walks always the highlight of any alaskans days...

for the afternoon, i noticed the sun was coming out despite the forecasts of rain. in ketchikan when they forecasted rain...it just rained. here you just never know what the weather will really do. so i headed up to arctic valley to chase some vista's. that also meant walking directly up hill. not sure who made all the trails in the area but they were obviously young and fit. there are no switchbacks. of course, when i was younger and more fit i remember my early hikes on switchbacks thinking how silly they were. i mean..it seemed more obvious that you would shave off the time on the trail by just going straight up. now my joints tell me that the switchback was created for the more mature hiker. i didn't do the entire hike, mostly cause i am a very cautious hiker. it was after 5pm when i started and as i was up on the ridge the weather began to come in again. wind and rain were coming so i headed back down. was there long enough to enjoy the views and to wear blossom out a bit.

blossom has figured out that i am slow and she just takes a break and waits for me to make my way up the long hill.

thought the valley looked pretty amazing, despite my breathing hard. being bad on hill climbing has been really great for my photography skills. i stop often. below, same valley, different section of hill...stopping to "take pictures"...yeah right.

this morning when i came out for my walk with both dogs i noticed the change in the mushrooms i posted yesterday. below is the same long puffy shrooms from yesterday now tall and flat on top. very strange....! sometime through the night the bottoms came up. who knew this happened. i'd need time lapsed photo to figure out if this happened suddenly or if it slowly crept up through the night.

took the dogs for a nice longish walk from my place on up to cheney lake. there are lots of great parks near here. the fall colours always look great against a lake. blossom has fun getting in the water as well. so above is cheney lake. we looped around the lake then headed back home, passing by a creek which the dogs enjoy wading in as well.

thought the leaves above on this tree looked pretty, below is another picture of the lake. lots of fishermen out today enjoying the weather and lake. i guess it had icky fish so they killed off the bad fish and the fishing for trout has improved. my trail friend who lives near there says cheney lake used to be a big pit and they turned it into this beautiful lake.

blossom drops into "sphinx"...and waits for her tennis ball to be thrown. sorry, i know rio is rarely pictured, but rio doesn't like to be away from me. anytime i set her up for a picture she just walks toward me as i try to walk back to get a shot. it's pretty funny actually.

as i ate lunch i watched some show on international brides. always interesting. it sometimes goes very badly for the brides. it also can go well. i'm sure it takes a certain personality to thrive in this sort of relationship. i'm sure they have goals and this is just a way for them to attempt to obtain those goals. i couldn't pick up and move to a foreign land and marry a man i hardly know. i also couldn't have sex with someone i have zero attraction to just to improve my life...but then my life isn't thiers and i haven't had the life they've had. i don't judge these women. in a way they are creating thier own power.

one woman they showed was later murdered by the man who married her. she was only 18 and he was really a gross, fat dude. turns out he had a previous record for spouse abuse. one man was speaking of his bride who was in her early 40's and fairly fit. he said that most american women of that age are 50# overweight. funny that he was also over 50# overweight. these men feel they have control over the female they bring over and marry. often though, i think these woman are smarter than that and they are using these men and working them. i'd see them look completely uninterested as they look away and then turn towards the men with brilliant smiles and give these men the attention they obviously crave. they find thier own way to manipulate the situation for thier advantage. they are just better actresses than i could be. if it works for them and gives them the choices they would not have in thier country than it really empowers them in a way. there are no free rides though and there is a risk. they are in many ways simply endentured servants. some happy marriages are born of these international matches. much of happiness is dependant on attitude and expectations. there is also some amount of luck. for the 18year old, it was her bad luck that the man she chose to trust was one not worthy of it. that bad luck happens to plenty of american females who thought thier partners worthy of trust and ended up abused or dead.