Alaskan Chimes

A clock in the hall on a drive in Soldotna chimes Big Ben notes on the hour reminding us of home. Our door bell 7000 miles away chimes to the same notes saying someone is awaiting hospitality .Jan and Stan our friends in Alaskan have greeted us with such hospitality that we are beginning to understand the majesty of this place its rhythm, distinctiveness and "chimes. "

These are the melodies of Soldotna a town on the Kenai peninsula in Alaska in late May as Jan and Stan prepare to leave us and walk the Cotswold Way at home .

There are twenty hours of daylight here .We go to bed at around 10.30p.m with spectacular layered sunsets above the silent volcanoes across the Cook inlet easily visible from our bedroom window. We wake sometimes as early as five to bright silver birches against azure skies and soft gentle bird calls as the Alaskan Spring heralds rapid growth and also trumpets nature's short frenetic busy season . Around the lakes wild lupins ,roses and geraniums are bursting into life .Fleshy wild hostas boast confidence with their luscious leaves.Fiddle heads ( bracken ) curl and await picking and frying !

Chiming to Alaska time means walking dogs at "six mile post on Funny River " with friendly canines of all breeds and ages and of course the fellowship of their owners who they have taught of the ways of the kindred spirit . Hi there Jan ,Ellen ,Amanda and Soly .( not forgetting Jim who has now returned to the lower 48).

It is conversation which flows in streams of spontaneity ,honesty, trust and genuine kindness.Above all it is flavoured with fun , laughter and an enthusiam for living things in pure mountain air that refreshes the soul. Here we are close to our roots as human beings and our relationship with nature's beauty both inward and around us.

Scouty is our JRT leader .This sleek ,princely long legged terrier scents the air and lives up to his name.He scouts the land on either side of the wooded path reminding us of the closeness of bears and the pepper spray in our backpack which is at the ready in case of an encounter with a grizzly.Scouty almost laughs as he goes about his business of protecting us sniffing out the mischievious rabbits that tease his concentration. BUT WAIT suddenly he returns wounded ! In his back left pad three porcupine quills pierce his flesh like sharp needles ,two are in his side and one in his front left paw .Jan holds him and quckly Amanda and I remove them .This is a chime of the wilderness that sings the need of adaptation of us all to our surroundings .Quickly our protector is relieved of his pain to be replaced with a  soreness. It has happily dispappeared by the next day.

Alaskan Chimes include the phrasing of notes of  optimism and ingenuity and the capacity of human kind to adapt to harsh conditions  .Everything is crescendo.Denali the second highest mountain in the world guards this land in majesty providing a feast which tempts these English eyes with glimpses of pyramidal peaks ,morraines ,braided rivers ,log cabins, boreal forest ,taiga ,moose ,caribou ,bald eagles and tundra.Homesteaders and Native American alike are to me now  symbols of hope and the life that chimes in this wilderness.They shall linger in this heart for all the years to come.

This post is dedicated to Nicole a young Kenaitze woman who blessed me yesterday at a beach potlach with her tenacity and capacity for hope .

Thank you Alaska long may you and our new friends continue to chime your hospitable harmonious notes of welcome !!