Mardell Gunn took a break from harvesting and putting up food for the winter to celebrate her birthday last weekend. She sat around a bonfire with a group of women friends including Rashah McChesney, Brynn Murphy, Chloë Copeland, and PhoebëSnow Desatoff. They shared a dutch oven blueberry cobbler cooked over the fire, among other foods. “How could one have a better summer birthday?” said Gunn.
A group of Haines residents had an impromptu reunion in the Tatsenshini-Alsek Provincial Park over the weekend. Cindy Buxton, Russ White, Dennis Geason, Aimee Creelman, Thom Ely, John Norton and Tom Ganner met up on the Chuck Creek Trail.
SAIL grilled up more than 175 burgers at its annual community picnic with help from teens participating in SAIL’s Transition Camp and music from Lucy Nieboer, Lex Treinen and Amanda Painter. Joan O’Keefe, SAIL’s Executive Director, was in attendance with local staff Sierra Jimenez, Janine Allen, Ashleigh Reed, and Cori Stennett. Southeast Alaska Independent Living serves seniors and people who experience disabilities across the Chilkat Valley and throughout Southeast Alaska.
Pilot Drake Olson flew Jenn Shelton, 3-year-old Cima, and Andy Hinton to the base of Le Blondeau Glacier recently. They camped and then rafted the Tsirku River. Hinton is visiting from Tennessee. He is working as a raft guide on the Tatshenshini River for Momentum River Expeditions.
Recently, teachers in the Upper Lynn Canal met in Klukwan for the Jilkáat Aani Ka Héeni (Chilkat Watershed) Place-Based Educator Workshop. Fifty-five teachers from Haines, Skagway and Klukwan participated in the workshop. Indigenous Knowledge bearers Guneiwtí (Marsha Hotch), Saantaas’ (Lani Hotch), and Skaan K’i (Cory Grant) and local geologist Cindy Buxton presented during the full-day field trip touring the watershed.
Haines author Tom McGuire has published a new book, The Curve of Equal Time, tracing the lives of commercial fishermen on the outer coast of Alaska. He held a reading at the library recently and said a handful of folks attended – mostly friends who had read his first novel. Afterward, everyone bought a copy and then he went for a picnic with his grandchildren. “What could be better than that?” he said. He also held a reading at The Bookstore during First Friday in August, which he said ended up being more of a signing. “Haines is so lucky to have a good bookstore, newspaper, library, and radio station. Also a distillery and brewery,” McGuire said. “Not many towns can compete with that.”
Chorus Bishop and friends Lex Treinen, Jenn Shelton, Marnie Hartman, Zeb Cordner, Liz Landes and Ben Aultman-Moore did an overnight trip up Santa Claus Mountain Aug. 6-7. Fisherman Jake Bell gave the hikers a ride over and back on his gillnetter. The group summited after approaching via the south ridge. They camped at Paradise Lake in the basin to the south of the summit. They saw a mountain goat and wolverines. Kevin Forster and Greg Collen took their sons up the same route days later.
After a late viewing of bears at Chilkoot, out-of-towners Steve Arnold, of Ontario, and Dara Finney, of Ottawa, accidentally locked their keys in their truck on the Chilkoot Lake road after stopping to look at the sign noting the weir fish count. Night was setting in and the two were at a loss until two local women picked them up, drove them to the police station. While officer Max Jusi kept them company, a dispatcher gave them Al Jobbins’ name. Jobbins drove them back to their truck at the campground and spent what Finney said was approximately 15 seconds unlocking their vehicle. Finney said he drove away without letting them pay, so she thought it best to immortalize the kind act in the local paper.