Training in the Valley

    In normal years, Katmai rangers lead hikes out into the Valley of Ten Thousand Smokes. This year, with Covid mucking things up, we couldn't, but my supervisor (rightly) decided that Cheryl and I should go and be trained to do it anyways. I literally got to go hiking for my job. I love this place.




Cheryl was fascinated. Do you know how interesting you have to be to rip attention away from the view? 

    Barbara was our "trainer" for the day. Let me tell you all you need to know about Barbara: She knows everything about everything, she sets the bar way too high for the rest of us (If I end up being half as good as she is at this rangering business, I'll be doing better than 90%), and she does the most hilarious impressions of everyone here at the park. On her Valley Tours, she tells the story of the 1912 Novarupta explosion (obviously) but focuses on Captain Perry, who orchestrated the rescue and relocation of the villages here at Katmai at the time. I'm not going to go into detail on that, I'm just going to post some pictures so that you're suitably jealous. Just keep in mind: I got paid for this.

Porcupine on the ash mountains

Fossils! 
    Cheryl is another geology nerd (I'm surrounded!) and as we wandered around, we found lots of volcano-spewed rocks (Cheryl insists there's other names for them. I don't think so.) and fossils. 

Where the plants have grown back, Fireweed is abundant. I love this stuff. 



The Lethe River cutting through


"Social Distance Hiking" please stay at least one hiking stick apart

    Another official blogpost was written up about this, but it's still bogged down in the approval process, so we'll see if it goes up before the season is over. 

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