The Shoup Glacier toe (the part that reaches the water) is over 300′ tall. You just can’t tell from photos. When bits crack and fall off (many pieces as big as bungalows), the sound starts like a grumbling stomach followed by a thunderous crack and a splash.

It’s a good tired. Since my last post, I flew in a wee De Haviland Beaver over the Chugha mountain range to the interior of Wrangell Elias National Park. We stayed at America’s last frontier town and former copper mining community of McCarthy, a dusty strip of road with an original brothel/lodge (where we stayed) and saloon. The horses were replaced with ATVs, and I really doubt that the original settlers in 1910 had saffron-infused shrimp skewers on the menu. Yummy. We hiked on a glacier with crampons (definitely required) and drank from the crystal-blue runoff. Today we drove to Valdez, arriving just in time for a quick trip to…

It’s been hot here. My face is tingly from the sun. I’m just a little south of Whitehorse. This is Alaska. Since arriving here Wednesday, I’ve been on three small bush planes flying over 10,000-ft mountains, cruised to towering glaciers on silty teal-green fjords, flown on a float plane over the Baker ice field and landed in a remote glacier bay, seen bears, mountain goats, sea lions, humpback whales. I’ve been nearly tossed overboard on 12′ seas in a tiny fishing boat, and eaten more salmon than I have in the past year. When I close my eyes, I can feel rolling. It’s either the turbulence or the rough seas.…

I’m in Juneau tonight, but tomorrow we head back to the woods for 2 days. Lack of TV, radio or Internet in the wilderness would make a great excuse for awesome star gazing if the sun actually set.

Glaciers are made of snow that is compressed over centuries by even more snow into ice that is so dense that it twists light so that only the blue of the spectrum escapes. It’s robins egg blue, and is brightest when the sun isn’t shining. A thunderous crack announces the calving of the glacial front, hundreds of feet of sheer ice undercut by the melting at the water below. Glaciers calve like the World Trade Centre fell. Straight down. Puffins travel in pairs and rarely stray far from each other, kicking little bright orange webbed feet in the 9C teal-green glacial water. They’re crazy little birds with Einstein tufts of…

Jasper was up all night throwing up. Suzy says it was eight times. I lost track. Then in the morning while Suzy was at the gym, Simon has two creamy butt-to-ankle poos — in one hour. Just before my 15-hour trip. Jasper was still sick, by this time asleep, so I raced to the airport in a cab for the noon flight and sat on the Ottawa tarmac for an hour. Early observations of the Alaska Odyssey: Chicago O’Hare was incredibly busy. There’s a McDonald’s every 100m in that airport; everybody’s eating burgers and huge fries. Between Chicago and Seattle the guy next to me saw that I was reading…

The link is right at the top of the page. “Got a Problem?” Yeah, I think I killed Jasper’s sea monkeys. Suzy, Jasper, Simon and I went to Kingston this week for an overnight stay at the Ambassador hotel. The Ambassador reminded me of the Moncton Keddy’s Motor Inn I frequented with busloads of other homesick kids on band trips in the 1980s. The hotel was fine, basic. Empty bar fridges. We picked it for the waterslide. And spent some time in the park by the Lake Ontario waterfront. The apple trees were resplendent. I went to Kingston to make a brief presentation about Project Porchlight with energy efficiency guru…

The crisis is over. Gordongroup a rapidly fading memory. The Sponsor is paying to redevelop the light bulb plan. My sidewalk is dusted with apple blossoms. All’s well. I’m a bag of nerves. Maybe I need crisis. Maybe this is just the wave receding. I went for a run yesterday and nearly croaked at 3k. And next week I’m going to be paddling a sea kayak in Glacier Bay. Right. I hope there’s no wind. The Alaska Tourist Authority has invited me on a press trip, my first since Wales in ’04. I’ll be spending 6 days in national parks that skirt the southern shore from Prince William Sound past…

It’s 8:30AM on Friday. “Do I have time to take a quick shower?” I asked. “Are you going somewhere?” she replied. “Oh yeah. Right. No, actually.” “What’s wrong with your computer?” “Stuart’s ‘technical support'” “That’s not fair! You let Simon bang on your keyboard. It’s probably That! I keep this house running like a top.” “Freudian slip.” An old photo memory… Jasper

The Energy Star conference was a great success. The awards dinner was a glittering affair in the Imperial Room at the Royal York. This year’s award recipients include Whirlpool Canada, Home Depot and, you guessed it, Project Porchlight. The next day I cut loose a bit during my presentation to the plenary session and let myself talk idealistically about how we’re turning light bulbs into symbols of hope, change, empowerment. I thought, heck, what do I have to lose? The response was a bilzzard of business cards. At least four other major utilities and three provincial conservation authorities want to discuss running Porchlight campaigns. That felt good. Feet under me…

It’s 6:30 AM. I’m in my room on the 7th floor of the Royal York Hotel in Toronto. Suzy and the kids are asleep. The city’s slowly waking. An office tower a stone’s throw out my window is largely empty, even though the lights are on. It’s that hour of the morning where it’s dark enough to see into the building, not light enough to turn the windows all shiny business-like. Everybody’s got one of those newfangled flat-screen monitors. We’re here for the Energy Star national conference. Project Porchlight will receive a Market Transformation Award in a glittering ballroom tonight. Tomorrow I’m scheduled to address the conference on our success.…

The greatest excuse of the early 21st Century is “No, I didn’t get your e-mail. My spam filter must have caught it.” This of course is actually code for “Actually, I wasn’t really interested in your Spiritual Spot of the Day” or “Stop sending me those urgent notes about termites in the mulch.” Really. I don’t have time to read your stuff. I haven’t felt comfortable sharing this until recently, but lately I’ve been busy helping the son of the deposed King of Nigeria with his banking. He wants to invest in Project Porchlight!