Dani, the instigator of my mango tree, came over with his love Svetlana with a special gift from his mother in India: actual fresh Alphonsos, sent from the tree he’d grown up with so that we could know what we had growing out there.

He took them out of the jar of rice he’d carried them here in, showing us the traditional storing method. “Here, smell this!”

A deep, wondering (will it smell like last year’s blossoms?) satisfying whiff… I am in awe that he was willing to part with them.

He told us his mom was as enthused as he and I both are that my tree is growing here and doing well. Even if the weather’s been too cool and the tree too young this year for it to produce yet, it did bloom last year. So next year. Now that I know that warmth makes a difference in inducing flowering from the buds, not just in protecting them from harm, I may buy a plastic greenhouse cover for it. There’s one with a zip-down window to keep it from overheating.

We took them outside and showed them the tree and Dani took video, I think to introduce us to his mom, although in the few seconds he had it going I didn’t figure that out fast enough to tell her thank you. To Dani’s mom, if you see this: Thank you so much! And to Dani and Svetlana, Thank you to you, too!

I reiterated my promise that they will get one of our very first mangoes. I can’t wait to share back.

A little more on Alaska: I’d been disappointed I hadn’t seen the twelve-foot grizzly we’d been told was on display at the airport; the kids had said it’s to warn the tourists not to be stupid.

While we were waiting for departure, our last chance, there it was after all. Look closely: past its glass display case there’s a row of seats and at the end closest there’s a man sitting hunched over his cellphone, not knowing he’s being used for scale.

Other than that we did not, to our knowledge, go near a bear. We did, however, see one single crow: at the edge of a bay, fearlessly divebombing the backside of a retreating bald eagle that had flown low over the boat we were disembarking from.

Nope, not a fishing boat, guys, sorry.

More on that tomorrow.