When an area I’d been exploring with an eye to purchasing property was opened up to land staking by the state of Alaska, I jumped at the chance. I spent 3 months of the coldest winter in decades scouting the country then surveying and cutting property lines.
The land where I built my first cabin is great, but it’s at risk to erosion and flooding. I learned this the hard way when the river washed away the hugelkultur (permaculture garden) just weeks after planting it. The new property is higher off the flood plain, has hills and flat benches, and good timber for more experiments in boreal forest building projects.