Denali Finale

I couldn't think of a better spot for lunch.

First of all, thanks to Mom for this note’s title.

Welcome to my last blog entry. I have thoroughly enjoyed documenting my summer experience and sharing it with you, and hope that my ramblings and photos may spark an interest in some of you to make a trip to Alaska, our country’s last wild frontier. To quote Johnny Horton, “North, to Alaska, North, the rush is on.”

It’s been quite wet here recently—it rained every day for about three weeks. And no, I’m not kidding. Word around the office is that this has been the coldest, wettest summer in this area’s recorded history. Though the weather really only affected me negatively in two ways: first, my garden didn’t grow nearly as well as I had predicted (my fence ended up being a superfluous decoration, as no rabbit would have bothered with the jump into the raised bed on account of my measly greens), and secondly, the myriad berries of the Mat-Su Valley did not appear in their usual numbers—whereas normally a host of berries (raspberries, blueberries, cloudberries, watermelon berries, and more) can be found in quantity here in the park, the pickings were slim this year, though currants and highbush cranberries still made a good showing.

I was able to harvest a few nice radishes, but that was the extent of my bounty.

For the past two weeks we’ve been working on the East Red Shirt Trail, which will give Red Shirt Lake property owners a winter route to their cabins. The trail, which begins just off the parkway and ends five miles later at the lake, was started on last year by Chris and his crew, so most of the large obstacles had been removed already. We went through clearing alders and other brush, widening corners and marking wet areas for further improvements. In these swampy areas we’ll use either pit run gravel (basically rock-filled dirt, easily obtainable around here) sandwiched in a special geo-textile cloth, or install GeoGrid, mats of black plastic one inch square grid which is laid down on wet areas of trail and then covered with a thin layer of native material. Helping to float the GeoGrid in some areas will be corduroy, a trail building term for sections of wood logs placed lengthwise across the trail. Our last two days on the trail were spent cutting down dead black spruce and bucking it into 8 foot sections for this purpose. Though as a conservationist I usually have a few qualms about cutting down live trees, felling dead ones is very fun, and removing standing dead trees will help the healthy birch and spruce by allowing them more sunlight and room to grow. And when you’re running the chainsaw and yelling “Timber!” in a red plaid shirt, there’s really nothing like it.

On Sunday July 27^th, I hitched a ride with Chief Ranger John Wilber to Denali State Park. From the summer’s start I had planned on a backpacking trip there, and with time running out I decided on a date and planned my route along Kesugi Ridge, whose name in the Tanaina tongue means “The Ancient One”. The ridge runs Southwest to Northeast about 50 miles from the Alaska Range, with the Chulitna River separating the two. Offering spectacular views of “The High One” on clear days, Kesugi is rated as one of the top 10 hikes in the U.S.

Without access to all of my regular gear, I had to borrow a few things from the generous folks here at the station, including a bivy sack (an ultra-light one-man tent, essentially a waterproof sleeping bag), Thermarest (self-inflating sleeping pad), water purifier, hatchet, etc. But I assembled all the necessities and packed my food in a BRFC (Bear Resistant Food Container), which the park lends to hikers in Denali, and around 1pm on Sunday I started my journey at the Little Coal Creek Trailhead. The plan was for Wilber to pick me up the following Sunday at the Byers Creek Campground, giving me 8 days to travel 28 miles and allowing me a very leisurely week of hiking. Though I could have finished the trail easily within three days, I wanted a full week to photograph and simply enjoy being in the wilderness.

The clouds were beginning to break (which I took as a good omen, as I hadn’t seen sunshine for the previous two weeks), and ascending the first two miles (from 1400’ elevation to 3500’) offered spectacular views of the Chulitna River valley and its spruce forests. It was along this steep climb that I first spotted the blueberries (Vaccinium spp.) which became regular snacks for the rest of the week. I hiked about five miles before stopping by an alpine lake and making camp on the far shore among the rocks.

If you enlarge this image, you'll see my yellow bivy (the speck in the center of the photo) and my grey tarp (center, left hand side).

The next morning was extremely foggy, with visibility around 100ft, and after breaking camp I continued along the ridge. Though the first two miles Sunday were somewhat strenuous, once on top of the ridge the hiking is not difficult—the terrain is fairly flat with no brush to fight against, with the trail marked regularly by rock piles known as cairns.

Vegetation consists of moss, lichen, miniature spruce trees, crowberries (Empetrum nigrum) and a dwarf variety of blueberry which only grows a few inches off the ground, though in great numbers.

One of the many alpine lakes.

Late Monday afternoon I descended to the Ermine Hill Trail crossing and realized I had not been pacing myself as I should have: a day and a half into my weeklong adventure, I had already hiked 17.2 miles, almost two thirds of my proposed route. While I pondered my speedy traversal, a friendly ground squirrel approached, sniffing my boots and playing on my backpack.

These critters were just about my only company all week, as I didn’t see another hiker on the trail the entire trip. I decided to camp a little ways down the Ermine Hill Trail, by a lake once again.

My camp was in the clear area on the far shore of this lake.

After cooking rice on my fire, I watched as a beaver came out of his lodge and began patrolling the shore in front of my camp, slapping his tail every so often and asserting that this was his territory, not mine. I also spotted an Arctic Loon on the lake, along with a nice big pile of bear scat about 100 yards behind my camp.

Tuesday I awoke to glorious sunshine, and once out of my bivy sack I rushed to where I thought I could view the mountain and Yes!, there it was: Denali, the highest point in the United States, rising magnificently towards the heavens in a sparkling white show of grandeur.

Unfortunately, when Denali was fully visible I was in one of the few low sections of the trail.
Magnificent, nonetheless.

The surrounding peaks were dwarfed by the behemoth and I stood transfixed for several minutes before I hurried back to pack up and head again to the ridge. The sun stayed out as I traveled through a section of the trail where eroded boulders stood like guarding giants on either side,

and then the trail went steeply down into a valley of birch and spruce before rising again and coming to Skinny Lake, where I saw a mother black bear and two cubs racing up a precarious rock slope. Here I threw down my pack and similarly raced up an adjacent rocky hill, where to the northwest the range was bathed in a beautiful afternoon light (though the tip of Denali was now covered), and opposite was the green Susitna River Valley, with what I think was the Talkeetnas in the far distance.

I couldn’t leave that spot, and after hauling up my gear I searched for firewood (hard to find as you begin to move above the tree line), built a fire and fell asleep a happy man.

My camp, just southeast of the Alaska Range.

The next two days were misty with low visibility, but even the foggy haze couldn’t conceal the beauty of Kesugi; passing by alpine lakes and huge, strange boulders, with the ground covered in a soft carpet of vegetation and spread with frequent hillocks, I felt as if I was walking through the Shire (a Lord of the Rings reference, for those who aren’t Tolkien fans). I even surprised two families of Willow Ptarmigan (Lagopus lagopus), causing a general havoc as the parents and their five or six chicks hastily scattered in an airborne flash of brown and white. Thursday afternoon I came to the Byers Lake exit trail, where I had planned on hiking out at the beginning of my trip. But my walking stick got the better of me and I decided to continue past Byers on the Troublesome Creek Trail, which comes down off the ridge and ends at the Upper Troublesome Creek Trailhead, adding another eight miles to my trek.

During the flood three years ago about 3.5 miles of this trail was washed out, as much of the lower portion goes right alongside Troublesome Creek, and lacking proper funding the park hasn’t been able to fix it yet. Though they advise hikers to not take this route, Ranger Wilber had told me that with a good map and compass, it was doable. Possessing these two items, I decided to have a go at it. Camping at Ten Mile Hill Thursday night, I set out Friday morning in a gusty wind (which had blown my tarp loose at 4am that morning) and began the descent to the creek. Because of the park’s cautioning few hikers have been on this trail during the past three years, leaving it overgrown and hard to follow in spots, but beautiful nonetheless. The last two-thirds of the trail follows the creek’s bank, and while hiking alongside the crystal clear water I saw a few salmon making their way upstream (I believe they were silvers) and on the trail bear scat was very common—common enough to be a little unnerving. There are a lot of black and brown bears around the creek (hence the name) fishing for salmon, and on the sandy shores at the creek bends I saw many large brown bear tracks. But I just sang and talked to myself to notify the beasts that a visitor was in their midst, and luckily didn’t have any nasty encounters. Camping on the shore of Troublesome that night, next to a hot driftwood fire I watched as the sun sank, throwing color after color into the clouds until he tired and laid down for the night. I followed suit.

Camping on Troublesome.

I had decided to hike out on Saturday as opposed to Sunday as planned, because I wanted to try something I’d never done before: after years of hearing of wandering hitchhikers making their way across the country, and knowing that my parents had done their share of it back in the day, the urge became unbearable to try my thumb at this rich tradition.

I hiked out of the Upper Troublesome Trailhead at noon on Saturday and began to walk south on the Parks Highway, turning and flashing a big smile at every car going that direction. I was lucky in that the Parks is the only highway north of Nancy Lake, so I had a very good chance of finding an automobile going where I was headed. I stopped right in front of a campground parking lot in order to give my yet-to-be-seen savior a good place to get off the road, and after about 30 minutes a green truck turned into the lot and drove toward me, after which Nancy from Anchorage and I had an extremely pleasant ride to the Ranger Station.

Hiking in on Sunday and leaving Saturday gave me a long time to think and be alone—not talking to another human being for a week is an experience that is new to me, and quite a rare one, I would think.

Smart hornets.

Communing with Nature and being at her mercy give one a sense of returning to that time before apartments, AC, cars and airplanes, when a lone trapper would travel around the country with his home on his back and all of the wilderness his backyard. Solo hiking allows you to learn a lot about yourself and offers an exciting adventure in the vein of past explorers, but my week alone also established in me a greater appreciation for companionship. Humans are social animals, and though occasional respite from the rest of the community is refreshing and, for me, necessary, friendship and camaraderie should not be underestimated as vital aspects of our existence.

The Last Lonely Eagle
(Also a great song by New Riders of the Purple Sage)

The Monday after my return I participated in what was for me, another “first” to add to my list accomplished in Alaska: I helped skin a black bear. A Nancy Lake property owner had shot the 1-2 year old bear after it repeatedly came onto his porch and even charged his wife. (If done in defense of life or property, a bear can be shot legally, but the hide, head and paws must be given to the Department of Fish and Game.) A call was put in to Fish and Game, who, being busy with other bear issues, called Keith at the station, who then asked if anyone was available to assist with the skinning of the bear. Nick, another employee here, is quite adept at this practice and invited me to come along to help. After the short trip to the house and brief instructions from Nick, the two of us began the process. I’ll spare you the details, but with Nick’s expertise we finished within an hour. I’ve cleaned many a fish, but this was the first mammal I had ever skinned--it was an extremely interesting, though slightly unsettling experience.

This would be a good time to talk about hunting and fishing here in Alaska. Whereas back home I feel these two pursuits are deemed more a sport than an important means of procuring food, the general approach up here seems to be one of subsistence. Catching salmon throughout the year isn’t just for the fun fight, but rather to store, can and smoke the fish for the winter. And most hunters try desperately for their one moose a season, as a 1500lb bull can provide meat for a whole year. Many people in Alaska only need the grocery store for produce and perishables, with all of their meat provided by their own hands. And though I’ve never been a hunter, with that ancient mindset which guided our forefathers I could see myself shooting a moose or a caribou for the meat, whereas I could not hunt purely for sport.

The night after my bear experience a group of volunteers hosted a potluck dinner in honor of Jacob and me, as both of us are flying off before the official Volunteer Picnic takes place. Held at the South Rolly Campground, we had a delicious dinner around the campfire (I brought potato salad, recipe courtesy of Mom, which I have to say was quite popular) and reminisced about the great summer we all had.

Friday night Eric, Mariah, Jacob and I went over to Chris and Jess’s house for dinner and a little target practice. Informed that Eric, Mariah and Jacob had never shot a gun before, Chris asked if they would like to. So we all got to try our aim with a .22 pistol, a Smith and Wesson .45 and a Ruger Redhawk .44. They all got a kick out of it (excuse the pun), and afterwards we had a delicious supper of fish tacos with homemade mango salsa, cabbage and Halibut, caught by Chris, of course.

Saturday I drove Jacob to the Anchorage airport and bid him farewell, a trip which reinforced in my mind the fact that I only had three days left before I would make the same trip again. After our goodbyes, Eric and Mariah (who had come to see Jacob off, as well) and I made the short drive to Flat Top Mountain, a popular three mile hike just outside of the city. From the plateau on top we could see all of Anchorage and far out into the Cook Inlet, a truly spectacular vista.

Tonight, my last night here in this great state, was shared with friends around the campfire, the crystal clear sky above offering one last look at Denali, and as we moved into the wee hours of the morning the famed Northern Lights made a tentative appearance, one of their first showings of the fall. I couldn’t have asked for a better send off.