Ryan's Journal

Did some hiking along the Teklanika River, and lost feeling in my toes for over an hour after having to wade across through the freezing water. My legs are thrashed after all of the hiking during the past few days, but it’s been well worth it. Still no wolves.

Some time in the past twenty-four hours the sun set at the North Pole for the first and only time this year, a reality that I can’t fathom. The weather today was again beautiful, but the night promises to be extraordinarily cold. I’m in my tent in the Denali backcountry, so body parts may freeze while I sleep — I’ll spend a few more days looking for wolves, then it’s going to be time to start heading south. The wolves are still in hiding, but with luck they’ll be howling at the moon tonight.

It was so cold when I woke up this morning that my boots had frozen — I had to hold them under the car’s heater for a few minutes before the leather was pliable enough for me to put them on. The weather warmed up into the fifties as the day went on, and once the fog lifted the sky was completely blue — I didn’t see a single cloud all day. Far and away the best weather yet, and I ended up hiking almost twenty miles along the closed portion of the park road up to Sable Pass. Still no wolves, but there were hundreds of fresh tracks in the snow. The scenery is awe-inspiring — all of the mountains are snow-covered, the lakes and rivers are partially frozen, and some of the trees still have their autumn colors while most of the evergreens are dusted with snow. Awesome day.

Ma Holliday’s birthday is on September 25, so I’ve got a favor to ask of anyone reading this log. Ma is now “internet savvy”, i.e. she can check e-mail, so it would be great to be able to flood her with happy birthday messages — her e-mail is e-mail@removed. Many thanks!

Woke up this morning and for the second time this trip had to remove each tire from the car to chisel out mud — by the fourth tire I had lost feeling in my fingers, making the job considerably more interesting. There was another snow storm last night, so the road through Denali was completely shut down for most of the day. When it did open there were less than fifteen vehicles on it — imagine if there were only fifteen cars in all of Yosemite Valley, and that’s what it’s been like out here today, just very quiet and peaceful. Did some hiking, a grizzly and a few caribou made brief appearances, but unfortunately the wolves remain elusive.

Big snow storm today, so I bid a fond farewell to the Dalton and am on the way to Denali again to hopefully find wolves. While the far north is somewhere I will remember for the rest of my life, some of the little things in the civilized world are nice to come back to — I’m drinking hot chocolate in a coffeehouse, I’m warm, I just got a shower, and I don’t have to run outside into the freezing cold when nature calls. The Dalton was beyond incredible, but civilization does have a few good points, too.

Woke up this morning to a snow storm, with two inches already on the ground. It made for pretty scenery, so I went for a short walk out in the snow, then got into the Subaru and headed south. A grizzly and five caribou made an appearance, and as I was leaving the plain and starting into the Brooks Range foothills six muskox showed up near the road to see me off. This part of the world is a very, very special place, and it will be a tragedy if it isn’t allowed to remain as it is.

I’m now starting into the Brooks Range, and was greeted a short while ago by a fox that was completely black except for a white patch on his tail. I’ve never heard of a black fox, and was dumbfounded as I watched him trot towards me, head around the car, and then across the road and up into some rocks. I’ll have to check the bookstores in Fairbanks to try and figure out exactly what he was.

Made it up to Deadhorse, the end of the Dalton Highway, but the only way I could find to get around the oil field security and get to the Arctic Ocean was to hike a twenty-five mile round-trip through marshy land in the cold and rain. Given the fact that I couldn’t feel my fingers after just two hours outside yesterday I decided that seeing the Arctic Ocean will have to be an experience for another trip.

Spent a good chunk of the afternoon in the midst of a herd of about fifty muskox. It’s apparently their rutting season, and I watched two of the beasts duking it out — what a sight! They shake their big heads from side-to-side menacingly at one another while backing up until they’re about eighty feet apart, then they charge full speed and smash heads, making a loud banging sound. The two I saw did this seven times before one was thrown off balance and the other one chased him off. Later on a big male was walking right towards me, apparently not seeing me, and not wanting to surprise him I stood up and starting backing away. It was only after a few seconds that I realized I was exactly duplicating the rutting behavior I’d witnessed earlier, but luckily this guy didn’t feel like butting heads. Another very memorable day.

Today has been an Arctic safari — well over a hundred caribou, two herds of muskox totaling probably forty animals, two grizzlies, three falcons, lots of geese, a few swans… quite an amazing day. I made my way to within seventy-five feet of the first group of muskox, and they seemed completely unconcerned that I was there — the one nearest me looked at me then rolled over on his side and went to sleep. I didn’t want to get closer in case they’re like buffalo and will charge, but they were pretty damn cool. Hairy as anything, with really short, stubby legs and horns that curled down to their cheeks and then outwards.

The caribou have been everywhere, in groups as large as about thirty-five. Since getting out onto the Arctic coastal plain there have been tons of geese, including one group of orange-billed geese that I’ve never seen before — I assume they must go to Asia for the winter and just be here for the summer. The falcons also appeared once I was out on the coastal plain, and they just sit posing on the tops of the poles along the road. The weather has been cold and wet, so photo opportunities have been nearly non-existent, but still, what a day!

MUSKOX!

I’ve been awake for only three hours, but already today has brought two grizzly bears, over twenty caribou, a tundra swan, and a few other animals that I only glimpsed before they disappeared. I stayed with the second bear for a half hour, but a truck came by and that spooked him, so now I’m waiting in the Subaru, hoping that he might reappear. This area is utterly amazing.

Crossed the Brooks Range today and am now traveling through tundra and small hills that extend to the horizon. The hunters who are out and about are insuring that most animals stay away from the road, although there were about twenty Dall sheep while crossing over Atigun Pass, the highest point on the highway. I’m tremendously impressed with the wildness up here, and given the open tundra hopefully will be doing a lot of hiking tomorrow — this is muskox land, and I’m going to find them even if I freeze important body parts while trying.

Shortly after setting out this morning I came to a road block and discovered that the highway had been shut down until 9:00 PM for bridge repair. This turned out to be a good thing as it got me out of the car and hiking in a place that I would have passed up otherwise. There was a lot of thick brush surrounding the road, but I stumbled on a pipeline access road that led through the brush and above treeline. I then spent five hours roaming the tundra and climbing to two small ridges that afforded awesome views. The plants on the tundra are all tiny and often completely alien from the sort of plant-life I’m used to — I found one little plant that was about an inch high and emitted a cloud of smoke when I touched it, while others looked more like something that would be found under the ocean. Even though I’m five miles from the Arctic Circle the weather was warm enough that a t-shirt was often sufficient, but the Brooks Range on the northern horizon is completely snow-covered, reminding me that today’s warm weather is probably just a fluke.

The condition of the Elliott and Dalton Highways has improved dramatically since I was last here in 1994 — the seventy miles of the Elliott Highway leading to the start of the Dalton Highway are now all paved, and the Dalton Highway itself, once a road described by a travel guide as “anus-clenching”, has several long paved stretches scattered along its 414 miles. Maybe I will be able to make it up to the Brooks Range and beyond after all.

Stopped for a bit at a roadhouse this morning that had a sign out front reading “Not a single mosquito out here… they are all married with large families”. Luckily the mosquitoes are mostly gone after mid-August. Talked to the folks at the roadhouse, and they were nicest people you could ever hope to meet. They’ve been up here for years and years and have twenty-three kids, eighteen adopted. The people in Alaska are like no where else I’ve ever been — very down-to-earth, independent, and full of an appreciation of how great life is. There are of course also a fair number of cranky old-timers and slightly crazy folks to keep things interesting.

The country along the Dalton Highway is almost completely wild, with views to the horizon of nothing but mountains, evergreens, and golden birch trees. No radio stations, no cell phone coverage, almost no services — the sort of environment where the “civilized” world fades into memory. Today is definitely looking like it’s going to be a good one.

The wild places of the Kenai Peninsula are best visited by boat, but unfortunately a kayak is hard to come by after Labor Day. As a result I decided to head north again. I stopped for several hours yesterday along Turnagain Arm watching for belugas, and a group of four passed just twenty yards out from the rocky point I was sitting on. Unfortunately no more whales came by before it got too dark to see, but four whales at twenty yards was nonetheless a special experience.

Today it snowed while driving back towards Denali, and now that I’m here the mountain peaks are white and most of the trees are completely bare — I’m hopeful that winter will stay away for a bit longer, since the park road opens an additional fifteen miles in five days, weather permitting, and miles twenty to thirty are prime spots for wolves. Until then I’m going to head north of Fairbanks and perhaps drive just a bit of the Dalton Highway — that road is notorious for killing cars, so most likely I won’t be going too far.

Stopped for a shower last night (the owner cleaned with enough Clorox that even Vicki would have been proud) and was a new man by the time I went to bed. Woke up at 4:30 to an absolutely amazing display of the northern lights — they’re tough to describe, so please forgive the bad analogies, but unlike the first time where I was reminded of a slow-burning fire, last night they were sort of flashing and reminded me more of the fountain outside of the Bellagio. They faded after an hour, but I’m hopeful that there will be an encore performance tonight.

Heading down along the coast towards Homer today. I knew the tides on Cook Inlet were extreme, but apparently they’re the second most extreme in the world behind the Bay of Fundy — last September a tide was recorded that differed forty-one feet from low tide to high tide, and differences of at least thirty feet are common.