Jeremie Forman, I
Awe, Nice!
Welcome to where we highlight moments of wonder while working outdoors. This is our 40th segment since this little project started last year. This week, I talked with of Francis, Utah. Francis, population around 1,800, is 50 miles east of Salt Lake City and sits near the foot of the Uinta Mountains. The Uintas are unusual because they run east-west while most mountain ranges in the US run north-south. In fact, the Uintas are the highest east-west range in the lower 48, with peaks between 11,000 and 13,000 feet. Jeremie is a busy guy who’s managed to combine and juggle police...
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Mini-Awe-Polis 6
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Welcome to !, where we highlight moments of wonder while working outdoors. My name is Maddy Butcher, I’m the creator and producer of awenice and it’s time for another segment that I call, Mini-Awe-Polis, a collection of observations, like hay in my jacket pockets. If you’ve been listening to lately, you know that we have dedicated several segments to wildland fire fighting, specifically some moments as told by members of Interagency Hot Shot crews, who are elite wildland fire fighters charged with some of the most risky assignments. I think it would be a safe summation to...
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Steve Nicholson, II
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Welcome to where we highlight moments of wonder while working outdoors. This week, I’m airing another moment recounted by Steve Nicholson, a division supervisor on the Stoner Mesa fire, here in southwestern Colorado. Steve was able to get away from fire work for a while and was spending time back home in Montana. It was a hot fall, with temperatures approaching 90, and the woods, he said, were really loud because everything was dry and crackly as you moved through. Steve was archery hunting and it made things challenging. Often it’s difficult to squeeze Awe, Nice recollections...
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Jamie Carpenter
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Welcome to where we highlight moments of wonder while working outdoors. This week, we have another interview with a wildland fire fighter. I met Jamie Carpenter on the Stoner Mesa fire this summer. Jamie was on the Cal-Wood fire five years ago, during another history-making fire season, this time complicated by the pandemic. Ten million acres burned across the western US. Thousands of homes were lost and dozens of people died. The Cal-Wood fire was towards the end of a vveerry long season. It was relatively small, eventually contained at about 10,000 acres, but it was right in...
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Doug Falconi, Part II
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Welcome to Awe, Nice! where we highlight moments of wonder while working outdoors. This week, we return to a moment recalled by Doug Falconi. It’s part of a bigger focus on recollections from wildland fire fighters. In the first segment, Doug describes a moment as part of the Bitterroot Hotshot crew, on the Ash Creek Fire in 2012. On the day they arrived, it literally blew up. Each day, he said, it burned 40,000 acres. Temps were in the 90’s. Winds gusted over 30 miles per hour and the relative humidity was low. When we pick up here, the fire is converging, burning up three draw to a...
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Steve Nicholson, I
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Welcome to where we highlight moments of wonder while working outdoors. I’ve been turning my attention to wildland firefighters, several of whom I met this summer on the Stoner Mesa fire, which burned over 10,000 acres north of Dolores. I work as a hand up there on a grazing allotment. One of the people I met was Steve Nicholson. Here, Steve shares an anecdote from the 2012 fire season, which as listeners may know, was the 3rd worst in US history. Though he wasn’t positive, he thinks it unfolded on the Wenachtee Complex, multiple fires which burned 56,000 acres in central...
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Doug Falconi, Part I
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Welcome to where we highlight moments of wonder while working outdoors. Sometimes I think I should call this show, Oh, No! For many, the moments they recall have excitement and wonder, but also scary predicaments. Over the next few weeks, I’m turning attention to wildland firefighters. This is partly because they deserve attention and partly because I met several this summer on the Stoner Mesa fire, which burned over 10,000 acres north of Dolores. I work cows on one of the Forest Service allotments that was right on Stoner Mesa. For weeks, my boss and I were pretty busy tending to the cows...
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Nina Hance, II
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Welcome to Awe Nice, where we highlight moments of wonder while working outdoors. This week, we return to a conversation with Nina Hance, the backcountry guide from Montana. Nina and her husband have had several encounters with grizzlies. Once they were mountain biking and were bluff-charged. She estimates the sow, who had cubs with her, was 500 pounds or so. While the incident was short, it had a lasting impact on her psyche, including regular nightmares. Another time, she and Alex were hunting and were chased off while field dressing a deer. Because of these events and others, she tends...
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Nina Hance, I
Awe, Nice!
Welcome to Awe Nice, where we highlight moments of wonder while working outdoors. This week, I talked with Nina Hance. Nina is a backcountry guide certified by the American Mountain Guides Association. In the winter, she works for Beartooth Powder Guides as a lead guide. Nina shared two events. Her first moment was during a guiding trip outside of Cook City. Cook City (population about 70) is near the entrance to Yellowstone National Park and not far from the Wyoming border. She takes us to Woody Creek Cabin, a 20 x 24 foot, single room cabin which served as the group’s base camp. ...
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Jon Tanguay, II
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We’re featuring another moment with Maine lobsterman Jon Tanguay. It occurred around this time of year, early winter-late fall, when his traps were all dozens of miles offshore, taking several hours to get to them and to get back home. Some shorthand for a few things he mentions: At the time of this event, the strings laid down between two buoys consisted of 20 traps. Four strings would be 80 traps and it would take about an hour and 20 minutes to get through those 80 traps. Also, when he mentions hauling out, that is to say to bring his boat out of the water for maintenance. ...
info_outlineThis week, I interviewed Kim Kerns. Kim is a fourth generation rancher in eastern Oregon. The country is remote. No Man’s Land. Services are distant, which is why her family and their neighbors banded together to organize a rural fire fighting entity, which you’ll hear about.
I met Kim several months ago and we talked about dogs, mostly. Kim and her family have about a thousand sheep and hundreds of cows. They have eight guardian dogs, several stock dogs – those are mostly kelpies and border collies, and she also has Burt, an 18-pound Jagd terrier, who keeps down the pack rat population and takes on all comers, Kim told me.
Predators are a constant source of concern. Mountain lions, wolves, coyotes. She relies on her incredible guardian dogs to keep her animals alive, especially during calving and lambing, in the spring, but really year-round.
It’s a big operation and she tackles it with her parents, her husband and two employees.
Kim said she met a big family from Seattle up on Big Lookout Mountain during the 2017 eclipse. They were planning to just watch the eclipse in a parking lot or something, but they ran into some NASA guys who said, “Heck, no. You’ve come all this way. You’re going to get up to this mountain!” And they did. Afterwards, that family tracked down Kim’s dad online and got a message to him that visiting with Kim and her friend, Maddie Moore, was a highlight of their trip.
Awe, Nice! welcomes interviewees. If you have a moment you experienced while working outside and would like to share it, contact us here.
Our music is by my friend, Forrest Van Tuyl. Find a link to his terrific music here. If you’d like to donate, find the link on our About page and thank you.
My name is Maddy Butcher, I developed Awe, Nice! to highlight moments of wonder outdoors.
Keep your eyes, ears, and mind open. Until next time.