Leaving Tikigag: the flight from Point Hope to Barrow

As always happens, the time soon came when I would have to leave Point Hope and it came earlier than I wanted or would have planned - were it not for the Era schedule. Era is the only air carrier that links Point Hope and Barrow and they only fly twice a week - Tuesday and Thursday; $410 for a one-way ticket. This will give you an idea how expensive it came be to travel about the Arctic Slope.

I wanted to stay at least through the high school graduation on Friday but I needed to be in Barrow no later than Monday, so I had to go Thursday.

At nighttime before I left, I saw Jesse Jr. walking home. 

He and his brothers would now get their room back.

Many decades separate us, but Jesse and his brothers all felt like friends now.

On May 5, immediately after taking the picture of the Tikigaq Harpooner Three-Peaters, I barely caught a ride to the airport in the truck of a man who runs a little on-demand-cab service. If someone needs a ride to the airport, or anywhere else reached by the villages very limited road system, they can call and he will come and pick them up.

So Krystle called for me.

The cab was full of his family.

I thought I wrote down the names of everybody, including the dog, but I can't find them. Still, if you find yourself in Point Hope and you need a cab to the airport or someplace else, just ask anyone and they will direct you to the driver and then he and his family and his dog will come and pick you up and give you a ride and then when you ask how much he will answer, "whatever you want to pay."

Be as generous as is practical for you. His fares are not like those of a city cab driver, but come only sporadically - mostly when an airplane lands.

The cab driver's daughter, the little dog and the airplane. 

Once airborne, we passed over the Lisbourne, the last bumps of the Brooks Range, which themselves are the final northward extension of the Rocky Mountains, which come to an end just before they reach Point Hope and fall into the sea. 

Pans of ice floating in new ice forming below.

We landed for a brief stop in Point Lay, to drop off one passenger, plus this four-wheeler and to pick up a couple more passengers.

And here we are, landing in Barrow.

Some new readers who have come over as a result of the piece in the Lens blog of the New York Times may be feeling a little confused right now to find me flying in someone else's airplane instead of my own.

What the Times said about me being a bush pilot is true, all right, but for some reason they chose not to mention the part about how I crashed my airplane in Mentasta and, for now, anyway, must fly in other people's airplanes.

Originally, I had intended to blog my time this trip in Barrow pretty much the same as I did Point Hope and I have every bit as much material to work with. However, I had also intended to have the whole package complete at least three weeks ago and here I am, still muddling along.

Realistically, I do not have time to do a decent edit of the Barrow pictures right now, although in time I will, for other purposes than this blog. I think what I will do is, on Monday, after returning this blog to Wasilla over the weekend, I will just put up anywhere from one to half-a-dozen images from the Barrow portion and then get back to blogging the present, but only briefly most days, as I have tons I must do this summer, so, even though in my mind I have no higher priority than developing what this blog has begun, for now, I must put the huge bulk of my time elsewhere.

Thanks for traveling with me!

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One month ago - flying to and settling into Point Hope; Yesterday in Wasilla

I again back up one month ago to begin anew my oft-delayed series of posts on my recent travels to Point Hope and Barrow - both of which are much colder towns than is Wasilla. I start on the Era flight that took me there on a one-way ticket that cost $410. Later, I would purchase another one-way ticket from Point Hope to Barrow and that would also run $410. 

Then I would need to purchase another ticket from Barrow to Anchorage on Alaska Airlines - $402.

Just imagine if you had a family of five or six and your father died two villages away and everybody needed a plane ticket to get there. That's the reality people face in Alaska, every day.

The only practical way to travel about Alaska is by plane, but it is getting harder and harder and harder to do. That's Annabelle Lane to the left, her son, Ephraim and Al Sokatis of Challenge Life Alaska.

I had originally planned to go to Anaktuvuk Pass on this trip. I needed my trip to coincide with a Challenge Life Alaska/NSB Healthy Communities event. Such an event had been planned for Anaktuvuk, but it got postponed and the time was scheduled for Point Hope.

So off I went to Point Hope.

I still hope I can get to Anaktuvuk before much more time passes by.

It was still early in the spring whaling season. I hoped that I might get out onto the ice. All my good, warm, Arctic gear had fallen apart or disappeared, so I was not properly prepared. Maybe someone would let me borrow some.

As we neared Point Hope, I could see open water, with shorefast ice on one side and young, new ice pinching in from the other.

This is Krystle Ahmaogak, granddaughter to the late Ben and Florence Ahmaogak of Wainwright, who in 1995 took me into their whaling crew, Iceberg 14 and then later adopted me as their honorary son. Krystle now lives in Point Hope with her fiance, Jesse Frankson and their three children.

When she learned I was coming, she invited me to stay with them.

We are headed to her house.

Krystle's two year-old son, Jonathan, at home in his play tent.

In the afternoon, Al and his Challenge Life Alaska partner Mike Hajdukovich met with the senior class, who were about to graduate. The students had raised money for a post graduation senior trip - to New York City. That is mostly what they talked about.

Geez, I wanted to go!

How fun it would have been to follow these kids from Point Hope around the Big Apple with my camera in hand!

Senior playing chess.

Going to New York with the graduated seniors was out of the question for me, but this is Michelle and as she was about to graduate, go on the trip, and loves photography, she was designated to be the official Point Hope Class of 2011 New York City Photographer.

Al and Mike had acquired a nice Canon 7D for the class, so she and I went walking about Point Hope so that I could give her some pointers on using the camera.

She caught on fast and she had a pretty decent eye for a picture.

I hope I get a chance to see the pictures that she took.

As I walked with Michelle, this girl came sliding by on a sled with a dog behind.

I shot many pictures of Challenge Life and have not yet taken the time to go through them. I did quickly pull this frame out, though: Challenge Life, Al Sokaitis in the school gym leading young children in a round of game playing.

This is Rex Rock, Sr., whose crew I followed whaling in 1991. Rex is also President of ASRC - the Arctic Slope Regional Corporation.

Children at play on a storage shed.

We learned that the crew of Isaac Killigvuk had struck a bowhead and were about to land it. Rex's wife, Ramona found a parka for me to wear. Mike and Al had never been to whale camp before, but now they had their chance. 

Off we went - the first stop would be the Rock whaling camp.

more to come

And this from yesterday in Wasilla:

Yesterday, as Margie and I passed by Wasilla Lake, we saw this dog in the next car, looking at us.

Inside the Metro with Carmen, study #6722: With Palmer Musician Dusty Bannon, wife Michelle and other family members and friend.

Dusty grew up on a Delta Junction homestead. When time and opportunity allows, I hope to catch him in action and to tell more of his story.

Also, let it be known that I have learned the identity of the person who, right after I returned home from this trip, bought me the coffee, pastry, paid the tip with 25 cents left over for me.

It was the Alaska Pony Girl. Thank you, Alaska Pony Girl! I think I owe you quite a few coffees now.

You can find her old blog here:

http://akponygirl.blogspot.com/

And her new blog here:

http://akponygirl.wordpress.com

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I bike to Church, go on to Sunrise, see a four-wheeler through a pipe and am told a search is under way; Fat Boy's is gone, Sicily's is here

My modem went on the blink and ceased to blink, so, if I wanted to keep blogging, I had to take it back to GCI and trade it in for a new one. As I pulled out of the driveway to go and do so, I saw Kalib in the back of Caleb's truck. Caleb was nearby, keeping an eye on him.

After I swapped out the modem, I returned toward home along the edge of Wasilla Lake and shot a few blind frames. By "blind frames" I mean that I pointed my camera through the window and without looking in that direction myself, fired off a few frames, letting fate and serendipity choose the subjects and the composition.

Just a few weeks ago, Wasilla Lake was still coated in ice.

Now look at it. It has once again become:

"Wasilla Malibu."

I should do a series of studies of Wasilla Malibu throughout the summer - even though I don't expect to be here that much this summer. Still, I will shoot what studies I can, beginning with this one, which I shall title:

Wasilla Malibu Study #204: The red fire hydrant and the sunburnt boy.

Next I went to the Post Office. After I came out, I got into the car and started to drive away, but I saw the broader-faced of these two dogs. I braked to a stop, backed up, parked poorly, jumped out, scurried over and told the lady and the man kept by the canines that I would like to photograph the dog and then the other dog appeared and so I amended that to, "I would like to photograph your dogs."

So I did. I didn't learn much about the dogs, because, as I have already stated, I was parked poorly and needed to move my car before the wrong person came along, took offense, and shot me. I did learn that both dogs had just been groomed. They had been wearing heavy winter coats but now they were ready for summer.

I also learned their names, one was Sammy and the other was... the other was... the dog's name was...

Oh, good grief! I have forgotten!

This is terrible.

Not only that, I can't even remember which dog is Sammy and which is the other dog. 

But one of them is Sammy and whichever one he is, he is a mighty beautiful and fine looking dog and his temperament is pleasant.

Next I took a bike ride, my longest one so far this season. Here I am, headed down Church Road.

Here I am, about three or four miles further along, on Sunrise. A man and a boy pass by me on a fourwheeler and wave. I want to wave back, but worry that I might crash if I do because I am already pedaling and photographing and talking on my iPhone while surfing the web and to add one more element might just be too much.

So instead I nod my head and shout "hi!" hoping they can hear over the engine and wind noise.

Actually, I was not talking on my cell phone - or surfing the web. My iPhone was in my pocket. I just made that up to add a little bit of drama to the moment.

Our paths intersected again a little further down Sunrise, by the Mahoney Ranch, where the road has been torn up so that some new drainage pipes can be dropped in beneath it.

Turns out it was Dustin and his son. Dustin grew up just up the road. We talked a bit and he spoke about how wonderful it was to grow up here and I commented that he must have seen a lot of change and development and it must frustrate him a bit and he said, oh yeah, he had witnessed incredible growth and change and it was frustrating.

I was nodding away in awe at all the change he must have witnessed growing up here his whole life, especially considering all the change I had seen even though I grew up elsewhere and have only lived here a short time when suddenly it struck me that my short time living in Wasilla is getting close to 30 years and Dustin looks pretty young so I have probably been here longer than he has and have seen even more change.

As we were talking, a car stopped and a young Mahoney got out and then prepared to ride away on a bike. He said the people who had just dropped him off had told him that a two year-old child had wandered off and got lost at the s-curve, maybe a bit over a mile up the road. A search was underway and he was going to go help.

One never wants to hear or believe such news, but these things happen. It puzzled me a bit, though, because I had already pedaled through the s-curve and had seen no one. I knew that if a search had been going on there, there would have been people and emergency vehicles at that curve.

Maybe I had pedaled through before the search began. I did not think so, though. I thought perhaps he had received some inaccurate information. I hoped so.

The young man pedaled away.

I then took a picture of Dustin and his son through the new culvert pipe.

Then they turned around and headed off. I resituated myself on my bike and pedaled off in the same direction. I soon realized that they were going pretty slow and it would be an easy thing to catch them and then shoot a few frames as I pedaled alongside them.

So that is what I did. The Mahoney horses were in the field on the other side and I had planned to shoot a few pictures of them on the way back, but by the time I had shot my final frame of Dustin and son, I had passed the horses.

At that point, all I could think about was the story about the two-year old. I did not want it to be true. I did not think it was true. But I had to find out. If it was true, then I would have to do my part to help.

I could not leave with a two-year old child wandering in the woods, or being downstream in the frigid waters of the Little Su.

I pedaled on, toward the s-curve. Soon the Mahoney kid came into view, returning home. He said there was no one at the s-curve, no sign of any kind of search at all. The information he received must have been bad, he said.

Relieved, I pedaled on. As I reached the s-curve, an airplane passed overhead.

In time, I reached Seldon, which not so long ago became the Mat-Su Veterans Highway. It is hard to think of Seldon Street being considered a highway, but if it is a highway, then it is appropriate to name it for the veterans.

I took this picture right by Fat Boy's pizza. Unfortunately, Fat Boy's has gone out of business. It was said that he would reopen in a busier part of town in May, but he did not. I hope he yet does.

Now, there was a sign in the window that said, "Abby's Home Cooking, opening soon."

I wonder if Abby will serve breakfast? What will her hash browns be like?

Will she steal me away from the Family Restuarants? It would be an easy and good thing to leave the car behind and get on my bike in the morning and peddle the mile-and-a-half to Cora's.

When I got home, the house was chaotic. Jobe and Kalib were having a blast. It was after 7:00 PM. All the dishes were dirty, no one wanted to cook and dirty more dishes and anyway I now had pizza locked into my brain. So I ordered pizza from Sicily's, the place on the Parks Highway just past Church Road that I only discovered while driving home from Fairbanks May 15, following the honoring of Katie John.

They deliver, but the lady on the phone said it would take 45 to 55 minutes but the pizza would be ready in 15, if I were to pick it up.

So I picked it up. On the way home, I saw this dog.

I am very sad to have lost Fat Boy's, but glad to have discovered Sicily's.

It was very good pizza.

I ate too much, though, and then, to compensate, I had watermelon and cantaloupe afterwards.

After the gorge, I found Kalib and Caleb playing in the guest room. "Uncle!" Kalib would say. "Nephew!" Caleb would answer. Then they would reach out their hands and touch.

Jobe finished the day with some milk and then went to bed. Just as he is no longer sleeping in his cradle board, he no longer dines on mother's milk. 

Lavina had two goals in mind when she breast fed Jobe for over a year - the first was to provide him the healthiest diet possible, the second to give Jake and her a natural form of birth control.

It will soon be evident just how successful that part of the plan proved to be.

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The boys come out for the weekend, Muzzy is shorn; the landing in Point Hope; the unsure takeoff

The boys came out this morning. They are going to spend the weekend with us so that their parents can work on their house.

It was their mom who brought them. She brought Muzzy, too. Muzzy had been to the dog groomers and now had a bit of the poodle look. Lavina and Muzzy couldn't stay, because Lavina had to get to work. So she opened the back door to her car and Muzzy jumped in.

He jumped right back out. So she had him jump in again. I think Muzzy enjoys making multiple jumps into the car.

And yes, my recent Arctic series is still in the works, still coming. To prove it, here is a picture that I took exactly one month ago today, right after we landed in Point Hope.

Anyway, the editing is going very slowly, because I don't have much time for it. Also, it just dawned on me that this is a holiday weekend and so my readership will be down - especially if the weather stays as beautiful, sweet and magnificent as it is right now. I will not bother to post the series until the holiday has passed and sunburnt readers come straggling back.

Perhaps I drive some readers nuts with my ever-shifting plans and frequent delays, many of which I just let slip unseen into the past as the present takes over.

Look at this way - you are getting to observe an experiment being conducted by a photographer/writer of at least some talent who has spent the past 35 years making a living in certain ways that he sees coming to an end. These ways of making a living have not ended for him yet, but the end is swiftly coming and it will soon be over and archived.

So he is looking for a way to both survive and create in the new reality that is ever shifting in front of him, dominated by bright, young, energetic and creative talent who understand current trends and digital code much better than he does.

This blog is not the vehicle that will allow him to truly survive in the looming new times, but it is a part of getting there, a part that he clings to as he struggles to find the solution, to take the next step, knowing just what he wants to do but not yet how to make it happen.

Will he succeed? Or will he fail?

I bet on success.

But it is a bet, a gamble, the outcome greatly in question.

So keep coming back, keep watching. Take a front-row seat and watch this spectacle unfold. In time, the answer will be clear.

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Dog flies from Nuiqsut to Barrow; Shoshana the young writer who is not to be taken for granted and other unnamed Metro studies; lady drives off the road on Lucas

Late last night, or rather early this morning as I was bringing my work day to an end, this picture showed up on the final frames that scrolled into my editor. It is a dog, and the person owned by the dog and the dog is in an airplane that is flying from Nuiqsut to Barrow.

I have not been to Nuiqsut lately but even so, I pretty much spent all of yesterday there and on nearby Cross Island - at least in my mind and on my computer screen, as I tried to figure out how to narrow down and shape up the Nuiqsut/Cross Island portion of the big project that I am working on.

The effort left me very frustrated for a couple of reasons. For one, I have 116 pages for this project and I must divide those pages up somewhere between 20 and 30 topics, involving pictures that include hundreds of people.

Yet, I could use the entire 116 pages on Nuiqsut/Cross Island - and I would still feel that I had fallen short.

And, when I work on the other topics, I feel the same about them.

So that is one frustration.

The other is that, to finish this project and the others that appear to be following close on its tail, I would do well to just sit this blog aside for a few months and put my entire focus there.

But I really don't want to set this blog aside.

So, when I came to this picture of this dog in the airplane flying from Nuiqsut to Barrow, I thought, "I will put this dog in the blog and it will be the only picture that I blog tomorrow. If I blog but one picture a day, I will at least keep the blog alive and it won't take much time at all."

So that is what I decided to do: to blog the dog today and nothing else.

When I got out of this plane back in September, I knew the name of the dog and of the person that it owns.

I no longer know their names. As I recall, they were headed south. Far south, like somewhere in the southern states.

I could be wrong, but that's how I hazily remember it.

So I have now blogged the dog. I am done blogging for the day. It didn't take long.

WAIT A MINUTE! I must include the above study!

Yesterday, after I pedaled my bike to Metro Cafe, Shoshana went to her car and brought in this story to give to me. She does this every now and then and then I take the stories home and read them and they are always good. 

This one was titled, Taken for granted.

These are the first three lines, which I asked her permission to include:

My life has always been anything but normal. It is unique to the point of questionable. I have often said that if my life were a movie, well, there is no doubt that it would be a drama. But not just a drama, it would be a drama/thriller/comedy; but mostly a drama nonetheless.

So I shot this young writer study, and having shot it, I decided I wanted to use it even though I was only going to blog the dog today. So here it is:

Study of the young writer, Shoshana, #6589: Shoshana, who is not to be taken for granted, with her story, Taken for granted.

Well, Hell. I also shot a couple of nameless studies while at Metro. I figure I might as well add them in as well. It won't take that much extra time. So, here is the first:

Metro Cafe nameless study, #99: Guy working at computer who told me his name and I was sure that this time I would remember so I did not write it down but I have forgotten.

Metro Cafe nameless study, #990: Carmen causes customer at drive-through window to laugh and she laughs, too. He told me his name and I was certain that I would remember so I did not write it down, but I have forgotten.

Metro Cafe nameless study, #1099: Actually, I did not forget his name. It is "Nike." I might have forgotten, but he kindly wrote it down on the back of his jacket before I took the picture so that I would not forget. Nike was born in Japan, wears cowboy boots and rides a black horse.

And then this morning, as I was driving home from breakfast at Mat-Su Valley Family Restaurant uphill on Lucas Street, I saw this car stuck off to the side of the road, a lady sitting behind the wheel.

Thus I was presented with a moral dilemma - to stop or continue. Once, there would have been no question. I would have stopped. But things are different now. Everybody has cell phones. If you were to look at a larger version of this image - such as you can find in slide show view, depending on the size of your monitor - you will clearly see the reflection of flares burning at the side of the road.

There were no signs that the lady was in distress. It appeared that she had set the flares, had undoubtedly called someone and was now sitting calmly behind the wheel waiting for the help she had summoned to arrive.

If I were to stop, there would be nothing I could do but ask if she was okay. I am not equipped to pull her out and with my artificial shoulder I cannot physically push anybody. She would answer, yes, she was just waiting for someone to come and pick her up.

So, knowing that is how it would play out, I drove past without stopping.

I am quite certain that I analyzed the situation correctly, but I am still a little uncomfortable about it. Now, I wish I had stopped. I don't think that it would have made one bit of difference in this world but still, I wish I had stopped.

And I have spent too much time on today's blog. I can't afford this. Yes, I will still put in a full day's work on my project, but if I am ever to get it done, from here forward I really need to put in two day's worth of work each day until it is finished - except, of course, for the week that I will spend in Arizona.

I plan not to work on it at all when I am in Arizona, May 11 - 19.

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