Denali Highway.

The small lake at the photo’s left edge is Swan Lake (also known as Mud Lake but we don’t use that ignominious term here); the meandering river in the left foreground is the Gulkana River, which has originated in Summit Lake and descended through the canyon along which runs the Richardson, also carving out the gravel bank shadowed here but still very noticeable at the top of where one can see the Richardson.

This photo is from early September; it demonstrates the red hues that dwarf arctic birch, remnant fireweed, and bearberry, blueberry and other ericaceae impart to the tundra. In the taiga we have white spruce, black spruce and golden-hued cottonwoods (balsam poplar). This scene shows why we adore this time of year – it is a glorious spectacle of golds, reds and greens, with the greatest chances of fine weather. No mosquitoes, lots of spawning salmon and the terrestrial animals all are focused on fattening up for the half-year fast that is just around the corner.

All of Paxson is nestled in the crook of road at the junction of the two highways, directly below the gravel bluff. The Paxson Inn & Lodge, once the gem of the Richardson but woebegotten these many, many years, commands the corner itself. Our compound is hidden along the river to the north and west of the lodge and directly below the bluff. The DOT maintenance yard, our neighbor to the north, is marked by the presence of the cone-holding telecommunications tower. Angling between the two highways and marked by a stretch of low golden shrubbery – willows and cottonwood – is the airstrip. The small white feature on the right-hand side of the Richardson is the AT&T facility which occasionally sees use by workers maintaining remote antennae in this region. And that’s the whole “town”!

Elevations: we are just below 3,000′; Summit Lake and Isabel Pass just above 3,000. The peaks shown rise to the 9,000′ level and the high peaks of this part of the Alaska Range – Mts. Deborah, Hess and Hayes – are just off to the left and top out at over 13,000′.

A forgotten Adirondack chair on the deck of Isabel’s Cottage. It’s going to have a long wait!

In China, ‘Audi’ Means ‘Big Shot’

Always count on the Times to make it clear for those of you who hadn’t been in the know……

Abandon all hope of getting rescued, ye who enter here…..

Two sets of these signs, this one and on the other side of the road, go up here in Paxson each October.  A matching set appears at the other end of the Denali Highway, in Cantwell. The last winter fatalities on our road occurred over a dozen years ago as the culmination of a series of Very Bad Decisions. Three crosses at mile 43 remind travelers that There But For the Retention of a Few Still-Synapsing Brain Cells Go I.

There are a number of circumstances that make the possibility of big problems on our road even more precarious this winter. First is the altered hunting regulations, which are encouraging significantly more caribou-seekers here than has been the case for decades. Second is that those mile-42 stalwarts, Alan and Susie Echols of Maclaren River Lodge, have folded their tents and gone to balmier climes….like Fairbanks….until at least the beginning of February.  Alan has been responsible for many, many rescues over the past decade – AK State Troopers have been more than happy to pass on to him the burden of rescues.

Not this winter.

As posted last week.

NEW, however, is that the extant site is, momentarily, gone from view. It will be back! With any luck, that will be before you’re even reading this post. Thus, long before the new site is active, the old site will act as seat-warmer.

For today: One of this summer’s guests related how he asked of a certain eatery in Alaska – no names now -

“What is your specialty?”

“Umm…hamburger, I guess.”

What better way to slide into winter than with hot mulled wine? No, there is no better. Here is the concoction that makes each day’s end in Paxson warm and mellow:

Hot mulled wine, Paxson-style

*Feel free to use dashes and splashes in lieu of the amounts listed. After all…that is what I do. The strict numbers below are just a guideline, yaaaarrrrrrrrrrrrrrhhh.

Serves 4
Or 3
Or 2 – mmmmm!

Place into a suitable-sized saucepan the following:

*1 bottle drinkable red wine. Do not use the good stuff; rough-and-ready will hold up just fine to the seasonings you will be adding
*1 1/2 cups/150ml apple cider or apple juice
*1 cup/100ml orange juice
*2 tsp/10 ml allspice, whole
*1 tsp/5 ml clove, whole
* 1 stick cinnamon. Kept whole, you may use once more; or grind to very coarse flakes (a blade coffee grinder is perfect for this)
* 1 tsp grated orange peel or 1/2 tsp/2.5ml orange extract

I used to have a large tea ball into which I could confine the spices; that makes it easier to remove them after steeping. The tea ball long ago fell apart; I now dump everything in and use a sieve once steeping has finished.

Steep for about fifteen minutes, slowly bringing the concoction up to a hot drinking temperature. The spices are not too overpowering if you allow them to remain in cooled brew overnight if you have any remaining, but you don’t want to keep them hot for much more than 20-25 minutes or bitterness may result.

In the last minutes of heating, add:

* 1/2 c/50 ml  sherry
*1/4 c /25 ml orange liquer. Triple sec is fine: again, save the Cointreau or Grand Marnier for a more delicate quaff!

You don’t want to add the last two ingredients early on as the heating will drive off too many of the attitude-adjustment molecules…

Find a loved one and two glasses, and – who said anything about winter?