Chicago

The Chicago skyline above blue Lake Michigan, viewed from the Shedd Aquarium

After Matt's fantastic recital, we celebrated with champagne in the park

We were followed closely by a beggar squirrel 

The bridge over the river at Water Street, right in the center of the downtown. The city was so loud from street noise that it was hard to hold conversations outside! 

Window display

A statue warns a young girl of the dangers of eating too much candy: you'll turn into a silver statue yourself!

Elaborate details are a highlight of Chicago's architecture

The Chicago River is not as blue as the lake, but this may be lingering effects from it being dyed green for St. Patrick's Day. 

We were fortunate that tulips and other flowers were just beginning to bloom during our visit

Caribou Antlers and Caribou

The caribou antlers have been accumulating in the house for a few months, and so it felt like time to paint!

 Aurora antler, acrylic

I was impressed with how persistently the wolves followed the caribou around out on the refuge. I made two "haiku" for this antler. One is for the caribou and one is for the wolves.

 Hunting From Sunrise to Sunset, acrylic

Caribou
Sunrise demons
always in eye reflected
one step behind us.

Wolves
Black winter phantoms 
teeth winking fur singing
chasing the wind now.

When thinking of designs, I try to imagine what the caribou see and encounter every day. Lichens are essential to caribou survival in the arctic during the winter. Here at the Refuge, they seem to survive on wetland grasses.

I Like Lichens, A Lot, acrylic

The Watchers I

The Watchers II

The Watchers III

Sheep Creek to Cathedral Rapids #2.5 traverse

On the first bluebird day in a week, we took a ski tour up a stream called Sheep Creek. We have been eying it from the highway because it looks like a wide path with a steeper gradient than other nearby streams.

April skiing - blazing hot

The snow was consolidated enough to be relatively firm underfoot, so we made good time skiing the 3 miles to treeline.

Snow balls falling down the south-facing slopes leave funny tracks

We saw weasel tracks all the way up here! And there were ground squirrels out and about.

There was a rock-ice slide in the valley in the center of this picture. The rumbling sound of falling debris was alarming!

The saddle is somewhere around the bend to the left...

This valley had a series of snow chutes that I think have been carved by a combination of avalanche paths and spring snowmelt.

Looking back from the first saddle, a false summit. We switched from skis into snow shoes because it was getting too steep.

We found a caterpillar near the summit! I have no idea how it is supposed to eat. We took it back to the house and it is now living in a mason jar. What will it become?

Finally, the actual summit. 

There aren't many named features on the map, so I'm going to call this "weasel pass" because we saw weasel tracks and because it kept having tricky false summits!

Looking down the Cathedral Rapids side of the mountains. 

The terrain was too steep to ski down safely, and we were cautious about avalanche danger, so we hiked up a knob and descended part of the way on a rocky ridge. It was almost too steep to walk down in snow shoes!

Big thunderheads building on the horizon hurried us onwards.

We followed this ridge line down to the last set of jagged rocks.

Looking back up at the saddle from where we decided to switch back to skis. This was the lee side of the mountains, and the snow looked so pillowy and smooth!

Once we descended in elevation the valley narrowed into a chute, which was like riding a miles-long half pipe.

Cathedral rapids was as awful as I expected, with lots of enormous boulders and loose, deep snow. But it's a mercifully short section of the trail and the Tanana River was beckoning us home.

We biked back to the car at about 9 pm. The total traverse was about 10 miles and took us about 7.5 hours.