Staying Busy and Having Fun in 2022

Sometimes life seems busy, but when you have some quiet time to reflect…you realize it has been even busier than you thought! We didn’t realize how much we had done in 2022 until we started to add everything up. 

Outdoor Adventures and More

As is often the case, we had a lot of big and small outdoor adventures. We had three week-long or longer vacations and about 15 smaller all-day or overnight adventures and we camped out a total of 26 nights. And between the two of us, we competed in about 20 local races(skiing, snowshoeing, running and biking). We definitely kept with our MO of being physically active outdoors. 

But there is more to our lives than just being outdoors. Corrine continues to work 40-50 hours/week as a family physician. She plans to retire in just a little over two years. Her patients are already beginning to worry who will take care of them when she leaves. She reminds them that she has great partners, so they will all be in good hands. She also continues to make quilts although she sewed a few less this year than usual. 

Quilts that Corrine made in 2022 - not to scale

Eric, meanwhile, has ratcheted up his volunteering. He stays busy advocating for trails and getting people outdoors. He continues to do social media and other work for both the ski and cycle clubs. He has taken over as treasurer for the cycle club. He fits in other volunteering as well, including helping with a big drainage planning project for the neighborhood and doing a bit of work for climate change. He continues to edit a book for his friend, Ned, while still finding time to work on his own writing. (He also got a second woodshed built for us.)

Here's our past year in more detail (with links to our blog posts about these adventures). 

January

Once again, we headed to Hawaii at the end of the month, this time to the Big Island, for a medical conference for Corrine. When not at the conference we hiked and biked and explored the island and, of course, watched many sunsets. Corrine did another sea-to-summit challenge by biking from the ocean up to the top of Mauna Loa. Having a mid-winter break with sunshine really helps us make it through the long winters.

February

Riley and Sam got engaged in Hawaii in June - they plan to get married July 2023

We had planned to ski the American Birkebeiner (the largest ski marathon in the USA) with Riley but he had to come to Alaska, to the village of Venetie, to work on an aurora research project. While he was there, his fiancé Sam (yes, they got engaged this past summer) had a seizure back in Iowa and was subsequently diagnosed with a brain tumor. Fortunately, Corrine already had time off for the Birkebeiner, so she flew down to help while Riley worked on getting home. Sam has since had surgery to remove as much of the tumor as possible, received six weeks of radiation, and is now getting monthly chemotherapy, all while helping organize a large physics student national conference, continuing to work on her master’s in science teaching and planning a wedding. This woman is amazing! 

Riley, meanwhile, is finishing up his PhD in space physics and will graduate this next May. He just accepted a job at the Space Dynamics Laboratory in Albuquerque, New Mexico, where they will move after the wedding.

March

We love March in Alaska. We did a multi-day bike trip in the White Mountains National Recreation Area (just north of Fairbanks) once again for our birthdays, we both did the 26-mile Chena River to Ridge race on skis, and Eric skied the Sonot Kkaazoot ski marathon (taking his own path) while Corrine did an overnight bike to Borealis Cabin in the Whites. It was a great month for getting outside and enjoying spring conditions in the snow.

April

This was another great month for spring snow conditions. We had an amazing weekend biking on a trail off the Denali Highway and on the Stampede Trail. And we finally made it to Richard’s Cabin, the last cabin in the Whites that we hadn’t been to. Eric also flew down to Arizona to see his mom who turned 90 this year. 

May

May is a transition month from winter to summer. Corrine’s biking friend, Linda Gryczan, came up for a visit while her spouse did an Alaska cruise. Corrine was able to show Linda some of our favorite biking spots including the Ferry Road and Denali National Park. Corrine then did the Denali Bottom bike race (a 120-mile bike race on the Denali Highway) on a glorious day over Memorial Day weekend.

June

Corrine did another overnight bikepack to Ophir Creek in the White Mountains as part of her training for her July attempt of an Individual Time Trial on the Cross Washington (XWA) route. (A grand depart for the route – bikepacking speak for “race” – happened in May. Corrine had hoped to join that, but heavy late spring snows and then rain convinced her to try later in the summer.) We also did a quick overnight bike to Mastodon Cabin in the Chena River State Rec Area.

July

Corrine spent a week doing the XWA, racing 700 miles across Washington while Eric visited with his friends, Eric and Lorraine in Port Angeles, and then explored spots across Washington, while occasionally meeting up with Corrine. As usual, the bikepacking “race” was harder than Corrine expected. She persevered, after having to make a big 27-hour push at the end, so that we could make it back to Seattle in time to catch our flight home. Later in the month we did an all-day hike on Sugarloaf Mountain near Denali National Park. Corrine also did another overnight, biking to the Upper Angel Creek Cabin. Eric meanwhile did a couple of trail running races.

August 

In August, Montana came up for a quick visit. It was great to see her. Montana continues to live and work in Missoula. She has been busy with her music and has finished several new songs this year. Check out her YouTube channel. She has been working on a new music video (we got a sneak preview over the holidays) and we can’t wait to see the final product. She and Eric meet by phone weekly to work on Spanish lessons and help her figure out how to promote her music.

September

We had a great Labor Day weekend on the Taylor Highway. Eric drove support and did some hiking while Corrine biked with our friend Nikki. The weather wasn’t great, but the fall foliage was outstanding. And neither of us had ever been to Eagle before, so it was fun to explore a new place.

October

We had the trip of a lifetime floating the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon with a fun group of 24 people and seven amazing guides. We got to run rapids, hike up narrow canyons, swim through waterfalls, camp under the stars almost every night, and even see a flash flood. We really enjoyed our 16 wonderful days of being off the grid.

November

Corrine did an early season solo bike trip to Moose Creek Cabin while Eric stayed home, nursing an injury. Thanksgiving weekend we headed down to Hatcher Pass to explore. We got to ski on new trails and explore more of the Mat-Su Valley.

December

Winter weather foiled most of our plans for December. Due to frigid temps, we cancelled the cabin trip we had booked for our 30th wedding anniversary and instead celebrated by skiing 30 miles in a week and re-creating a photo from the year we got married. And then, due to the big winter storm in the Lower 48, our friends, Jill and Beat, had their flights cancelled and couldn’t make it to Fairbanks for our annual holiday cabin trips. The horrendous weather got even worse with strong winds on top of the cold temps, so we bailed on a couple of planned cabin trips and instead had a quiet Christmas by ourselves.

Bad December weather didn't ruin one outing. We participated in a public reading for the book Wheels on Ice: Stories of Cycling in Alaska, in which we both have an essay. About 80 people showed up for the reading! 

Reflections and Looking Ahead

The quiet Christmas did give us time to look back on the last year and look toward the upcoming year. We have several big adventures planned, including doing a ski marathon (Birkebeiner) with Riley and 10,000 other skiers in February, biking across Iowa (RAGBRAI) with Riley and Sam on their honeymoon in July along with 20,000 other people, and doing a hut-to-hut bike trip from Durango to Moab in the San Juan mountains in September. What adventures do you have planned for 2023?

We are excited about 2023 and what it will bring!