Crag Lake to Muncho Lake

ever present raven is there every day

stragglers and vivid greens

letting go of winters coat

Haines to Skagway to Crag Lake

Great day for the 70 -200 lens, lots of animals and the sun breaks out to melt patterns in the snow.

To Skagway, some soiled doves and a raven.

via the water

some soiled doves

the elusive raven on the hood of the FJ

Kluane to Haines, AK

With two days left, I went for the dramatic scenery in the northwest Yukon.  A passing highway glimpse of Kluane National Park, then on into Haines, AK where there was a Saturday night beer festival.

The melting of the upper snows made abstract patterns everywhere.

The last peak paintings were quick late night marks on Yupo.

Last weekend in the North.

The last large format painting of the ice breakup from the previous Friday. Working on these from memory and some video I shot. The light kept fragmenting and jumping around as the ice flowed from west to east with the wind.

The ice breakup is all but gone and the peaks changing daily.  Great light well on till 11:30 pm now, at least you can pant till then. The mosquitoes are beginning to be a bother, but I've worked in a lot worse.

Not a day without a bear photo recently. Here's one that was a few kilometers down the road enjoying a spring evening.

The snows are a melting and guess who I meet in a peaceful meadow

Yes I met another of those brown fellows today, the fast ones that stop you in your tracks, I got lucky again.
Then later a peaceful cow moose nibbling on some willows.

I can hear rushing of waters somewhere across the lake, it is perfectly still today, possibly a stream from a hidden valley.

I'm told the lake will rise a foot or so with the "spring" melt down. So here are some of the last lower splashes of white.

Ice break-up and desert sands

Friday the ice let go with the west winds and slowly moved eastward, I've attached a video. The ice makes a tinkling sound like crystals of glass, I believe they call it candling. The sound on the video is not great due to the camera vs. the wind.

There is a "desert" just west of here of here that is actually and old lake shore from the last glaciation. The winds blow the sands around to actually form dunes. Some rare sedges grow there but are battling it out with the quad drivers. They are thriving on the steepest slopes.

Wildlife photos for yesterday were just the porcupine and the gopher as they call them here.

The back end or business end.

Yukon Peaks in my immediate area

This last week the weather has been damp but I've managed to get out and do the Yukon Peaks up and down highway 8.

The break-up of the ice

The long awaited break-up of the Crag Lake ice started Friday. I've been down to the rock beach photographing the ice chunks and fractures plus attempting to record the sound. I've been painting these forms for a for a few days now. They melted quickly but the inspiration is there for a series.

They are waking up… me too

 I was in my truck when I first encountered these two guys. At first I thought, "oh wow a brown bear".
Then I saw how fast they could move…

More images from the water movement photos

Here are some of the images I took of the movement of waters from the stream up the road.