Friday, September 14, 2012

We took a family walk to Thunderbird Falls on one of our last days of our trip.
 Cathy's mom Judy, sister Angie and sister in law Jennie. I took two of this pose, but Jake wasn't in the other one. He reminds me of those pictures of bigfoot walking in the woods, or Will Ferrell in Elf.
 Colt turned 10 while we were visiting.
 I've taken this picture before. Chase was in it though. And, we were leaving Alaska on different terms.



2012 Sheep Hunt

I took my great friend Rob to my sheep hunting area. We had to walk through this creek bed that cuts through the mountains to get to it. This picture shows the terrain we had to manage for a few miles. You really have to watch your step if you don't want go home early. Ankles and knees take a beating.
 We woke up on opening day to dense fog and visibility that was less than 100 yards. I love the ptarmigan silhouettes. Or are those rocks. Is that why some of them are called rock ptarmigan?
 It can be quite challenging when you're hunting in this kind of visibility.
 This is where we camped. We hunted the mountains behind us. We saw many sheep, 20-30 of which were rams. Of those, only 2 were close enough to full curl that we even studied them for more than a minute. Sadly, we too no pictures of them. We got so lost in watching and studying them without getting busted that we never even got our cameras out.
 So, after we quit sheep hunting, we decided to go bear hunting. We had seen one the night before we hiked in. Any one who knows me knows I have a bit of clownery engrained in me. Rob does too. There was record snow fall last winter. Two years ago, there wasn't any snow remaining in the creek bed. I couldn't resist a photo.
 This is Gunsight mountain. Of the last six years I spent in Alaska, I rarely saw this mountain top when it wasn't enshrouded by clouds. When I did see it, I didn't take a picture. Now it is mine forever!

More Homer and Kenai Peninsula

Our awesome friends the Reeves contributed generously to our trip. Not only did they loan their pop up to us to camp in on the spit, Jen gave us a bag of cookies that we turned into s'more saniches and lovingly called them Jen Reeves Chocolate Chip Cookie S'mores. (JRC3s)
 No matter how many times I go to Homer, I want to take this picture.
 The spit in the background. The flowers are Fireweed.
 I'm pinching her. Usually am.
 Colt was the only one to catch a fish here. We're on the Kenai in Soldotna. 17 inch dolly varden. I only know that because F&G measured it for me. I was one inch away from a ticket.

Sunday, September 9, 2012

Homer Salmon and Halibut Fishing

After floating the Kenai, we headed to the end of the peninsula for more fishing. The kids tried there hand at salmon fishing in the fishing hole on the Homer Spit. Justice caught a pink salmon that we kept.

This picture sums up the weather we had for the 4 days we camped on the spit. It didn't hurt the beauty of this awesome little town.
 Meg had to get some fresh air on the way out to fish for halibut. Rather flat water too. She doesn't tolerate the open seas very well.

 We still had fun, for a while we hijacked the vessel.
 Then Colt took a turn. He needed fresh air too.
That's a lot of halibut. And not a one of them over 25 lbs.
 Ours have the blue tags. They may not be big, but ten halibut adds up at $18 a pound local.

 Relaxing on the way back in. Wore out to say the least.


Sunday, August 26, 2012

Creation Museum

We went to the Creation Museum down in Cincinnati. Meg and Riley are standing by a zorse and a zonkey. I don't know which is which, but I think Megan is on the right. Argh argh.
This is in front of the museum.
Riley got to ride a camel...
...then a triceratops.


Kenai River Float

My buddy Rob has a drift boat and offered to take us fishing down the Kenai River. It turned out to be a beautiful day. We didn't catch any fish, which keeps his streak alive, but it was fun. Cathy did catch one Sockeye, but he was spawned out, so he was released. We fought a few but she landed the only one. 
We did see several bears. This was a brown bear we saw while fishing from the bank.
 Nice black bear.



Tuesday, July 24, 2012

Going to the Ball

Okay, so there was no ball, but you couldn't tell that from these two. Meg had a dress in her closet from I don't know when and they found one for Riley when they were bargain shopping and the scene was set. The photo's aren't the greatest quality, but they both are glowing with a beauty that I don't believe either of them realize. They were just having girl fun.


Pool Time

No visit to Grandma and Grandpa Fenwick's house is complete without some pool time. Grandpa turned on  the slide for the kids too. He rarely does it. It makes him a nervous wreck.


As payment, Cathy made him some apple dumplings with apples from the tree in our back yard. He growled when we came near him before he finished. It was that good.

Monday, July 23, 2012

Cincinnati Zoo

Riley visited us for the summer and we drug her all over the state (and 2 others) to try to get in as much fun as we could. We took her to the Cincinnati Zoo and she wanted a picture with the tamarin(sp). You can't see him very well, but he's in there.
 I believe our favorite part of the zoo was in the bird cage. These little guys are so beautiful and fearless.
 Beautiful smile.
 And another.
 Justice is saying something here, I'm not sure what, but he doesn't look too sure of the situation.
 Justice and Colt got in the turtle shells for a picture.
 I couldn't get Cathy in there.

Sunday, July 1, 2012

Guess Where We Went!

Yep!
 We had some awesome company along for a while. The boys wanted to go to the wax museum with King Kong hanging off the building, didn't happen. But we got this great picture!
 This was a pretty cool day. We were wore out from the activities in here. The inversion tunnel was wild! 
 From the top of the chair lift.
 My beautiful wife and me.
 The had to climb every boulder we came to. This was at Clingmans Dome, the highest point in the Smokey's.

 This was on a nature hike coming back from N.C. Very cool.
 Driving back home we stopped to check out fireworks. Colt got eaten by a lion.
 And well, monkey see...