Road To Alaska

The Beginning

Eleven years ago I had found Alaska. I had set out on my honeymoon with a man I was only just beginning to know. It wasn't much of a honeymoon. We were on the road every day, from Anchorage to Denali to Glennallen, Valdez, Seward, Fairbanks, the Arctic Circle, and back. We fought our first battles and forged our first peace. We became best friends and I became a traveler.

Stranded in Minneapolis after missing the last flight to Fairbanks, I drank a lot of beer. The bartenders were chatty when I said I was going to Alaska. One of them shared that he wanted to go there too – to look for gold – but had to invest in a state-of-the-art metal detector first. What was I going to Alaska for?

My husband died a little more than a year ago in a motorcycle accident. I was going to take what physically remained of him – an awful thought still – to the Gates of the Arctic and the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, where he had tried to hike in 2011, but hadn't been able to go far without a guide. The traveler in me also knew that I had to go a bit further and open my heart to Alaska. I was reading The Blue Highways as I waited for my plane. William Least Heat-Moon chided, "any traveler who misses the journey misses about all he's going to get". I thought I should listen to him... he has seen more than me and is a much better writer.

State Fair: Reindeer sausage, anyone? Photo: Urjasi

Day one in Fairbanks was not what I expected. I had planned to visit the museum, and rest. Instead, I hit the state fair with Julie, Steven and Judy. We grazed on all things fried and got on rickety rides. In the evening, we met the rest of the group, got dinner and loaded up on alcohol for the trip. Sue, my tent mate and veteran group-traveler, assured me that we had enough beer – on these trips, people rarely drank that much. She had to eat her words before the week was over.

Manley Hot Springs

It was a 160-mile ride to Manley Hot Springs, a town with 65 – 70 residents. We hiked in the White Mountains area on the way, picked wild blueberries and found a dead vole. Kim, a scientist among us, explained that voles are promiscuous creatures. The receptors in their brains are not as dense, so they don't feel intensely "in love". When a male vole meets a female vole, they go, “eh, you’re cute… but not cute enough for me to stay put”.

Sign before Manley Hot Springs/ Photo: Urjasi

Closer to Manley, where the highway is often unpaved, we stopped to look at the Minto Flats. After the engine died and people stopped chatting, there it was – the silence – the utter absence of sound, except when a bird flapped its wing or the wind rustled. That silence is the most peaceful "sound" I've heard. Finally, I was in the Alaska I remembered!

Manley Hot Springs Slough/Photo: Urjasi

We reached Manley in the evening. This time of the year, the summer sun doesn’t go down until late night, and even then, it just bobs along the horizon as the sky turns pink and gold. After pitching tent near the Slough, we headed for the Roadhouse next to our campsite. It came with a full bar, food, flush toilet and pay showers. We downed some local beer, gratefully used the flush toilet, tipped generously and made friends with the locals, including Tonka, the bartender’s Chihuahua and Ruby, a miniature pincher with frostbite tipped ears.

“What’s the hardest thing about living here?” we asked Ruby’s owner.
“The cold.”

In a classic lack of perspective, I was having trouble imagining the cold trumping the darkness and isolation. What does 60 or 70 below zero feel like? The coldest temperature ever recorded in Central Park, New York City was -15 degrees, on February 9, 1934. And in more recent years, on January 24th, 2011, the city experienced a record low of 6 degrees. I had stayed in and watched television. I had explained to April, my pit-lab bundle of joy, it was too cold to go for a long walk. She had agreed.

Manley Roadhouse/Photo: Urjasi

We had baked halibut for dinner that night – the first of many unbelievable meals that our guides, Steve and Jeff, would whip up at their camp kitchen – and then it was time for skinny-dipping in the hot springs until midnight. The hot springs were part of a resort that's no longer there. A couple manage a greenhouse with concrete tubs fed by natural hot springs - rustic and perfect. For a small fee, you can book a slot and soak underneath a lush green canopy (check in the Fairbanks Visitors Center for more information). Jameson made my tent spin that night, but I was among friends.

Pam Redington tells us about fishing and drying
chum salmon for dog food / Photo: Urjasi

In the morning we met Pamela Redington, musher and wife of Joe Redington. Joe Senior is known as the "Father of the Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race”.  Pam and Joe don’t participate in the Iditarod any more and are training a “small” pack of 30-40 huskies for speed racing. Huskies, we learned, are dogs with a thick undercoat and often mix-bred, far from the AKC definition.

Pamela is a petite woman with graying hair. Her eyes speak of wisdom and tenacity. I could easily see her racing twenty dogs on a sled in the middle of a blizzard, and her dogs would obey her. In her little backyard and greenhouse, Pam grows vegetables. Joe and Pam have a subsistence lifestyle. They fish, hunt, farm, race sled dogs, make carvings and hats out of ivory and fur. When she first moved to Manley, she went to Fairbanks once a year to get all her household supplies.

Sled dog/ Photo: Urjasi

As with most year round residents of Alaska, Pam and Joe have more than one job, a zillion skills, and roots that run deep and strong in Alaska. In her previous life, Pam was a potato farmer’s daughter in Idaho. We asked what brought her to Alaska. "I always wanted to and once I was here, I wasn’t going back..." she smiled wistfully.

I come from leftist liberal, feminist politics, not in favor of guns or sports hunting/fishing. But when I meet Pam, Joe and others like them, practicing subsistence lifestyle in Alaska, I can see that they hunt, consume and live much more sustainably and humanely than us. They don’t over fish because they know their food supply would be wrecked if they do. They don’t kill senselessly. Hunting, skinning, using all parts of the animal, storing the meat, is a lot of hard work, and the people who live off this land don’t mess with their source of subsistence. For these people, climate change is not a political debate. It's a frightening reality that's poaching their way of life and wrecking the planet for all of us.

The rest of the day we canoed on the slough, hoping to spot moose. Instead, we saw a sign on an outhouse "Sarah Palin for Governor". Day three closed with another gourmet meal – baked salmon, pasta and fresh green salad from Pam’s garden – followed by dips in the hot springs. We had it booked for the entire evening. No Jameson for me tonight. Our stock of beer, however, had started dwindling.

The Haul Road

Tanana River/ Photo: Urjasi

Past Manley airport, which is a mere strip of gravel, we drove to the banks of the Tanana River in the morning. In 1984, a 25-year old man named Michael Silka had gone on a killing spree here that left 7 people, including a two-year old baby, dead. He was ultimately shot dead by the state troopers from a helicopter.

Steve and Jeff skipped stones as we took photos. The past and the present played hide and seek as we turned on to the Dalton Highway, driving towards the Arctic Circle.

The Haul Road and Minto Flats/ Photo: Urjasi

I love the “Haul Road” – 414 miles long, the Dalton Highway runs from just north of Fairbanks to Deadhorse, weaving through mountains and valleys, with the Trans-Alaska Pipeline often running parallel. It was built as a supply road for the Pipeline in 1974 and formerly known as the North Slope Haul Road. This is a road that I would love to drive some day – stop as many times as possible, soak in the silence, switch off the lights and sit in the blackest night once more, looking for the aurora. Here, on this road, I never feel alone. Here, he belongs, and will return if he can.

Yukon River Camp/Photo: Urjasi

The Yukon/ Photo: Urjasi

It took us half a day to reach the Yukon River Camp. The old woman who ran it eleven years ago was gone, but the place was pretty much as I remembered it. The Yukon is powerful, and at thirty-four I am patient enough to appreciate it. Eleven years ago, a 26-year-old boy and a 23-year-old girl had got their truck stuck in the mud on these banks. The girl had complained, “I told you so.” They had to wait until someone came with another vehicle to pull them out.

I met a fisherman/musher on the banks of the Yukon, loading his retired pack of sled dogs on a truck. We talked about Alaska, dog sledding and climate change. He was thankful that the people in the lower 40-s keep lobbying “to save Alaska from the Alaskans”. The Alaskans in the cities don’t care about Alaska, he said. The turnover rate in the cities, where majority of the population is concentrated, is five years on an average. Politics ensuing from there serves the rich, not the land and animals of Alaska, and certainly not the people who practice subsistence lifestyle.

Driving past the Yukon River Camp, we finally reached the Arctic Circle. Jeff busted out his saxophone to mark the crossing. Before we go any further, let me answer the two most frequently asked questions – it wasn’t cold in the Arctic Circle, and no, there were no penguins. Summer temperatures in the Arctic can rise up to 80-s or even 90-s. The “arctic circle” marks one of the five major circles of latitude  and it’s the southern most latitude in the Northern Hemisphere. The area that lies north of the circle is known as the Arctic, the land of the midnight sun.

In the Brooks Range

For the next two nights, we set up our tents at Marion Creek Campground, overlooking the stoic Brooks Range. Steve whipped up memorable meals and Jeff played his saxophone from the top of the van. I learned I was good with rum, had fun with tequila, and spun on Jameson. 

Tundra hike/ Photo: Urjasi

In the morning we went for our first tundra hike and met “tussock” – the one-of-a-kind arctic grass that I lovingly call “Arctic Gremlins”. They are round clumps of grass that roll beneath your feet. I was grateful for having hiking boots with good ankle support. The red-and-green Sphagnum moss, on the other hand, felt like trampoline and gave us a bounce. We hiked up a mountain, past a gold mine where Crazy Mike and his dog Stupid are the only year-round residents. The mining area was quiet, since most of the mining happens in winter when the shafts are not at risk of being flooded. We hiked 6 miles, with an elevation gain of almost 1000 ft, and picked wild blueberries on our way back.

Marion Creek in the morning/ Photo: Urjasi

Julie woke up next morning and said “damn tussocks!” But she still led the way, along with Kim, through the forest floor carpeted with snowy lichen and rolling tussocks towards Marion Creek Falls. We only had about a couple of hours before breakfast, so couldn’t make it all the way to the falls. After a comfortable stroll, we returned to the camp to devour our share of wild blueberry pancakes. The guides served them with melted butter and maple syrup on the side. “Would you have this much butter if you were at home?” Joyce asked me. “Yep” I said in between bites, unperturbed. (I am trying to see life through my dog’s eyes. You eat, shit, walk, play, work, love, and then you die… there’s always room for butter in that way of life).

Log cabin in Wiseman/ Photo: Urjasi

Next stop, Wiseman, a town of maybe 13 residents, some 12 miles north of Coldfoot, where trapper Jack Reakoff was waiting for us. A “town” has different meaning in the Arctic. There are no paved roads in Wiseman, although this 78-square-mile-community is only 3 miles from the Dalton Highway; there’s no electricity or cell phone reception. Jack’s sister runs the Boreal Lodge, which has a store selling instant noodles, canned goods, chips and souvenirs. As you walk through the town on roads that are dirt in summer, muddy in spring, and frozen in winter, you see log cabins strewn around, and some sink lower than others.

Jack Reakoff in front of Boreal Lodge/Photo: Urjasi

Jack Reakoff is a subsistence trapper, hunter, and gardener. Handsome and clean-shaven, perhaps in his fifties, he speaks in a steady, calm voice and has still eyes. I didn’t have trouble imagining him killing his first bear at twelve. If you chance upon a bear, Jack says, hold your ground, establish dominance, as you would with a dog. “But if a bear was hunting me, I would stand no chance” he admits.

Jack was raised in Wiseman and has maintained a subsistence lifestyle supplemented by talking to tourists, and commercial fishing. He has solar panels and Internet in his cabin and uses the generator sparingly. He grows vegetables in his “yard”. The growing season here is short, but furious. We couldn’t believe the size of the lettuce we got from Jack’s garden.

Jack taking samples from spawned salmon. Photo: Urjasi

Jack also serves on the Regional Subsistence Advisory Committee for the Alaska Department of Fish and Games and shared his concerns about over hunting of caribou in these areas. The Alaska Department of Fish and Games is partly funded by selling hunting licenses. Jack’s arguments for conserving the caribou population by not increasing hunting limits or expanding it to caribou cows have fallen into deaf ears of the Board. While reading more about the issue, I came across this petition that Jack had filed in 2010.

We asked Jack about his thoughts on Shell’s plans of digging for oil in the Arctic. He believes it would be far too costly and unmanageable to dig and transport more oil from the Arctic – "there is talk of lowering the maintenance cost of the Pipeline.” I shuddered hearing this. In recent years, there have been concerns about corrosion in the pipeline, a viable threat to wildlife and people alike.

The town of Wiseman is where early wilderness advocate Bob Marshall spent a little more than a year in 1930, and wrote a book called “Arctic Village”, giving the most delightful, vivid description of life in the north of Koyukuk River. In his book, Marshall observed that the “Koyukukers” were the happiest people he had met; over 90 percent of them had above average intelligence and the percentage of Koyukukers in the “very superior intelligence class” was four times greater than among normal Americans.

Mountains from the sky/Photo: Judy Kuczenski

The village of Anaktuvuk/ Photo: Urjasi

We took a scenic flight out of Coldfoot that evening to the Nunamiut village of Anaktuvuk. The small plane took us over the Gates of the Arctic. I had dreamed of taking Sanjay’s ashes to this place, not knowing that it would be impossible to reach this point on foot in a day’s hike.

When Bob Marshall got to this point, where the Boreal Mountain and Frigid Crags flank the North Fork of the Koyukuk River, he named it the “Gates of the Arctic” and remarked, "No sight or sound or smell or feeling even remotely hinted of men or their creations. It seemed as if time had dropped away a million years and we were back in a primordial world." 

Anaktuvuk, "Avoid Conflict"/ Photo: Urjasi

The Nunamiut were the last of the indigenous peoples in North America to give up their nomadic lifestyle and settle in a permanent village. Harriet, our Nunamiut guide in Anaktuvuk showed us around. We saw more sled dogs, sod houses, and dumpsters painted with words like “Love”, “Share”, and “Avoid Conflict”. Harriet explained that school children made the artwork, drawing from the main tenets of their culture. We asked her if the kids who grow up in Anaktuvuk continue to stay there or migrate to the cities? “No, they stay here. We like the village life.” “Why did your ancestors give up their nomadic life?” I asked. “The government built us schools and we wanted to go to school,” Harriet answered.

Sunset from top of the van/ Photo: Urjasi

We couldn’t get Harriet to talk about the oil money or the Alaska Native Settlement Act, which, along with the construction of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline gave natives, including the Nunamiut, land and cash awards and irrevocably changed their lifestyle. In this remote Nunamiut village, a grocery shop sells the most basic supplies, in cans and bottles. Fresh vegetables are not easy to come by, and many of the young ones have forgotten how to herd reindeer. But as soon as we landed in Anaktuvuk, our cell phones had full reception.

The sky went up in flames of red and pink that night as the midnight sun bobbed along the horizon.

Beyond the Northernmost tree

We filled up on drinking water and gathered firewood on the way to Galbraith Lake. We passed the “northernmost tree” before going through the spectacular Atigun Pass. Someone had actually tried to axe down the northernmost tree – spruce, I think – and it was dying! But Steve pointed to a baby tree growing merely a few feet away from the “northernmost tree” sign. “The light of God is shining down on those trees,” drawled Sue from the back of the van.

Atigun pass/ Photo: Judy Kuczenski 

Golbraith Lake, North Slope/ Photo: Urjasi

Golbraith Lake in the North Slope was our last camp for this trip.  It sits off the haul road, and to its east lies the Gates of the Arctic National Park (GAAR) and to its west, the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). This was the pinnacle of our trip. I've been walking in Sanjay’s footsteps.

Past the Atigun Pass, where we had stopped to watch Dall sheep on the ridges, the Pipeline was once again our faithful companion for the rest of the journey. As we got nearer, I recognized that somewhere along this road, Sanjay had stopped, and tried to hike in. He had described the road, with the pipeline running next to it, and the vast tundra around it. He had been to Golbraith Lake.  I looked around and realized that this was not only my destination, but also my Alaska – with or without him. That night, I stayed up very late and got very drunk, watching the fire burn down.

Steve and I discussed where to scatter the ashes. It didn’t really matter anymore, whether we hiked east or west. We decided to hike west if it was sunny, or east if it was wet. I knew that I would know the place when I saw it, and Steve seemed to know where to take me. Sometimes, you just know...

View from Midnight Dome/Photo: Judy Kuczenski

On the ridge of Midnight Dome/Photo: Urjasi

We had pancakes and coffee for breakfast next morning. I skipped the cereal… my stomach was somersaulting, a combination of nerves and hangover. We parked our van by the Haul Road and hiked through the boggy tundra, along a low plateau, up a mountain and down a valley. We had stopped to take a break when a caribou ran in front of us, posed, and trotted away. It felt so magical that it may as well have been a unicorn.




By then, I had forgotten my hangover. I was sure that the weather would hold that day, and that I would take whatever remains physically of my best friend, partner, anchor ("husband" just doesn't cut it) to wherever he was supposed to go.

That place turned out to be on a ridge line of Midnight Dome, in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, facing the rivers, creeks and a glacier. We hiked about 7 miles, experienced an elevation gain of close to 2000 ft, and scrambled up rocks in all fours to get to this point. And there, inexplicably, I didn’t feel alone.

Land’s End… Deadhorse

I am struggling to describe Deadhorse. Steve and Julie agreed that it was something like “Mad Max,” except in a place with dirt roads flanked by tundra and monster trucks.

Most photographed spot in Deadhorse/Photo: Urjasi

Deadhorse is at the end of the Dalton Highway, by the Arctic Ocean. It is an unincorporated township with warehouses and trailer park like structures that serve as living quarters and hotels for the workers and companies that work on the Prudhoe Bay oilfields, and for tourists like us. The workers mostly work two weeks on and two weeks off. Our “hotel” had almost sterile rooms along a long corridor. While the signs inside the door urged guests to be quiet and mindful of the people sleeping on the other side of the thin walls, we woke up to the sound of heavy trucks.

Our hotel, Deadhorse/ Photo: Urjasi

The hotel came with wholesome meals, hot showers and laundry. Sitting on her sterile bed, Sue, my tent/room mate, reminisced that in grade school her teacher had thought she would be a juvenile delinquent. I wanted to sing Jailhouse Rock at this point… but even more than that, I wanted to steal Steve’s van and drive back to Golbraith Lake.

Deadhorse was an eye sore and a rude reminder of what the “Outside” looked like. After more than a week in the Alaskan wilderness, I had lost track of the “Outside.” Time and dates had blurred, cell phones were meant for taking pictures and emails were forgotten.

Watching the tundra from behind the trucks/Photo: Urjasi

I woke up early the next day and took my coffee to sit by the monster trucks, looking at the tundra. As we had driven from Golbraith to Deadhorse, we had seen the hills disappear into the Arctic plains. We had spotted a grizzly bear, musk ox and loons. At 6 am, the air was cold, the sky was gloomy and the silence was only broken by the sound of occasional wheels on the Dalton Highway.

After breakfast, we piled on to a “secure” van for a tour of Deadhorse and the Arctic Ocean. You cannot access the Arctic Ocean from here without security clearance. We saw a caribou on our way. The brave (or stupid) ones among us – that includes me – took a dip in the Arctic and ran back to shore as fast as we could. 

Deadhorse, AK/ Photo: Urjasi

We had lunch and drove few miles away from Deadhorse for a quiet tundra walk. Jeff played his saxophone by a glacial blue river. Steve skipped stones. We all linked arms around each other and walked back to the van, to head towards the airport.

And, just like that, a spell was broken, a trip was over.

Goodbye march/ Photo: Urjasi

Afterword

During much of this trip, I was walking in Sanjay’s footsteps. Please check out his photographs from his travels in Alaska: http://seenonfilm.net/albums/alaska/album/index.html. 

He took a film camera and an extra lens and came back with these.

I booked the trip, Gateway to the Arctic, through REI and I would recommend it to anyone who wants to explore Alaska but doesn't know where to start. Also, unless you know the area, it's quite difficult to hike off trails in the arctic. Phones and GPS don't work there, so having a guide who knows these mountains helps.

I went to Alaska fearing pain, but found joy. And because I let myself feel the joy surrounding me, and immerse myself in the journey, even as grief walked along with me, I found my Alaska again. This is the Alaska I would some day return to, for myself.

I don’t know what happens after we die. I am reminded of my favorite chapter from "Arctic Village" as I write this, "An Evening at the Roadhouse." There, in 1930, the wise men of Wiseman had deliberated about death, after-life, racism, capitalism, income inequality, censorship and more. All I really know is that I have this life, right now, and a choice about living it with joy or misery. The grief is a given, and there is no "closure" to be had. I'll always love him and miss him, but I choose joy and wish that Sanjay gets another chance to hike these mountains.

I want to give a shout out to the incredible group of people I traveled with. We were strangers and none of us had expected to find so much joy and camaraderie in each other’s company. We also had unusually good weather. I would have done what I had sought to do even without good weather and good company... but I couldn’t have sent him off amidst joy, and I may not have found my Alaska. For that, I thank my fellow travelers and guides.

A last word, about the environment: Climate change is the one issue that will affect us all, incrementally, or drastically, regardless of where we are and who we are. Some population theorists would even say that it would be nature’s way of culling the burgeoning human population. But I won’t go there. Instead, I will share the knowledge I gather during my travels, and point you to small and big things that we can do for the environment.

Consider donating to or taking some actions organized by the Alaska Wilderness League. Here’s one that I signed on to, asking Congress to designate the Arctic Refuge’s coastal plain as wilderness and off-drilling http://www.alaskawild.org/our-issues/arctic-national-wildlife-refuge-campaign/. 

Thanks for reading… and happy trails!