Pup Lake and Yard Dogs

It’s Matt’s birthday! The “death” of June. It never gets old.

Matt’s friend, Scott Christy, took him and Jeff up in a float plane today. Meanwhile, Lauren and Anna gave me a day off to write — so while they headed out to the field, I took a brief trip to downtown Anchorage with Sophie and Jana to do some souvenir shopping.

They then headed off to do their water quality sampling for the day. The plan was to do two lakes today — Stepan Lake being the first. However, when we trapped Stepan a few days ago, we walked in over muskeg. It being rather difficult to carry a canoe between two people over water-logged marsh, Bravo Team set out looking for the public access. They ended up at the end of a dirt road where a house stood overlooking a lake. There were dogs outside so they bravely got out and went to knock on the door. The man who answered kindly informed them that they had ended up at Big Beaver Lake and let them come into his incredibly nice house to look for the public access to Stepan on Google Earth. So they go off looking… End up at Pup Lake which they knew was wrong. Pulled into a driveway that looked oddly familiar — it was a friend’s house on Lazy Lake. Wrong again! Turned around and saw a side road they hadn’t tried, so down it they went. There was a house at the end of this road with a black dog in the yard. This detail had been in Susan’s description of where the public access to Stepan was so they got out to ask the owner if this was indeed the place. And that was how they met “Mrs. Key, but call me Dee.” An incredible character study ensued that would be impossible to relate through mere words on a computer screen because it involves a lot of relevant body language. And that would be why Bravo Team only got through one lake today.

– Rachel