Stebbins and Back Again….

Well this morning one of the St. Michael school staff members Steve gave me a ride on the 13 mile road between St. Michael and Stebbins.  I was done shooting where I was and it was time to head off to a different village.  It is interesting to go right from one school to the next.  Seeing how people do things differently and how the kids behave in the different environments.  I think that the students in St. Michael will really respond well to having a new facility to learn in starting next fall.  Dan Eide on of my teachers from Valdez High School is now the principal there which I think will be a nice change for the St. Michael school.   I think he is very good at what he does.  Students look up to him and strive to achieve the expectations he puts out for them.  I am excited to see how things will be changing there over the course of the year.   Stebbins on the other hand has what looks like a brand new school.  The student population appears to be a bit bigger and having the space available in their building is very nice.  I shot some video on the drive into town.  The Stebbins Native Tribe owns a reindeer heard that grazes on the land between the two communities.  I was able to get some video of the coral they have set up for round up which is where they remove the antlers from the animals which they then sell to people in the Asian countries.  I was also able to get a few shots from the road looking down on the village.  Once I arrived at the school I went from class to class filming in each.  I probably won’t use very much of it, but it will be nice to show perspective teachers what it might look like to run a class in the Stebbins school.  I also shot the store, the post office, the clinic, some scenes from around town, the beach, and the cliffs just outside of town.  Ben Dolgner a teacher who just moved to Stebbins from Little Diomede was kind enough to loan me he 4-wheeler.  I took it out and road up on top of one of the mountains just outside of town.  Damon Hargraves the person that replaced me in BSSD’s district office told me that it would be a great place to get a nice look down onto the village with the bluffs in the background and the ocean out front.  He was right.  It was a beautiful ride up to the top.  A little bumpy for sure going across the tundra, but really worth it.

I spent the rest of the day shooting around town and in the school before I hopped on Hagelands 207 and flew back to Unalakleet.  On the flight back we flew by a rainbow.  I was able to shoot some video of it, so I am hoping to snag a still off there to post at a later date.

Tomorrow I will help Damon set up the studio and then fly to Valdez via Anchorage to meet up the the fam.  Then its off to Northway to hopefully chase down a moose.

St. Michael

I left Unalakleet this morning at 9:30 heading to St. Michael as the fist step in gathering video for my contract with BSSD.  As we stepped into the little tail dragging Cesna 207 I notice my pilots shirt.

I thought it was kind of funny.  The flight over was beautiful.  The sun was shimmering in the ocean and the green tundra jumping up out of the water.

Here is what St. Michael looks like from the air.  You can see the foundation of the new school being built.

[QUICKTIME http://bbryson.com/bill/files/2007/08/smk.mov 320 260]

I shot video all over town today.  One thing that amazed me was the store in town.  It has all kinds of fresh produce and even milk.  Very cool for a place that isn’t a regional hub.  After school was out Dan, Bonnie, Rocky (Dan’s dog) and I went down to the beach to look for sea glass, and to allow me to shoot a little more video.

It is amazing how much there is on the beach over here.  Apparently there used to be a floating Bar just outside of the village and when people would finish their bottles of beer they would chuck them into the ocean.  Well over time the broken pieces have been smoothed down and washed up on the shore.  In my 20 minutes of walking on the beach I found a whole pocket full of them.  It was a lot of fun and a nice view of town for the video.

After the walk we headed back to the house for some dinner.  Very tasty stew which reminds me how much I really like stew.  The sun setting this evening was very pretty.  Even though I didn’t have the best angle for a photo I snapped a couple anyway.  I’ll leave you with those to end this post.  I’m off to Stebbins by car tomorrow.  What a novel idea to travel from site to site in BSSD by car instead of plane.  🙂  An update on that adventure tomorrow.