Southeast

**Achtung** - This post has little, if anything, to do with the UAA Ski Team - **Achtung**

Sometimes having a job gets in the way of having fun.  But sometimes the job is the fun. Last week I needed to miss the whole week of ski practice for work, which is a drag considering that two of the workouts were described by Andrew as: "the best hiking workout (Falls Creek), and the best running workout (Kincaid Park) that the UAA Nordic Team has done in the past three years".

But Coach Kastning gave me an excused absence for the week, so I flew down to the corner of the state known as the "Alaska Panhandle" to outsiders, or simply "Southeast" to Alaskans. I spent a few days traveling by boat in Petersburg, Yakutat and Cordova, exploring the coastline and the rain forest in the area, inventorying remote houses and cabins.

We had to fly a few laps around Petersburg before landing to allow the fog to clear enough so the pilot could find the runway.

Our transportation for much of the week. I swear I remember my boss telling me earlier this summer we were going to be on a "yacht"...

Rain forest in Wrangell Narrows, near Petersburg

A fixer-upper. Maybe this is the "yacht" my boss was talking about.

Not all the places we needed to go were easily accessible by boat, so I needed to spend one sunny day buzzing around in this Hughes 500. I like airplanes, but I love helicopters.

Petersburg Creek with morning fog.

Farragut Bay in Frederick Sound.

Petersburg, with Devil's Thumb in the background, rising out of the Stikine Ice Cap.

I had been hoping to do a little surfing while in Yakutat but there was a storm, and surfing seemed like a bad idea, especially for a novice like me.