Summer driveway

I'm not sure why I put summer in the title here.  I guess it is an Alaskan summer, but supposedly it is one of the coldest on record, at least where we are.  We did have three days that got up close to 80 degrees which was way too hot for my taste!  I'm one of the very few who has been enjoying the cool summer!  I can't imagine how the rest of the country can survive with the temperatures as bad as they have been elsewhere! With all the snow from last winter and all the rain we've had this summer, the Matanuska River swelled higher and wilder than we have seen before.  That river is always dangerous due to the cold, but it is also swift, full of silt and constantly changing course.  I couldn't resist a picture.

With all the rain we had, there were also a lot more rocks falling along Long Lake than normal.  I'm so thankful I wasn't there when this one came down.  The picture doesn't do justice to how huge those divots were in the road.  There's another huge rock on the opposite side that left quite a wrinkle in the road when it came down.

After taking a few pictures, I turned around to get perspective on the other side and decided I'd hung out long enough.  There are plenty more big ones still hanging there and it looks like there's not much holding them.

Between the cloudy days and the point-and-shoot camera dying, these aren't the greatest pictures, but I figured I might as well use what pictures I did get.  I've been hiking up to Inspiration Point (well, until recently when there has been a large grizzly hanging way too close for comfort) so I grabbed this picture one calm day.  I'll have to try that again sometime with the Canon. 

There aren't too many still days at camp (between weather and kids) so I quickly grabbed this shot with the mountain reflected in the water.

 When I went to get some shots of the poppies, I noticed Victory Peak above and couldn't resist getting both in the picture.

The Fireweed is already blooming!  It seems really dark in color this year for some reason.  Or maybe it is always this color and it is just my imagination that it seems so dark.

Gratuitous scenic picture of the Matanuska Glacier:

As promised, here are pictures of the progress on the driveway.  The lighting is way off on these but at least you can see what has been going on.  Here is the first cut in from the bottom.

This shot looks back from the top of the first curve to the glacier.

These are some of the timbers taken out to make the drive.  Rodney started trimming the branches in preparation for milling, but someone stole a bunch of what he had trimmed so he's stopped work until we can figure out who has been doing it and make sure it doesn't continue.  There's no sense doing all that work to get them ready for milling just to have someone turn it into firewood.

There is kind of a landing part way up the drive.  This view is from that landing up the drive toward the house site.

Not that it looks like much, but this is the house site.  They ran into frost at this point and had to stop work there to let it thaw.

Just a little muddy.

 The next phase made it look much more like a driveway.  This view is from the house site looking down toward the machinery sitting on that landing site.

Certain bad dogs enjoyed playing in the dirt.

This view is from the landing back toward the road.

Ellie does provide plenty of entertainment.  There's not much funnier looking than a running Basket!

It's hard to beat the view from the top of the first part of the driveway.

The view from the road up the first hill.

 At least Blogger and I are understanding each other better now.  There's still a LOT more to catch up from the last few weeks, but at least I'm not as far behind as I was an hour ago!