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Wednesday, September 05, 2007

More about my house

I mentioned that walking to and from the house to the car was a long trek yesterday, or did I, I can't really remember.....oh well. Anyway it is a long walk and I will show you although for some reason I don't have a picture of all the stairs from the house to the trail.

Here is a picture of the trail starting from the top of the stairs though..


About halfway down that picture this is what we start to see.....the top of the garage.

At the top of the hill you see in the picture above this is what you see...then we walk around the garage and there is our cars and obviously in reverse to get back to the house. Its probably pretty close to a 1/4 mile walk to the car so you really don't want to forget something when your leaving the house, especially if your in a hurry!

The path is lit at night.....if we remember to turn the lights on so we aren't walking all this way in in the dark. Which is good because one of my well known secrets is that I'm afraid of the dark and walking with the kids and being scared doesn't help their morale much either! Oh and yes Pamela comented about the bear or bare issue from my comment about Kelly mooning the tourists and yes there are bears in the woods but they don't really come around as long as you keep food items where they can't smell them and think they can get an easy meal! We have all kinds of wildlife around and this area actually has a lot of black bears but right now a lot of them are gathered around the fish hatcheries and rivers to catch the salmon since it is really plentyful right now with all the salmon spawning. We have seen a few bears a little farther out but none and no signs of any near our house so we are okay and they really don't like people much anyway.... they haven't had a bear attack here in forever pretty much people for the most part know how to keep them away from their houses. My cats aren't very happy though right now because they used to be outside cats but I really dont want to feed them to the eagles so they are inside now. Although if Milo doesn't stop with the load meowing at night I might just take the chance to shut him up! Hopefully he can hide from them well.

Okay enough about that and more about the house. For anyone who doesn't know much about Southeast Alaska our area at least is part of the Tongass National Forest which is a temperate rain forest which basically means its it cool in the summer and always rains. It doesn't get as cold though as other parts of Alaska and there is not supposed to be as much snow in the winter. Of course the 12.5 feet of rain a year average is quite a lot. Many parts of western Oregon are considered temperate rainforests also although they are not on the scale of the Tongass. Anyway my point was to mention the fact that here in Ketchikan it rains so much that if you live outside of town you are not on a city water supply, you have your own and it comes from your roof when it rains. In the picture below you can see the gutter part that leads from our roof to the container in the next picture

This is a very large tank that collects all of the water from the rain that falls on our house. It then runs through a pump and 2 filters to our faucets in the house to supply our water.

I was a little worried about the water at first tasting funny but actually its really good. I don't know if it is the running through the 2 filters but it tastes a lot fresher then anything I drank in Portland and I couldn't taste any chemicals like the chlorine you can taste in our old city water. It's also very clear.

Also the air here is just so much fresher. I could tell when we got here and when Kelly flew into Portland he could see the the smog in the city as well. There really is none of that here, just fresh air and the ocean. If any one remembers I am a big fan of the ocean so that is even better for me. I will even get over the frustrations of town for it. yeah town I've had a few frustrations with things people wise, nothing major but yes frustrations that I can only contribute to small town/Island life. It's all okay though I will take it for my view and the fresh air!

18 people had something to say:

Beccy said...

How lovely to be surrounded by fresh air and clean water and as you say, you will get used to small town life. It all sounds wonderful to me.

heiresschild said...

beautiful, beautiful surroundings terri. you and the family will get plenty of exercise. glad you all made it safe and sound.

Amy W said...

I can only imagine how good the air smells...

frannie said...

I want to move to Alaska, too! It looks like heaven!

ChrisB said...

The more you tell us, the more I envy you your new life. Oh for clean air and decent water. I know you say the bears are not a problem but that might just be one thing that would spook me!

Beckie said...

The water supply is really interesting. I don't know where I thought it would come from, but rain water makes perfect sense if you are not in the city and you are in a rain forest.

I love learning these things! Your new life sounds great...I can't wait to read more. Oh, the walk to the garage is a little long, but good exercise. :)

Steffi said...

Very interesting and really beautiful pics again!I would like to live there too ;O)!

~ej said...

i love the water collection system, how cool! and all that fresh air and nature must be beautiful! i'm so glad you are there finally....i've been meaning to check in since we got back! :)

Heather K said...

wow it sounds like paradise...if you love the wilds! I think our family would love to live out there!Except that it is SO far from everyone... but that is the way it goes when you relocate a long distance like you have. How are the girls settling into school? Oh and Joshua too..
ps... I could have sworn I left a comment on yesterday's post but I don't see it there....hmmm makes me think I'm losing it!!
=)

Anonymous said...

I am so forgetful that if I had to walk that trek to the vehicle and back I'm sure I'd be skinny in no time!

Beautiful photos and very interesting about the water.

BS said...

Great exercise - still loving what I see of Alaska - enjoy every minute of it.

Anonymous said...

It all looks so beautiful - EXCEPT for hiking a bunch of groceries in the rain from the car to the house.

In my many daydreams, I have wanted to catch Oregon rain like that and use it for watering the garden in the summertime.

Scribbit said...

That is really interesting, you won't see that in Anchorage!

Anonymous said...

Sounds a bit like heaven to me..as I was reading your post I was thinking that you all will be getting your exercise just walking to the car! I had the question about the bears too and you answered that, so that is good the bears aren't around much. I also enjoyed reading about the water tank! Very interesting.

la bellina mammina said...

Now I'm really jealous...:-(

Anonymous said...

wow that looks beatiful... really sounds awesome place to live.. what are the frustrations? i can tell you from living in a small town.. it can yeah be frustrating;P

Stacy said...

So Awesome! Can't wait to still see more pics!

Pamela said...

that is a lot of rain. I worked with a guy who moved here from there and he told me that it rains constantly there - and I thought he was kidding.

You are going to come back to visit and we are going to nick name you rusty.