From the same producer as Ice Road Truckers and The Deadliest Catch comes what may well be the next big thing in prime time reality TV, America’s Toughest Jobs.
And the Crow Creek Mine in Girdwood will be featured in the show.
Contestants range from Wall Street executives to math teachers and personal trainers, all competing for the combined annual salaries of the jobs they’ll perform.
These jobs include crab fishing, ice road trucking, gold digging, oil rigging, rodeo bullfighting, working on a bridge crew, logging, search and rescue, and driving monster trucks.
The gold digging portion of the series was filmed on location at Crow Creek Mine May 9 -15.
Tune in Monday night, Aug. 25 on NBC for the series premiere. The Crow Creek segment is Sept. 8 at 9 p.m. Alaska time. The entire one-hour show will take place at the mine with contestants staying in wall tents and prospecting in known gold producing areas of the creek, running sluice boxes and suction dredging, said Nate Williamson, who manages the mine with his companion Kate Toohey. Sean Toohey, co-owner of the mine, and a couple of local miners and assistants will also be in the show.
“We employed almost a dozen local residents to work on the show,” said Williamson. “It was a good experience, we were a little nervous working with such a large film crew (40-50), but they were super respectful of the property and family business.
The series is scheduled to conclude Wednesday, Nov. 5.
National Geographic Adventurer magazine listed Girdwood as its number four choice in the Western states for the nation’s next great adventure towns, citing the resort’s $20 million dollar renovations as a reason to rest assured that Girdwood is a sound investment.
The story goes on to point out that “savvy adventurers have long prized this bump-in-the-road town for its access to the half-million-acre Chugach State Park—home to countless glaciers, epic rafting, salmon fishing, mountaineering, cross-country skiing, and even windsurfing on Cook Inlet’s narrow Turnagain Arm.”
However, the magazine neglects to mention that Girdwood, unlike some of their other picks, is a mere 40 miles down the highway from a major international airport and the largest urban center in the state. Read the rest of the list at www.adventure.nationalgeographic.com.
A favorite local ski hut located on Notch Mountain used for luncheons by Chugach Powder Guides on its snowcat tours may soon be managed by CPG.
Dave Hamre, owner/representative of CPG received approval from the Girdwood Board of Supervisors at their Aug. 18 meeting to lease the approximately one acre property that the hut is built on and commonly used by locals hikers.
Dave Hamre, owner/Rep. of CPG told GBOS members that he was approached by the Heritage Land Bank, which owns the property, as a potential manager for the property citing sanitation and other upkeep issues as concerns.
“We’d like to manage it and make it a sanitary place to stay,” Hamre said. “We’re e all really committed to the hut and would like to keep it the way it is.”
While use would remain completely open to locals, Hamre said the agreement with HLB would require buying the building and leasing the property for a minimum of ten years. To allow for upkeep expenses, users of the hut may be asked to pay a nominal fee of $5 to $10 per night. CPG also wishes to eventually add a yurt or similar structure for private use.
The Municipality of Anchorage is offering to reimburse homeowners who install rain gardens 50 percent of the cost of installation (up to $750) based on availability of funds.
Rain gardens are a depression in the landscape designed to catch and filter the water that runs off your roof, driveway, walkway, compacted lawn areas and other surfaces by acting as a buffer and filtering storm water runoff, thereby improving water quality before it reaches storm drains and the water system.
For more information on how to build and maintain a water garden, or to apply for a mini-grant, go to www.anchorageraingardens.com.
Despite the recently added municipality provision which calls for shorter and more numerous light posts as opposed to taller and fewer, the Town Square Park light poles in the recently completed Phase I improvements of Girdwood Town Square will remain.
According to Girdwood Board of Supervisor John Gallup, he stated at the Aug. 18 meeting that the Town Square Park plan was “designed for what was current at the time, before Chapter 9 came into play.”
Gallup said that despite his initial objection to the height of the poles, he believes it would be completely cost and time prohibitive to re-engineer and re-design the plan to replace the light poles and recommends the design go forward as is with the remainder of the light poles planned for Phase II of the project to follow suit.