Many natives here in CO complain too. You even see it with me. Thing is they move out and generally move back. There is very little like the environment of CO or Alaska for that matter. In regards to the deadly critters you must be lucky. I have a habit of running into at least one rattlesnake a year the last 3 years. 3 years ago it was a baby in our garage, 2 years ago it was on a path we walk on, another year it was across the creek, this year my mother walked 2 feet from it before seeing it. I live in the foothills though. I suppose it should be expected.
garden down there. 
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If I owned a place, I certainly would. I suppose I could get a few big pots and go that route.
i would buy a acre plot and put a decent sized rv on it. in the south you could live out of that pretty comfortably. come spring hook it up and head north. put big tarps over your garden so the weeds dont take over. my dream someday.
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It’s a mystery to me how people survive in places with long winters. When I lived in New Jersey, I got dead tired of winter by mid-February and could not wait for it to end. Dark and cold are so depressing.
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I saw a robin today. Spring is coming early. The robin is smarter than the groundhog but both are smarter than the climate scientist.
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For me Maryland winters were depressing, it was one long gray season, everything looked dead. Here the winters are quite stunning with lots of blue skies. Not to mention that there are lots of things to do in the winter time.
Once we start getting enough sunlight (outside of Dec~Jan) I’m a happy camper.
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Winters here in central MN are pretty long and cold, but they usually “only” last from November from through late March/early April. In many areas of AK, I think winter may arrive in mid-late September and not leave until late May-early June.
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Do the more populated areas of AK have snowmobile/snow machine trails that are groomed? I assume lots of areas with groomed x-country ski and/or snowshoe trails? How long of extensions do ice augers require to fish all winter?
I get pretty tired of winter once the Christmas lights turn off. During Christmas time even as an adult there is some magical trait to the snow but my winters last 4-5 months past that time. I can certainly see why the older people move to the other side of the state than me. The thing that is keeping me where I am is that I have not saved up enough for a good house in a good neighborhood, my family is here and I still need time to transfer jobs. Otherwise I certainly would transfer somewhere way warmer than the Denver CO area. I am definitely seeing that houses in the Denver CO area will be way too expensive for me to ever reasonably buy in my position anyway.
Yes, there is a very extensive cross country system in the heart of Anchorage and lots more a short distance from it. There are also dedicated snow machine trails in several breathtaking mountain areas. Heck every major road in my valley has one side that is paved for foot/ski traffic, the other side for motorized 4-wheeler/snow machine traffic; it is not groomed but I see people cross country skiing around in that system.
But the real beauty of both is the back country, where you have hundreds of thousands of square miles to explore. Heck have you ever tried cross country ice skating? The palmer hay flats are wetlands that while amazing in the summer time for salmon and birds, in the winter time you can hop and skip across miles of frozen creeks and ponds in skates. Or portage glacier:
I’m getting wimpy so I just drive my truck 20 miles up the river to the Kinik glacier.
For fishing the ice can get thick but I usually cheat and find me a pre drilled hole, or a friend with a gas powered auger. The last time I drilled down 4 feet by hand just to hit mud I gave up on hand drilling holes.
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Why is there no snow on the ice? Is that in spring when snow melts but the ice hangs on? We’ve got 1-3’ of snow on lakes, depending on where the drifted snow ends up.
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I was disappointed to find out that we don’t get all that much snow here. What falls sticks around but in the ice where it is cold it can’t find a hold. In windy places it just gets blown by the winds and glaciers happen to be in valleys that promote winds.
Some areas just work on years with low snow precipitation, such as Jim Creek:
Where they were is a 20-mile trek to the glacier. It doesn’t look like they went that far but then again, they made it further than the truck on the video…
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yeah i noticed when we went up early April 7 yrs. ago you guys had very little snow. no snow in Anchorage. once we drove over the mountains to lake Louise, there was about 2ft on the ground there with very little on the ice.
My wife thinks Anchorage is the boonies!
Suns getting warmer…
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windchill warning to -60f thurs. into fri. winters just getting going here.
Ouch.
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Seems like the last few years some of our coldest lows and heaviest snowfalls have come in February.
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its like its a month behind turning cold. march used to see many warm days. now its in april and then it all melts at once in like a 2 weeks span.