Byer's Lake

Alaska is full of public use cabins that folks can rent for a few nights through the park systems. This cabin, at Byer's Lake in Denali State Park, is one of the closer cabins to the road system, only a mile ski in from the parking lot. Some of the cabins are 20-30 miles out making them more conducive to dog sledding or snowmachineing. Last weekend Becky and I along with our friends Amy and Dave decided to get away for a little R&R with our K-9 friends Charlie, Riga and Yukon (Charlie and Riga's friend that lives with Amy and Dave). I'm sure you will be happy to know rest and relaxation was successfully achieved. Saturday was spent skiing around the lake with a nice quiet lunch mid-day by the partially frozen over creek draining the lake. It is hard to tell from the photo but this is a sod roofed log cabin with large burls incorporated into the structure. Just out of the picture to the right is Byer's Lake frozen over and covered with snow. Had the sky been clear we would have been able to view Denali by waking out onto the lake. No view of Denali this time but that was not our goal so no skin off our teeth.

Ice Art day dream

This year's Ice Art Competition has been no different than years past. It is absolutely mind blowing! The shapes and detail these folks can extract out of blocks of ice is impressive. This sculpture is 13 feet tall. The person is pretty much life size.

Ice Art Starts

Just because interior Alaska is cold does not mean we can't have fun. Every March Fairbanks is the home to the World Ice Art Championships drawing competitors from all over the world. To check out some of the past and present art go to http://www.icealaska.com/. There are two main categories, single and multi-block. A block being a 8'x5'x3' chuck of ice the sculptors get to manipulate using every tool imaginable from chain saws and chisels to hair blowers and sand paper. The photo to the left is an entry in the single-block competition. The multi-block competition starts in a few days and is when the really impressive sculptures are created. The meticulous detail and enormous size of some of the works are mind blowing. Sure, Becky and I go for the beauty of the occasion but we also go to keep the little kid inside of us alive. Half the park is full of serious ice sculptors to be marveled at while the other half is built into a kid's park for play time. They create 60 foot long slides of ice coming down dinosaur backs, igloos and tunnels to run through, a gigantic labyrinth to chase folks in and a series of luges, and spinning cups. Except for our size you would not recognize us as one of the mature, responsible adults in the park.