Staying put.

I will wait here in the fields
to see how well the rain
brings on the grass.
In the labor of the fields
longer than a man's life
I am at home. Don't come with me.
You stay home too.

--Wendell Berry

Adams Inlet snakes away from Glacier Bay toward Lynn Canal

through beatiful mountains on all sides. I spent seven days kayaking there last week with Sean Neilson. My journal/gillnet for mystery yields these fish for the bar-b-que:

"This morning we watched a pack of 8 wolves (3 black, 2 grey, one brown and one black/grey/black like an oreo or a scaup). They were walking the beach playfully, visiting the intertidal, tug-of-waring with a piece of something we couldn't make out and rolling in one spot before taking off into the woods a short walk from us. That was pretty wonderful and it seems they weren't aware of our presence until the very end. Interestingly, when the pack passed a group of Canada geese and sea ducks foraging in the intertidal, none of the birds seemed concerned, whereas they fly from our presence at much farther distances. I checked their path for fresh wolf scat, which I've never seen. It looked like a smooth black paste with white hairs throughout (snowshoe hares?) and smelled 'horrid'."

"Today we entered Adams Inlet. From our first site of the mouth of the inlet strange noises confused us. It sounded a bit like a waterfall coming from the middle of the bay but turned out to be a group of ~150 sea lions feeding. The group approached us en masse to within 20 feet and began to scream and levate halfway out of the water. They seemed more curious than angry and we did what anybody would have done: screamed our best barbarian response and snapped photos."

"We saw lots of goats today. As always, their regal faces and agile mountain climbing captivated my attention. This time though, the captivation almost sunk my boat. A goat/subject of our future awarding winning photography we were approaching decided to head up the cliff above us. He sent down a shower of unpredictable rocks (on purpose?) that nearly put a hole in my boat and head. The sea was boiling with his rocks for several minutes--a site that was quite memorable even without the adrenaline-enhanced flee from danger."

"It sank it where I was today when an eagle feather and a steady supply of moose hair (perfect for bird nest making by the way) floated by my kayak. Signs of death as signs of life."

"Our bird list filled in over the course of the trip, following predictably the ecologist's s-shaped species area curve. First, the abundant ones--old skuas, ravens, mergansers, cormorants, guillemonts--and then ones rarer--a magpie, a red-throated loon, and two black turnstones. On our last day, and only day of inclement weather, we saw a group of hundreds of sandhills cranes flying high. The group was flying in pretty severe disorder while over the bay, but we saw them reach the steadier air currents over Gloomy Knob on the horizon and fall like beautiful dominoes into the steady lines that take them through the long haul. The best part about seeing the cranes was the process: you hear them first . . . they sink into your subconcious . . . you look up at the black in the sky . . . feel wonder . . . understanding . . . and then more wonder."

Thank you to those whose hard work protected this wilderness, and whose voices we still need hearing: John Muir is as responsible as anyone for Glacier Bay National Park and knew well the simple truth: "Fear not to try the mountain-passes. They will kill care, save you from deadly apathy, set you free, and call forth every faculty into vigorous, enthusiastic action. Even the sick should try these so-called dangerous passes, because for every unfortunate they kill, they cure a thousand."

Robinson Island Treasure

This update is fueled by a Parrilla and a liter of Hieneken in western Argentina. A Parilla is a mix of different beef parts like intestines, blood, kidney, and stomach. I think I'd have to say at this point that I'd rather they ground it all up and served me a hamburger with lots of ketsup. Maybe in Buenos Aires things will get better. I just finished a month on a farm within Pumalin Park, Chile and two days rafting on the Futeleufu River, one of the best in the world for rafting. Both deserve some more description. But, my travels start with three months on Robinson Crusoe Island, about which I should at least mention.

I spent October, November and December on my knees identifying plants which were giving me alergies on a crazy island 400 miles off the coast of Chile, and part of that country. The island was discovered (for real, not just in eurocentric terms) in 1574 by Juan Fernandez. At that time, 70% of the plants of the island were evolutionarily unique, aka endemic--the highest rate in the world. Some of these species have since been pushed into extinction, but the percentage has changed mostly due to species introductions--the subject of the study that brought me to the island.

While we quietly did our work in the next valley over a treasure hunt went on, directed by Bernard Kaiser. to be continued. . .