Summer solstice

So yesterday was the summer solstice. If you all recall, the solstice is the longest day of the year, because it’s the point in the earth’s orbit around the sun at which the earth’s tilt is pointing directly at the sun (I hope that makes sense…I found a nice little diagram if it doesn’t). At home, Vienna is at 38.5° latitude, and I never really notice too much. But here, we’re so far north (Homer is at 59° degrees latitude), that its definitely noticeable, and its also a really big deal. Someone at work was telling me some of her friends celebrate solstice like Christmas – feasting, family gathering, presents.

I didn’t participate in any crazy solstice parties, but I’m quite pleased with how I celebrated solstice. Work has been really busy this week, and at the beginning of the week, I’d been staying late for various reasons, so today I got to leave early. I went out to dinner with two other girls that live in the bunkhouse, we all watched a movie, and then me, one of the girls, and the guy that live here went out to the beach in search of some climbing. The bunkhouse is about a block away from the beach, so we just walked down and headed north.

Most of the cliff is not stable at all - all sandy and clay-y. But when we found bedrock, it was
exciting. This way my favorite formation. As you can see, Nate is a more skilled climber then I - he had to give me a bit of a boost.

Then the tide was going out, and we got distracted by the tide pools. We weren't dressed for that (not that we were dressed for climbing), so I couldn't get really into the pools to find things, but I still saw some fish, anenomes, seastars and plenty of seaweed and barnacles.

Finally, we found some really awesome rocks way down the beach, and decided they were prime location for some cheesy family photos. Oh the joys of camera self timers...

Also, there’s this weird grocery store here in Homer called Save U More. Its in this huge warehouse, and it has literally everything you could possible imagine, but its impossible to find anything – apparently this is because the store allows all its distributors to stock the shelves themselves, so if you are in search an item, its likely in 5 different places. Oddly, this store carries Trader Joe’s brand items (among other things), despite the fact that Trader Joe’s doesn’t even exist in Alaska. Anyways, I’m excited because I was there yesterday and found the wholesale bulk sections of the store, and bought this huge box of granola bars – 48 chewy fruit and nut bars for $11 bucks. Oh man, granola bars are so key in the field, and now I’m totally stocked. Hopefully I won’t get sick of them before I finish the box…

Apologies for the graininess of the pictures. The light was not that great, and I think I probably got a ton of sand in my camera clambering on the bluffs. And I don't know why the pictures are all misaligned. Oh well, you get the point.