Partly to mostly cloudy. Frosty overnight, with occasional periods of rain sometimes mixing with snow during the day.
I met up with Kitty around midday and we drove out to Starrigavan to take a walk along Katlian Road. I saw a report (either last fall or earlier this year) that the crews working to construct the road from each end had met, though there was still much work to be done. There are still signs posting the road is closed, but I regularly see people walking it on the weekends. The first mile or so appears to be basically completed, so I suspect they don’t mind people walking there, especially when they’re not working.
The only other time I’ve walked out that way was in January 2022. This time we went as far as last year. At that time the worked appeared to be stalled out at a steep section (though I apparently didn’t take any pictures).
Last year this was a blasted rock face. The original line for the road went along the left edge of the frame, much lower than they've cut the current road. Presumably due to steepness of the slope and/or rock that wouldn't hold up, they've found it necessary to push higher
It looked like they may have opted to go up and over that part. Based on what’s there now, it would be a steep, narrow section with quite a drop off. Perhaps they’re planning to blast it down a bit so it doesn’t go up quite so far. They may also widen it.
While we were on the north side of the ridge, we regularly heard and saw falling rocks (mostly small ones) from the uphill side of the road. I think it was due to the overnight freeze causing some expansion with temperatures finally warming enough to melt the ice while we were there.
After I got some lunch at Beak, the next stop was Cascade Creek.
I wanted to revisit the Macrodiplophyllum flaccidum. This time I found a couple other patches of it on the same rock. I didn’t look any further.
The channel only had a few gulls, and none that looked unusual.
I’m almost caught up getting my January-March 2023 observations into iNaturalist. I’ve also done well getting photojournals published. On the other hand, I’ve neglected finishing up getting my observations from 2022 into iNaturalist.
My iNaturalist Observations for Today
