Baby, it's cold outside.

Just as we head to Winter Solstice, we’re enjoying a clear and cold-for Anchorage-spell of weather. -2ºf downtown and even colder in some parts of town today. Much colder in other parts of the Alaska. Thick hoarfrost coats everything in a blanket of icy glitter. We’ve had record breaking snow the past couple of weeks, and the wettest year on record. The short days start getting longer tomorrow.

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Surf's up on the North Shore!

We’re taking an early winter break to visit Devany’s sister on the North Shore of Oahu, Hawaii, and to celebrate my birthday. We happened to be here while the Haleiwa Challenger surf competition was on. I love shooting surf competitions, so we spent a couple of days watching that.

Devany’s sister works for the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service, so we had the chance to go out with her and check on Albatross nesting sites on lands that she’s been responsible for eradicating invasive species of plants and restoring the land back to its natural state to increase nesting areas. Managed to see a couple of endangered Hawaiian Monk seals as well.

Plus it’s about 80º warmer than back in Alaska, so that’s not a terrible thing either.

Seward Harbor in early winter.

I spent the past week in Seward working on our boat. Tourist season is definitely over and the town is quiet. We had our first snow of the year that turned into 3” of slushy mess and then Thursday night—right after these sunset pictures were taken—the wind storm hit. We had 60mph gusts and whitecaps in the harbor. Didn’t get a lot of sleep with and the creaking and moaning of the boat.

This city is so pretty, but I think it’s even better in the winter with the surrounding mountains pressing up against Resurrection Bay.