Some recent AK photo's (live, interior, photos)

[warptman]

I love spring: Birds start showing up, that fresh smell in the air, people walking around, and sunken snowmachines...





The right way to cross overflow...

[ShipOfFools42]

So Warpt, how do you know where you can cross and where you can't? I would be pretty freaked out trying to ride a snowmachine across water like that myself, but I'm sure there's a method to the madness... right?

By the way, tigre, that's the kind of winter weather I love! When you go outside and there's a huge stack of snow like that on top of the car, and you gotta get out the snow brush and dig out a bit and drive through the snow... love that. Great big flakes!

[Floyd_Davidson]

Originally Posted by freezengirl

Great pictures Warptman! I had visions of every mother in Bethel hollering at her kids as they head out the door "And stay away from the puddles!" I can't tell you how many boots were filled with icy water over the years or lost getting sucked into the mud as spring thaw progressed.

I have this wonderful memory of my oldest son, at about age 4 following his mother down the trail walking to the store. It was summer, and raining, and she got him all dressed up and ready... and the last instructions I heard her give him as they headed out the door were, "Stay out of the mud puddles!".

I stood watching out the window as they walked off, her in front and the little guy walking about two steps behind his mother, as he stomped with delight in every single mud puddle.

She did eventually learn that little boys don't need to be cleaned up until bed time.

[Floyd_Davidson]

Originally Posted by ShipOfFools42

how do you know where you can cross and where you can't? I would be pretty freaked out trying to ride a snowmachine across water like that myself, but I'm sure there's a method to the madness... right?

See the one picture that Warpt says is the right way... notice the 90 degree angle of approach? Not an accident.

See the angle of the other one... headed straight down the open water? That's okay if the machine is going fast, but if it slows down, what you see is what you get!

Around here there are lots of folks who thoroughly enjoy driving snowmachines across open water on lakes and lagoons. Distances like 100 to 200 yards are common. Apparently it is great fun, but it requires being properly equipped for survival and accepting the fact that a snowmachine might end up sinking too.

[warptman]

It's hell on ice wheel bearings though.

[bethmarywhite]

I loved that picture of the big snowflakes against the red backdrop of the post office. I thought I'd never like to see another snowflake again after the winter we had here (ok, you Alaskans laugh your a#$ off here) but I had to admit, seeing those pics, I think I could go another round! Loved that little bulldozer thingy. Around here all my neighbors have a plow on their trucks and they all rush around to plow our little road before the town gets here. My other neighbor has a machine like in that picture and he made huge piles of snow across from my house in the woods and at the end of the road with it. Another neighbor yet again does my driveway with a snowblower.

Can't believe I'm getting nostalgic for the snow again!

[freezengirl]

Originally Posted by Floyd_Davidson

I have this wonderful memory of my oldest son, at about age 4 following his mother down the trail walking to the store. It was summer, and raining, and she got him all dressed up and ready... and the last instructions I heard her give him as they headed out the door were, "Stay out of the mud puddles!".

I stood watching out the window as they walked off, her in front and the little guy walking about two steps behind his mother, as he stomped with delight in every single mud puddle.

She did eventually learn that little boys don't need to be cleaned up until bed time.

I understand-my mother gave up with me too. I never met a puddle I didn't like to play in. One year we had my daughter and all her cousins in their pretty little Easter dresses begging to go outside and play in the melting snow. We extracted the usual promises and swearing to stay away from the huge melt puddles-15 minutes later there all of them are with one of those kids plastic pools from behind the garage trying to paddle there boat. The dresses and good clothes all ruined, blue lips and muck and mud everywhere. Sometimes it is so hard to be stern when you are trying so hard not to laugh.

[tigre79]

Originally Posted by ShipOfFools42

By the way, tigre, that's the kind of winter weather I love! When you go outside and there's a huge stack of snow like that on top of the car, and you gotta get out the snow brush and dig out a bit and drive through the snow... love that. Great big flakes!

Yeah, this was the biggest snow we've had since I've been here, and it wasn't even really big by normal Valdez standards (we're currently 0.5 feet shy of a record low season). NOAA says it was 31.5 inches over a day and a half. Heavy, wet stuff, too. Spent three hours this morning shoveling with a snow scoop on the hatchery's rearing pens out in the bay, then came in right at low tide and had to walk the boat in 100 yards to shore and then along the embankment for about 150 yards, trying not to get water in our boots or turn our ankles on the rocks. If you want real fun though, try wrestling a pallet jack through a foot or so of wet snow, on top of soggy silt and gravel, while the wheels clog up with snow and rocks until you're just dragging around the world's most awkward 200 pound sled. That was my day yesterday. Snow is pretty, and it's fun until it gets in the way of something you really have to get done.

We were asking one of the new guys at work what his girlfriend thought about the snow (she was keeping their driveway shoveled while he was at work), and he said she thought it was okay...as long as this didn't happen too often. Everyone else in the room broke up laughing.

[patrikcainan]

great photos that is can any one give me some more photos to me .

[ShipOfFools42]

Originally Posted by tigre79

Snow is pretty, and it's fun until it gets in the way of something you really have to get done.

Despite my rabid and irrational love of snow, I agree with you on that. It's just that, down here, it never snows enough to get in the way of getting anything done. And this winter we had a good three-week span that started with a foot and a half of snow and it stayed in the 20's that entire three weeks, so we got to keep our snow for a little while. I was ecstatic! Everyone else was sliding off the road, getting stuck in the snow, etc. It pays to have lived in the north and to know a thing or two about what NOT to do in the snow. That way I can watch my fellow Southerners flounder about in it, and I can just cruise on. And here, people don't usually stop for someone that went off the road. First of all, it isn't that cold, and second of all, if you stopped for all of them, you would stop every 200 yards!

So basically, with water crossing on a snowmobile, it's a matter of how far you plan to go across the water and how fast you can keep it going? That does make sense. Reminds me of growing up when we used to go off-roading in our 4x4s and sometimes to cross a big mud/water hole you would have to get up some speed and kinda skim across it. It works particularly well with small trucks like Tacomas. Chevy's and the like sink like a rock, though. I've known quite a few geniuses who sunk their trucks in the river.