Behind once again....

Hello All!
Another summer has started. This summer Evan and I are in Wrangell- St. Elias National Park, working out of a wee little place called Slana! We are on the road system, halfway between Tok and Glennallen on the Tok cut-off. IF anyone is driving up I highly suggest you have a little layover on Slana. We have an extra bed!
Evan is a backcountry Ranger again and I am working in the Ranger Station as an Interpretive Ranger. So far so good. I had two week of training, which was a blast. We started in Copper Center, came to Slana for a few days, drove down to McCarthy for a few more days and had some great adventures touring the mining town of Kennecott.
I'll post some pictures when I can...internet here is not the greatest, though I am told that we have it easy since we no longer need a generator for electricity!! Ahh, the simple pleasures we overlook when we live in the city!
Slana is a beautiful place to be, Evan and I go hiking, ride bikes and look for decent rocks to climb. Unfortunately there is not a lot of stable rock here, so mostly we just look at a lot of rocks!
I am making an effort this summer to actually post on the blog, so keep your eyes and ears open people!
lots of love
Ange

The end is near!

Hello again!
Here we are, our last full day in Nicaragua! We are spending the night in Granada tonight and will be taking a (very) early shuttle to the airport in Managua. We fly from Managua to Atlanta and Atlanta to Vegas. We spend the night in Vegas then make our way back North to Alaska!!
We have had a great trip but are very much looking forward to getting home. Though, I am not looking forward to dealing with a few things, ie: Someone stole my card info and charged $650 dollars in New York!! So, I will be doing everything I can to get the bank to bring justice down upon the jerks head(s)!!
I´ll post pictures when I get home, so you all can enjoy the beauty that we saw here!!

San Juan del Sur

After a few days on Isla de Ometepe, we are down in the south of Nicaragua at San Juan del Sur, which is a tourist hot spot. It´s a bit different than the rest of our travels, but still a good time. We almost did not come here, we were on Isla de Ometepe thinking how much we wanted to go back to Jiquilillo...we decided to come down though and I¨m so glad we did! We saw Kyle Martin last night, a friend from Healy...totally random! We were at the beach when we looked over at this guy standing by the fire ( I know, don´t ask me why their is a fire on the beach here, more for ambiance than heat!) and we both say, that looks like Kyle, lo and behold....it IS Kyle!! He was here for a few days with his friend Andrew and they were headed back down to Costa Rica, where they run a hostel, the next day. So, we weren´t planning on going down to Costa Rica, but, plans change! The Universe works in mysterious ways!
We have been loving our time here, (though Evan has not been as excited about the heat as I me!) but we are definitly excited about getting home! There will be no bugs, HOORAY!!
I probably won´t get a chance to post pictures until I get home in March, so be looking out then!!
Until next time...

Nicaragua!!

Evan enjoying a handrolled Cigar at the Cigar factory we toured.
A beautiful sunset at Jiquilillo beach
Another reason not to get stung by a sting ray: Infection!!
Us as we were going in to Canon de Somoto....a truly amazing and marvelous place!!

Nicaragua/Vegas/Red Rocks

Finally! Here are some pictures of our travels. There are many more to come, but for now this is the beginnings of our trip in Las Vegas where we had an awesome steak dinner with Nate Porter and Cassalynn David. We went climbing at Red Rocks outside of Las Vegas for a few days, then meandered our way down to Joshua Tree National Park where we got our butts thoroughly kicked!! It was a beautiful and wonderful place though and I left wishing that we had more time there!
So the pictures are in reverse order, the first one is us sweating our butts off in Nicaragua, the 2nd is at Joshua Tree, the 3rd is our stoic picture of us at Lake Meade (I think!) the 4th is our deelicious steak dinner and the last is Nate and Evan kickin it with the cowboy on Fremont street in Las Vegas!! I don't know how to turn the picture, sorry!!!

Hola friends and family!

here I am again, back at a computer. I have again tried to upload pictures and now the computer I´m using won´t recognize my card reader! SO....I will just give an update again, sorry no pictures to go along with it!
We got to Nicaragua and headed straight for the beach, Las Penitas is where we went to a nice little hostel called Playa de Roca, which translates to beach of the rock. The waves were really fun and beautiful sunsets all around! I am really wishing that my spanish were better, in fact if I knew how to speak to people would be great...but body and sign language seem to be working out okay for now!
I would have loved to post some pictures of my learning to surf, but unfortunately for me and pretty much going along with my luck, my 2nd day of trying out surfing, I JUST went into the water when lo and behold I get stung by a sting ray! yes, it really happened. It was actually incredibly painful for a while, we were able to go to a clinic by the goodness of some Nica people´s hearts where the doctor gave me some numbing to lessen the pain. The pain went away quickly after i took some pain killer/anti-inflammation meds! There were very nice people at the hostle we were at who translated for us so it was just a much better experience all around, even though it really sucked. Apparenlty it does happen quite often, it was a lower tide too, so it happens even more at those times. It was the last thing I expected to happen, but hey, it happened. Now I can honestly tell you all, you REALLY don´t want this to happen, it really is amazingly painful!
So, after my run in, we just hung out and relaxed onthe beach, took a nap in a hammock, then this morning we came to Leon. We plan on climbing some volcanoes and surfing or tobagganing down, taking a spanish class and enjoying the city here.
People are friendly and even the language barrier is not too much of a problem when you keep a smile on your face!
Hope everyone is doing great...oh by the way! I now have a new nephew! The first in 11 years!!
Take care!
Ange and Evan

Las Vegas and Red Rocks!

Hey All!
We have begun the first part of our Jan-March journey. Evan and I met up in Las Vegas on the 29th and then met up with our friends Nate and Cassalyn to enjoy the bright lights of Las Vegas for a few days. We headed away from Vegas on the day of the 31st to enjoy ringing in the New Year out at Lake Mead. It turned out to be a fantastic idea: enjoying good friends, a blue moon and 2010!
We then went to Red Rocks for a few days and did some hiking, rock scrambling and some rock climbing.
I will post pictures when I can hook up my card to a computer! Red Rocks is AMAZING I would highly recommend it to anybody, though it does get quite busy on the weekends. TONS OF PEOPLE!!
Mom, our phones died so, sorry we couldn't call!! ; )
From Red Rocks we are getting some much needed showers and heading down to Joshua Tree where we will stay for about 5 days and enjoy some more rock climbing.
I'll put another post up next week when we get back from Joshua Tree. Until then!!