Matt's "Garage" Project

Last summer or maybe in the dead of winter, I heard my friend Matt say he was thinking about building a garage.  I said, "I might work with you on that."  Then a couple months later he got serious!

He found a real nice plan.  I can't find it right now so I'll have to give you the link later.

We were thinking we would be able to start by the end of May.  Then we thought the beginning of June.  Then middle of June.  Maybe the end?  No.  We started the second week of July.

The excavation took forever, but they did have to put a lot of rock back into the earth.  They had to go down 10 feet before there was solid earth - and then fill it up again with rock.

Hard Rock Construction did the foundation.  It looks good while we wait for the pad to be poured.  They were really good to work with.

The main house is to the right of the foundation.

One wall up, another one on the way.

Three walls up.

Four walls up, and time for the first floor beam, 26 feet long, 2 feet high, and 5 and a quarter inches wide.

It always amazes me that the rental places let me rent equipment that I have no idea how to operate!  But, you give them your credit card, and with a two minute lesson, you're off on your own!  Fun!

Four walls, beam, and the BCIs are in.  Looks ready for plywood.

This was pretty much a week's work.

But it's not done yet.

Mt. Edgecumbe Hike

Doug looks at the view.





Mt. Edgecumbe, an extinct volcano, is a 30 minute boat ride from Sitka.  The trail was originally constructed by the CCC in the 1930's.  The trail wanders the muskegs for 6 miles, and goes straight up the mountain for 1 mile.

Luckily, my friend Bob was one of the leaders of the hike for Sitka Trail Works - he managed to get me a seat on the boat.

For six and a half miles, we weren't sure that we were going to see anything at all - not an unusual occurrence.  But not too far from the top, I got my face out of the mountain long enough to turn around and check things out.  The clouds were moving and the mountains in the distance were peeking out over the clouds.

In this picture, the town of Sitka is off to the left at the base of the mountains.

There was quite a large group for this hike and you can see some of them on the hump and some off the hump to the left.

Depending on the weather, it's fun to walk around the crater.  I kind of like this picture where you can see some of the crater with Sitka Sound and the mountains in the background.  You can see there's still a cloud bank ready to jump back over the mountain when you least expect it.

Mt. Edgecumbe is famous for an April Fool's prank.  It's more fun to read about it here rather than have me tell about it.  It's a great prank, for sure.

Hike: Starrigavan Lakes

The summer hasn't been one for great hiking - but I've been on a couple of great hikes.

A great destination that is off the beaten "Sitka" path (which means you won't see anyone most of the time) but close to town (OK, everything is close to town) is Starrigavan Lakes.

After a long 12 mile drive almost to the firing range, you park and start up through an old logging clearcut.  And focus on the word "up."  Any time you go through an old logged off area, it's miserable anyway.  Luckily, enough people go up that way that you don't have to crawl through the mud with devil's club scraping your back.

Then it gets steep.  Keep going.

But when you break out of the trees, it's all worth it.  This is one direction.



There's a lot of snow from last winter.  Note that it is July 5.








Matt, Bob, and I climbed up on top, about 3000 feet in elevation - and yes, we started pretty much from sea level.  Here they are, surveying the empire.  And what an empire.