“Freez­er-Burned: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka” is a reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update writ­ten by Steve Ulvi. Mail Will Be Deliv­ered, Part II   On a Sep­tem­ber day in the 1930s, mail car­ri­er Eddie Hin­der­mann steered his long­boat away from Chris “Phono­graph” Nel­son, who was talk­ing to him­self onshore start­ing into the tall spruce fring­ing the  Con­tin­ue Reading

“Freez­er-Burned: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka” is a reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update writ­ten by Steve Ulvi. The Con­fines of Heav­en   The Ala­pah carves sin­u­ous bends in a spa­cious val­ley side to side, flow­ing into the upper Kuuk Riv­er, a large trib­u­tary of the Yukon Riv­er whose milky waters bend west across the Inte­ri­or  Con­tin­ue Reading

“Freez­er-Burned: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka” is a reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update writ­ten by Steve Ulvi. For­ev­er More   With the blush of light clos­ing out a long sub-arc­tic night, among the first day­time crea­tures to engage in food-seek­ing are the clans of Com­mon Ravens, who launch impa­tient­ly from their heav­i­ly branched roosts in  Con­tin­ue Reading

“Freez­er Burned: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka” is a reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update writ­ten by Steve Ulvi. The Con­se­quences of Us and Them The old man emerged slow­ly from a cocoon of feath­ered warmth. The radi­ant heat­ing of the cab­in had waned after mid­night as the stove fire laid low. In the black­ness, he searched light-fin­gered,  Con­tin­ue Reading

“Freez­er Burned: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka” is a reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update writ­ten by Steve Ulvi. Cold Weath­er and Fuzzy Think­ing When­ev­er I look into the rearview mir­ror of my life gone by in Alas­ka; feel­ing nos­tal­gic, need­ing a laugh and real­i­ty check, I call up Archie. But like pick­led her­ring piled on  Con­tin­ue Reading

“Freez­er Burned: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka” is a reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update writ­ten by Steve Ulvi. The Mail Will Be Deliv­ered: Part I On a daz­zling autumn day, some­time in the mid-1930s, Eddie Hin­der­mann tipped his hat back paus­ing in his labors, lean­ing on a shov­el, catch­ing a blow.  He squint­ed while look­ing upriv­er  Con­tin­ue Reading

“FREEZER BURNED: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka” is a reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update. By Steve Ulvi, San Juan Island Just how much dif­fer­ence can a few bun­nies make? Com­mon notions when hear­ing of the place called Alas­ka, are a mish-mash of life expe­ri­ences (or lack there­of), book­ish knowl­edge and an active imag­i­na­tion. That place  Con­tin­ue Reading

“FREEZER BURNED: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka” is a reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update. By Steve Ulvi, San Juan Island Duck­ing through the plank door, cof­fee ther­mos dan­gling in hand, I paused to take in the sky while stretch­ing my sore back and shoul­ders. Breath­ing deeply, I was invig­o­rat­ed by the brisk 55 degrees  Con­tin­ue Reading

“FREEZER BURNED: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka” is a reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update writ­ten by Steve Ulvi. The aging sow griz­zly burned with an inces­sant urge to gorge on calo­ries as her 10th win­ter hiber­na­tion neared. To pro­vide for her­self and both cubs through anoth­er den­ning, required an ongo­ing smor­gas­bord of nutri­ent-rich food as  Con­tin­ue Reading

FREEZER BURNED: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka is a reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update writ­ten by Steve Ulvi… Arriv­ing in Inte­ri­or Alas­ka in 1974, I was 23 years old and had nev­er been in any kind of air­plane. (Well alright, full dis­clo­sure; as a kid, I was big on those hors­es and planes that ate  Con­tin­ue Reading

FREEZER BURNED: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka is a reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update writ­ten by Steve Ulvi… (Author’s note: This camp­fire sto­ry is most­ly fic­tion in terms of char­ac­ters and events. His­toric, eco­log­i­cal and polit­i­cal themes will always be sculpt­ed fac­tu­al­ly. The won­ders of the sub­arc­tic nat­ur­al world are as I under­stand them and  Con­tin­ue Reading

FREEZER BURNED: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka is a reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update writ­ten by Steve Ulvi…  The plane lift­ed off the state run­way in Eagle on dense morn­ing air on anoth­er blue­bird July day. The drowsy sprawl of town and sweep of the Yukon Riv­er reced­ed under the right wing as we climbed with  Con­tin­ue Reading

Click to enlarge pho­to. FREEZER BURNED: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka is a reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update writ­ten by Steve Ulvi… Dur­ing the sum­mers of the 1970s, a trick­le of new­com­ers of dis­parate back­grounds, wheeled into the time­worn town of Eagle, Alas­ka.    Less than twen­ty years pri­or, a sea­son­al road had been blast­ed and  Con­tin­ue Reading

FREEZER BURNED: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka is a reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update writ­ten by Steve Ulvi… The days of sub­arc­tic sum­mer blend togeth­er and can unset­tle inter­nal rhythms. This is both a bless­ing and a curse, in hav­ing so many out­door activ­i­ties and a great­ly expand­ed oppor­tu­ni­ty to over­do it. The real­i­ty of  Con­tin­ue Reading

FREEZER BURNED: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka is a reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update writ­ten by Steve Ulvi… In case you have nev­er heard this pithy phrase describ­ing a sin­gle woman’s chances of meet­ing Mr. Nor­mal in Alas­ka, I did not come up with it. Some form of this lament sure­ly has echoed every­where along  Con­tin­ue Reading

FREEZER BURNED: Tales of Inte­ri­or Alas­ka is a new reg­u­lar col­umn on the San Juan Update writ­ten by Steve Ulvi… Near­ly every mol­e­cule of water that now cov­ers 70% of our plan­et was spewed in awe­some vol­canic erup­tions or car­ried frozen in aster­oids or comets that pum­meled a life­less earth for eons.  Any giv­en water mol­e­cule has  Con­tin­ue Reading