Southeast Doubleheader

My job takes me to a lot of places that I really enjoy traveling to.  Yakutat and Cordova are two of those places.  Checking the weather, wave, and snow forecast on the internet in the days leading up to my trip, I wondered if this was going to be the trip where I would be able to surf and ski on the same day.  Things were looking good, so I brought along my wetsuit and my skis.

 

The Fairweather Range near Juneau.

The combination of long, pristine, golden sandy beaches and the Bagley Icefield is a pretty unique combination.

Yakutat got a lot of snow this winter.  I'm not sure that's gonna melt this summer.

I got all my work done in Yakutat by Thursday evening.  I'd optimistically left Friday open for a surfing session in the morning before getting on the plane for a quick trip to Cordova and a ski session in the afternoon.  Would it work out?  The weather was looking promising.  Here's Mount St. Elias from the window of my room, rising straight up out of the ocean near Yakutat to 18,008 feet - one of the biggest mountains anywhere.

Loading out of the van in the early morning at the beach.

Those waves are bigger than you think - unless you think they're 3 feet high - in which case you're about right. But Bill Lucy lent me his "wavecatcher" board. That board will surf even the tiniest ripples - it was great!

When you go by yourself, you have to take your own pictures.  With the right wetsuit, it's really warm out there.  I had to occasionally let a little 38F seawater into my wetsuit to cool off.

I must have caught about 30 of those little waves in 90 minutes. It had been a great morning!!

 

I flew to Cordova around noon.  After getting a little work done at City Hall, my plan was to ski the back side of this mountain range.

The weather hadn't gotten any worse during the day...

You can ski right down to the ocean.