our bear friends are back..my first sighting of the year!!

 saw a few cars pulled over on campbell airstrip road as i headed back from the monday walk.  saw a big black blob in a tree just off the side of the road...maybe 100 feet in.  this guy was maybe 50 feet up the tree. several of us gathered by the road there to watch.

 one guy said this bear has been popping out on this tree for the past few weeks. seemed to feel the bear was denned up in the tree.  it could be true. i watched, she dropped onto a lower branch and then was gone. she didn't climb down so not sure where else she would have gone off to.  i'll have to keep a better watch on this tree.  amy and i drove by later and didn't see the bear.

 i just got lucky.

 here she is peeking out from the side of the tree.  the tree is pretty large, as the bear seemed to be a good sized black bear, especially considering what time of year it is.

 we had a lovely day and a lovely walk.

 lena, tanya, amy, little miss sydney and i all enjoyed the weather, the beauty and the friendship.  not too many monday walks left til we stop for the season.  i'm thinking i may make a run to homer/seward next weekend with the dogs. i've earned some fun after being sick and then having this procedure done.

 the colour is improving on my leg and overall the pain is improving as well.  hopefully it will continue that way.  can't wait til i can skip wearing these dang ted hose during the day. felt hot today out there in them....and it was still upper 30's, low 40's.

 out of order, but a better side shot of the bear peeking out at all us gawkers on the road.  my sister, who i spoke to today, wondered about safety. i felt reasonably safe there on the other side of the berm on the road, but i also know that wild animals can move pretty dang quick when they want to.  you are never totally safe around wildlife such as this. in general most wild animals would rather not waste any much needed energy on human chases.  save that for food finding.

 tanya, amy and i joined at kaladi's for coffee.  of course i was late as i texted to say i had spied this bear and i was going to check him out.

 sydney was feeling quite chipper and walked quite a bit today. loved her pink hat!!

 manny comes down the trail.  between rio, sydney and my gimpy leg we took a shorter route...of course, i can't say it took us any less time.  monday walk has always been more social in my mind so i am never in a hurry on mondays. just great to be out there and enjoying friends and all.

 she did ride a few times.  once when we had stopped she snuck out and we all laughed as the sled got suddenly much lighter. amy looked back to see sydney out walking.  lots of much needed laughter today.  kids are always great laugh therapy!

 rare manny shots.  the dogs all had fun i think.  blossom looked a bit beat tonight.

 while we were enjoying a beautiful day here in anchorage apparently the people of boston were not.  as i drove  up to the monday walk i had npr on. there was something about bombs at the boston marathon, but i only caught the tail end.  amy filled us all in on what was happening. from what i'd heard i thought they had found unexploded bombs.  sadly, lives were lost and many were injured.  my heart goes out to all those effected and i do hope the culprit/s who did this cowardly act are caught and brought to justice.

 sometimes you have to remind yourself that even though there are terrible people on this earth, the bulk of the people are good and kind and just trying to live their lives.  it's so sad that a few bad seeds can have such a negative impact on us all.  they mentioned that there are camera's all over and hopefully this will help catch those responsible.

 always, the good people rush in instead of running away and rapidly begin to help those who have been injured.  i have a brother in the boston area and all are well.  there were also many alaskan's who flew out to run the race and so far i haven't heard of any of them being injured.

 lena and tanya stop to wait for us.

 indy above and boddhi below.

 amy on the trail.

 tanya and amy encourage sydney to walk.

 we had a sad story up here over the weekend.  a father was out snowmachining with his 9 year old out on a glacier.  he'd stopped and watched his son.  the kid went behind a mound and never came back out.  turns out he had fallen into a moulin...i think i have that right?  it's where water collects on the top of the glacier and it forms like a tunnel down through the glacier.  vertical shaft on a glacier through which a stream of surface water plunges...just looked it up.  the snowmachine took out a chunk of snow which went in with the machine and child.  a local emergency room doc with climbing experience was there and roped up and went in the hold.  the goggles and helmet were found, the guy tried to dig through the snow, but the boy was not found and is presumed dead.

 not sure if the snowmachine took him out, if he was simply buried in the snow or if  hypothermia eventually took him.  there are plans to try and do a recovery effort.  those glaciers are dangerous places and as the sun is out longer the top coat of snow from the winter will weaken.

 blossom tries to rope in sydney.  she likes to toss the ball for blossom.  always cracks me up that blossom looks just as happy chasing that toy 4-5 feet for her...with most adults i find blossom brings the toy back to me, but she will bring it back to the kids. it's like she knows they just want to have fun with her.

 tanya gets in the game of getting sydney running. i bet that little girl is sleeping good tonight.

 loved these of her running.

 and the balance! impressive. saw some little article that was saying how easily you can get up from the ground determines general health.  lay down and see how much effort and extra limb work you require to get up. it does make some sense.  the more effort involved the shorter your life expectancy.

 and she's walking!

 she'd fallen back to play in the deeper snow.  hard to get out of it once she was sunk in.

 not much else to my day.  errands.  steaks at costco so i had a nice dinner, followed by a root beer float with my broken tooth rootbeer.  back tomorrow for 3 more nights of work.  boo hoo.  resting has been good for my healing.