Latest Update: June 20, 2002 by Ben Marcus

16:03 PM ROOM 517 ALYESKA PRINCE HOTEL, GIRDWOOD, ALASKA

Hmmm, this might be a bust. Colin and I are in the room with a guy named either Leonard Martin or Martin Leonard who is a hard-core kayaker and a smart guy and an adventurer and a bit of a mysterioso figure. He has paddled the Northwest Passage and all the way down to Canada. He is the guy who left the magazine that Doc Renneker found on one of his Alaska trips. That's all he'll say about that, and I even called Doc to get the scoop.

Martin Leonard or Leonard Martin has been everywhere, apparently, and I believe him. He's showing Colin some maps and talking about some of the outside areas of Alaska and the pleasures and problems and such.

We met him out at one of the parking lots as we were watching this Two Star bore completely fizzle. This whole thing might be a bust. Dang.

The mudflats are all wrong and so instead of focusing the tide the mudflats are spreading it out. We saw the tide pop up off of Bird Point and it rumbled and bumbled and I still think the way to do this is have a small boat that would take you up to the top-to places you couldn't possibly walk to-and ride the bore up there until it peters out. Then it backs off and starts up again off the first parking lot.

Well today the low tide was .4 and the high tide was 26.2 and the tide came through right on time at 13:30. It was nothing. Lilliuputian. Barely rideable. Yawn. Shit.

We went down to Second Parking Lot where there was a gap the way it was supposed to be, but the bore was barely seeable. The mudflats are too spread out. Bugger.

Oh well. We met this guy Martin Leonard Martin checking the bore with two kayaks on the roof of his car. He's an interesting chappie, no doubt about it. He paddled the Northwest Passage and the Na Pali coast and the Kohala coast and he just seems to have been everywhere., before everyone else, even Doc, for goodness sake.

He's mentioned the Doc incident a few times. "He found my magazine," is what he keeps saying and then smiles quietly to himself.

Martin lives out in Bethel with an Eskimo wife and two twin boys who were born premature and just got out of the hospital after three months. He has a geology degree from UA Fairbanks and is a good guy. The world needs more of them. He is certain the bore tide will be good when it comes through and not to worry.

We had lunch at that Tesoro station on the corner that reminds me of California so much, the place where Grifter Gus was selling his mottos last year. I had chili and the waitress was from Montenegro, wherever the hell that is. We chatted about this and that and this Martin Leonard Martin Leonard chap at one point said to me, "You're exactly what I imagined from your e-mails."

So I threw down my beer and rolled up my sleeves and bellowed, "NOW WHAT IN THE HELL IS THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN.??!!!"

No, he was being polite I guess.

So we ate lunch and now we're in the hotel. It's 15:19 right now and Leonard Martin Leonard is showing me all the good weather links. There is a decent little low pressure system bubbling south of us right now and that could mean a surf trip out to Hinchinbrook with Scott Liska.

http://www.buoyweather.com/ wxnav.jsp?region= AK&program=NOAAsat1&area=GIFS/ALIR

I called Peter Mel and told him about the mudflats but said he should come anyway. If the bore doesn't work then we could go down to Homer and fish or go out to Montagu and Hinchinbrook. We might be in the right place at the right time for those outer islands, if that weather produces some surf.

Peter and them went there last year for 10 days and got skunked. We shall see what we shall see.

Now he's talking about the North Pacific gyre a current that runs from south to north. He said, "I'll go out to Montagu an Hinchinbrook and I'll just paddle back. I don't want to pay a fortune."

So now it's 5:30 and we have to go pick up the charming and glamorous Miss Amy Van Sant at 18:30. We gotta get going. I asked Martin Leonard about ANWR and we see it eye to eye. "Alaska is too big to screw up." He agrees and says the native people out there need the money and deserve the money. He has worked in the oil fields and believe, like I do, that the oil companies don't want to screw up the tundra any more than we do.

Alaska is too big to screw up and yet Alaska is having salmon problems this summer. The Kenai River is closed already and fish are down everywhere.

Alaska is also melting, I've heard. Maybe that's what screwed up the mudflats.

Leonard Martin Leonard knows a lot. He just pointed me to an internet site with a lot of Alaska weather information, because Alaska has a hell of a lot of weather and a lot of lives and livelihoods depend on it.

Here's the link I used to see that low pressure. There is a long-range forecast which is calling for six-foot surf.

http://www.buoyweather.com/wxnav.jsp? region=AK&program=nww3Java&id=AK29

Martin Leonard Martin is excited because, "It's the longest day of the year. If you want to get laid, this is the time."

Colin says, "What does the Solstice have to do with getting laid?"

Martin says, "I don't know. It's like full moon or something."

Aha. Maybe the Solstice Effect explains Little Miss Hot Pants in the airport bar yesterday. For all I know those two are into their coda only now.

Things that make you go hmmmm.

Gotta go get Amy.

20:01 16:03 PM ROOM 517 ALYESKA PRINCE HOTEL, GIRDWOOD, ALASKA

I just went to get Amy and she is happily placed in the room next door. She's likeable, a little bit Helen Hunt, a little bit Jody Foster a little bit Don Rickles. Colin was going to go to the airport with me but he decided to stay and go "get some exercise" with Martin Leonard Martin. I don't know what that meant exactly but I certainly hope it has nothing to do with the Solstice Effect-not that there's anything wrong with that.

I left for Anchorage at 18:00 and Amy's plane arrived at 18:38 and so there was the potential for me to be late and rude, but I got there okay and ran in and caught her coming off the plane. No problemo.

We drove back and the tide was way way up and I tried to explain to Amy what the place looks like at low tide and she didn't believe me.

We stopped at Bird Point and she shot some video and now we're in the hotel and we're going to find Martin Leonard Martin Leonard and Colin Brown and take the tram up the mountain for a lovely sunset dinner with a view of the Turnagain Arm in June.

I've said it before and I'll say it again: Alaska is the place to be in summer. Just being here is enough. Very soothing. Light, air, clouds, sky.

And also what is satisfying about Alaska is the sheer immensity of the place. Nature is in control and nature wins here and it always will. It really is too big to screw up. You couldn't do it if you tried. And that is satisfying.

Bye.