Welcome to My Back Yard. These short stories are my attempt to document some of my many fine Alaskan adventures. My developing love for writing is a perfect match for my uncanny ability to forget all but the most fundamental of details. J.R.R. Tolkien's timeless quote is my mantra- "Some things that should not have been forgotten were lost."- so I write.
“Mama always told me not to look into the eyes of the Sun, but Mama, that's where the fun is.” -Manfred Mann's Earth Band
I could see it getting closer. It was maybe a half mile away but I had to stop. That giant ball of fire hanging so low in the sky wasn’t keeping me very warm today but it was calling me and I fully intended to seek her out. I was riding in the shadows on the shady side of the river. Today the shady side of the river extended over half way across. Because of recent snowfall I was tethered to the snow machine trail in front of me but I could see that it would lead me into the light and the riding was good.
Do you see the light?
After carefully laying my bike down I went for a jog. I’ve been working on my cold-weather skills lately and I’ve discovered that if I get off my bike and jog around for a couple hundred meters my toes warm right up. The rest of my extremities are always fine; it’s my toes that don’t fare well in the super cold weather, especially the big ones, you know, the piggy that went to market. I didn’t want to have to pull the plug and have to go wee wee wee all-the-way-home. Maybe they’re cold because I’m pedaling with my standard-issue summertime leather hiking boots but I can get two pair of socks into them as long as I don’t lace them up too tightly. I’ve tried biking with my burlier North Face brand winter boots but it’s no fun to peddle around with big clunky boots on. I know there are special wintertime biking shoes on the market, but dropping another couple hundred bucks on this already expensive biking habit doesn't seem prudent or necessary. So I jog.
There I was hustling away from my bike on the newly packed snow machine trail courtesy of the Mid-Valley Trail Club. I had already been out for a couple of hours and it was 15 below zero and the snot-cicles on my mustache were growing longer and thicker. The longer ones on the sides were bouncing off of my cheeks as I ran up the trail. “Hey, I’m going just as fast as I was on the bike.” I thought. Before long I turned around and headed back to the bike and by the time I got back, sure enough, my toes were warming up.
This would be my pattern throughout the day; peddle for a while then stop and then do the warm-up toe jog. Although I carry-on, it was not bothersome in the least and most of my attention was centered around following the trail and chasing the sun.
It rose today at 10:18 A.M and set at 3:29 P.M. giving me five hours and eleven minutes to play with. Part of my wellness plan for the winter includes actively seeking out dates with the sun. The longer the dates and the more frequent they are, the better off I will be, I figure because in the past I have suffered from S.A.D.(Seasonal affective disorder)
Wikipedia says this: Seasonal affective disorder is also known as winter depression, winter blues, or seasonal depression. It is a mood disorder subset in which people who have normal mental health throughout most of the year experience depressive symptoms at the same time each year, most commonly in the winter.
The good news is that the condition treatable. Many think it is brought-on by lack of sunlight and although we don’t get much of it in Alaska in the winter it is a variable that can be planned-for, maximized and as it turns out, supplemented. One of the recommended treatment options is called light-therapy and it involves sitting in front of a special full-spectrum light each day for a few minutes. Exposure to sunlight is thought to increase the brain's release of a hormone called serotonin that we know is linked to mood. Light therapy mimics the therapeutic properties of the sun and is thought to do the same thing.
My therapy light box has been dormant for years
but it is making a strong comeback.
A dark figure stood before me in the trail. Standing a hair over 75 feet tall, I was impressed. I knew that he would continue to grow but I wasn’t going to stick around to find out. I was on the move. I unzipped my bike bag and drank what I could of my mostly frozen nalgene bottle and then pushed off pedaling my way up the trail as my dark friend mimicked me, danced around and silently morphed in and out of view.
Sasquatch?
The trail had only been packed a few times by snowmachines so far but it was delightful nonetheless. Long sections of it had set-up perfectly for riding. It weaved over and around various islands and channels of the Susitna River snaking its way North and West crossing finally at a steep cut in a bluff that locals have named the Ravine. For kicks I hiked up the Ravine and ran into the sun on the first swamp. My toes warmed with the extra effort and having reached the furthest point on my journey today, I turned around and back down the Ravine. The Sun would be in my face now and I was feeling just fine.
Flanked by Sasquatch.....on a bike!
Mama always told me not to look into the eye of the sun.
Since I have made a conscious decision to take-on our snowless winter head-on wielding no more than a shiny new fat tire bike I figured that I’d better get to peddlin’. Mother nature, forcing my hand yet again is going for the trifecta of shitty weather winters.
True-to-form I have been peddling my buns off. I have explored all of the territory around my house that is legally accessible. Fat tire bike tracks lead away from our house like a spider’s web and since there hasn’t been any new snow to speak of since the first few inches on October 17th, all of my tracks are still visible.
A month's worth of tracks have hardened, grown wider, and solidified serving as arteries pushing me into the wooded and watery landscape nearby. And although it has been nice to check out all of our local lakes (there are five lakes within a mile of the house), and nearby trails, it’s the river that I look forward to most.
Accessing the river from our property in Willow near mile 84 is a cinch. From our cabin I can peddle over the hill and be on the river in under two minutes. From the river basin there are endless sloughs, ridges, channels, beaches and flash-frozen overflow pools providing lots of cool stuff to ride on and is far from boring. I look forward to seeing the changes each time I ride down there. The Susitna River never ceases to amaze me. It is always in a constant state of change. A fire pit and log jam that Hazelee turned into a fort two weeks ago is currently glassed over in an overflow event that flooded the whole two acre shelf it was on. Skating anyone?
Last week this was gravel.
I picked up a pair of studded tires last weekend and they are pretty amazing. Riding over glare ice is not a problem. I can hear the studs crunch into the ice as the bike rolls effortlessly over top. Slamming on the rear brake carves several parallel lines in the ice as the bike scrapes to a stop.
Today I found a place to cross the mighty Susitna. I ditched the bike so I could check it out and test the ice. Carefully I made my way across the ice; Solid. Finally as I stood on the far gravel beach having just crossed the main channel of the river I looked back across to where my bike was parked. It was 150 meters away. I wanted to retrieve the bike and begin exploring the beach but I was out of time. It would have to wait until the next ride.
Yours truly halfway across the main channel. It was solid
Tight frozen ridges on a main channel of the
Susitna River near Susitna Landing.
Zamboni overflow.
Studs don't fail me now.
Frosty clear shards of fresh, new ice
glistening in the sunset.
“The way to get started is to quit talking and begin doing.” -Walt Disney
Let’s be honest, the last two winters have produced less than desirable snowfall. I’ve pretended not to notice but my optimism can only stretch so far. The NOAA ( National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) is losing faith in the possibility of La Nina (cold, dry) this winter in part due to the occurrence of “the blob” (warm, wet). I’m not even sure what all this means or how it works but I’m guessing that we are in store for another less-than wintery winter.
I’ve always been of the opinion that if you are going to live and thrive in Alaska then you’ve got to be able to recreate outside year-round. Otherwise why not live in Arizona? Luckily for us here in Alaska there are so many incredible things to do outside, even in the winter. But, in recent years winter activities that require deep snow have, well... sucked. Who wants to ski, snowshoe, or snowmachine in two inches of hardened snow turned icy crust? No Thanks. And what about those warm and wet days when the rain saturates the snow base into a slushy mess? Nah. Insert fat-tire biking.
Talkeetna is almost always a little colder and collects more snow than our southern neighbors in the lower valley and Anchorage bowl. But the last couple of winters have felt more like Juneau than Talkeetna. So when the opportunity arose for me to buy a fat tire bike from a friend this summer I jumped on it. I couldn’t dream of a better way to get outside on these marginal weather days. The bike I bought is a made by an Alaskan company called Fatback that is based out of Anchorage. It was purchased as a gift for my friend Arthur Mannix by his wife Karen. Arthur, is a diehard nordic ski bum couldn’t imagine wasting any precious ski days peddling a bike and was happy to let it go.
So far I have been loving it. I have had the opportunity to ride on a variety of terrain including up to six inches of snow, ice, four wheeler trails, hiking trails and river banks. I’ve even peddled into our non motorized hunting area to hunt caribou couple of times (no luck).
R0lling along the Susitna River
“What’s the big deal with these fat tire bikes anyway?” one might ask. Aside from being goofy fun, the wide tires provide a bigger footprint on the ground. Deflating the tires to as little as five pounds of pressure increases the footprint even more. The bigger footprint disperses weight over a larger area allowing the biker to cruise over terrain otherwise unrideable on a regular mountain bike. Sandy beaches, soft snowmachine trails, fresh powder...no problem. Since more rubber is in contact with the ground traction is increased. Hill climbing is easier too and the squishiness of the tires acts as shock absorbers effectively bouncing the rider down the trail.
So this fall, while waiting for the elusive “big dump” of snow, I have been pleasantly biding my time, bouncing along trails and sometimes even giggling.
The future of wild salmon depends on the decisions Alaskans make today
By: Steve Harrison
This rowdy crew is know to "take care of business" on fishing days.
Our state is home to the world’s last stronghold of wild salmon and, for the most part, we have managed our fisheries well. For generations Alaskans have sustainably harvested millions of wild salmon while this amazing fish continues to return to their native streams, spawn and rejuvenate the population every year.
Tasked with developing policies that protect our salmon resource, the Alaska Board of Fisheries uses the basic principles of sustainable yield and conservative management to drive decision making and, by and large, it has worked.
But managing the harvest of salmon is only part of the equation. Ensuring our salmon runs remain strong also means protecting the habitat they depend on, from the wetlands at the headwaters of the streams where they spawn, all the way to the ocean where they spend the majority of their lives.
In recent years, pressure to allow mining and damming interests to set up shop in and around our prolific salmon streams has increased greatly, with proposed projects like the Pebble Mine, Susitna dam, and the Chuitna Coal strip mine leading the charge.
One by one, developments much smaller than these have destroyed salmon runs in the Pacific Northwest. Attempts to replace the runs with hatchery fish have proven expensive and largely ineffective. It has been estimated that salmon runs of the Pacific Northwest are dwindling to roughly 6-7% of their historical levels. There is no question - poorly planned dams and mines kill salmon.
If we sit back and do nothing in Alaska, then the outcome is clear: We are next in line to lose our salmon.
I have been a Northern District setnet fisherman in Upper Cook Inlet for 36 years and, like hundreds of thousands of other Alaskans, have a vested interest in the sustainability of wild salmon. As setnetters we are held to a detailed set of rules and regulations. The Cook Inlet Area Commercial Fishing Regulations published by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game is a binding document for commercial salmon fishermen. It is 113 pages long. In it can be found detailed information about where, when, and how fish can and cannot be caught, sold, and processed.
Unfortunately big development proposals aren’t held to such specifics. Alaska’s Title 16 – which deals with all things fish and game – contains the guiding statements for development in sensitive salmon habitat. It says:
By law, an activity that will use, divert, obstruct, or change the flow or bed of a specified river, lake, or stream requires a Fish Habitat Permit. The Commissioner of the department of Fish and Game is directed to issue the permit unless the plans for the proposed construction work are “insufficient for the proper protection of fish and game.”
That’s it. That’s State law concerning the protection of our salmon from large-scale development projects. 113 pages of rules for set netters, two sentences for Pebble.
The problem is, nothing in Title 16 or Alaska Department of Fish and Game regulation defines what is sufficient for the “proper protection of fish and game,” and no review criteria exists to ensure that permitting decisions will protect salmon and the habitat they depend on.
The good news is that such a document already exists and has been adopted by the Board of Fisheries. It is called the Sustainable Salmon Policy, and is a comprehensive, thorough and thoughtful document that outlines clear standards for protecting Alaska’s salmon habitat. Unfortunately this common-sense solution has never been officially adopted into law.
Recognizing this, I joined with eleven other concerned Alaskans representing commercial, sport, subsistence and personal use fishermen, as well as experts in the field of fishery management, to author a Board of Fisheries proposal that attempts to fix this problem in Title 16 by addressing fish habitat permitting. Our proposal is simple and straightforward: We are asking the Board of Fisheries to recommend that the Legislature amend Title 16 by adding elements of the Sustainable Salmon Policy.
On Oct. 18-20, the Board of Fisheries will have the opportunity to take action on this proposal at a workshop held in Soldotna. Moving this proposal forward is the first step in ensuring the wild salmon runs that are iconic to our state and so many of us rely on remain strong today and into the future.
###
Steve Harrison is a commercial fisherman from Talkeetna and one of eleven authors of the Sustainable Salmon Proposal currently being considered by the Alaska Board of Fish.
“Five…four…three….two…one….GO!”. My first hour P.E. class blasted off the starting line like they were shot from cannons. It was cardio day and the workout affectionately known as SIXES was under way.
I hustled over to the dangling audio jack to pipe in some Pandora radio to keep my students pumped. Just as I reached for the cord to connect it to my phone, it rang. “Who could possibly be calling me at 8:45 AM on a Thursday?”, I thought. “Hello?” I said.
“Hi is this Steve Harrison?”
“Yes.”
“I see here that you are signed up for the road kill list and we have a moose down in your area.” It was Trooper dispatch. “It was hit by the train.” Just then a few of my students whizzed by as I stood there dumbfounded with my phone to my ear.
“Oh really?” My heart sunk a little. I’ve been burned by accepting train kill moose before. On three separate occasions I accepted road-kill moose calls that turned out to be train kills and it wasn’t a good deal, or fun. When a car hits a moose it’s typically a glancing blow and damage is minimum. When a train runs over a moose it can be, well, horrific. All three train kill moose I’ve dealt with were unsalvageable. On one such occasion as I pulled over at the railroad crossing, I couldn’t help but notice the dozen or so bald eagles perched high atop nearby trees. Lower down in the branches were the magpies and the ravens were interspersed all waiting their turn in the grand pecking order. As I opened the truck door, the waft of a fully gut-blown moose overcame me. I will spare the gentle reader at least some of the gory details but I will say that I have never, in my life seen such a grotesquely bloated mess. It was obvious to me that the moose had been dead for several days and it had been hit with such force that the guts had blown apart affectively releasing gallons of digestive enzymes to begin their work on the moose from the inside out. Luckily for me, I accepted it, sight unseen over the phone and was therefore committed. Sweet.
“Can you tell me anything about the condition of the moose?”, I asked.
“No sir, I’m sorry.” Pause. I was scrambling to gather as much information as I could because I knew that once you accept a roadkill you are responsible for its proper disposal whether or not any of the meat is salvageable.
“If I don’t take this moose, will I be put back to the bottom of the list?”
“I’m afraid so sir.”
“Okay, I’ll take it.”
The Moose Club at SuValley is into its sixth year. Each winter we accept roadkill moose and teach students how to process a moose from skinning to packaging. In 2010, we were fortunate to receive funding from the Talkeenta, and Sunshine Community councils through the revenue sharing program. We were able to purchase all of the commercial grade equipment needed to process meat including a grinder, vacuum packer, sausage mixer, and all of the consumables that go with it. In addition we built a processing shed. We got the lumber and all building materials at cost from Moore’s hardware. Our shop class, taught by Bryan Kirby built a nice moose butchering shed complete with lots of outlets, great lighting and heat. Also we were able to buy a second hand two-place snow machine trailer that we rigged with a winch. We built a custom moose-sled out of UHMW plastic that allows us to drag the moose onto the trailer with ease.
So with renewed purpose and a distinct change in the direction of my day, I made arrangements and took off from school to go pick-up the moose. I met my partner in crime at the railroad crossing. “Hi dad.”
“Howdie....hey it’s a legal bull!” Sure enough the moose had three brow tines which meets the criteria for the general harvest in our game unit. And as luck would have it this one was in decent shape. The three year old bull which measured in at a mere 39 inches was odorless and the digestive cavity was intact. Yes! I would find out later that we would lose one front quarter for sure but there was plenty of good salvageable meat.
After wedging the black sled under it’s head and shoulders we winched the moose onto the sled and then up onto the tilt trailer. We found a suitable pull-off to dump the guts and set about gutting it. We pulled the hind leg as high as we could and tied it off to a thick willow bush. After making a few key incisions inside the rib cavity the guts came free and slid neatly down the black sled and off the trailer as if by design.
Steve sr. is pulling the pin on the tilt trailer so the guts and blood will slip-slide down and away from the carcass and trailer. No blood touches the trailer.
By noon four of my veteran, go-to moose clubbers Branden Bettis, Stashia Leonard, Wade Griffin, and Kodiak Olsen were busy skinning the moose. My part of the work, essentially done would now be to direct traffic, answer questions and supervise. From here on out the kids do all the work.
From left to right: Stashia, Kodiak, and Wade skinning the moose while my sixth grade students look on.
Each scoop of my hand collected twenty or so berries. I was in no hurry to hike back up the hill. Hike a few steps, swipe some more berries; this was my pattern. There were at least two more packs of gear to hump down to the creek and I wasn’t particularly interested in getting too tired or sweaty this early in the day. So with a relaxed pace unfamiliar, I hiked and swiped and ate my way up to camp. Corey was with me and we had just dropped one of the rafts and a bunch of random gear down to the creek. The blueberries were thick but not nearly as thick as the crow berries. Each mouthful of crow berries was delightful. Having the definitive crunch and juice of a crisp apple, the seeds were discarded just in time for the next bite. We were at camp two.
“Hey guys, nice job”, Pete was packing up his stuff as his son Keaton helped and gathered the items that would round out their pack boards. They were ten minutes ahead of Corey and myself but no one was keeping track. This year it would be the four Musketeers. This year Pete and I were thrilled to bring our sons but it was a dubious start.
Pushing the cart a few day prior was a comedy of errors. Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that we were pushing over 600 pounds of gear. Poor communication between Pete and I had us provisioned for a three week trip instead of the one week we scheduled time-off for. The extra weight, I figured, was directly associated with the amount of character and grit we would earn in the struggle. Okay.
As it turned out the extra weight probably had something to do with the three tire issues we had to deal with, including one right off the get-go in the parking lot. Nonetheless we made it to the back of the valley otherwise unscathed and we promptly set up camp.
Camp-time is healing time for us and is important to the success of our trip. Our hunt doesn’t end after the first day. As it turns out each successive day is just as hard as the one before and tasks left carelessly unfinished aren’t appreciated in the crisp rude mornings. I can remember dealing with rigid, frozen socks on more than one trip (I’m a slow learner)
Pete and I, overflowing with wisdom and advice kept the boys aware of these lessons and although they assured us that they already knew these things, hearing “I know” didn’t provide much solace to Pete and I.
But despite our sons’ differing perceptions of what camp tasks were optional versus mandatory, it was a brilliant evening. The crackling fire and a pull or two off of the rum capped our first day. Rum wasn’t an option for the boys but they more-than made up for it on their own requisite pulls of the chocolate treats.
In the morning, while Corey slept-in I would rig-up and put in my time on the fly rod. It has become an annual tradition for me to haul in a fly rod and fling around some fishing gear. I have yet to catch a fish but perhaps one day, when I am longer in the tooth than I already am I will be there casting-away with the sun in my face and the wind at my back and I will feel the tightening of the line that I so desire. I can clearly imagine the arched back and large dorsal fin sitting on top with it’s perfectly rowed scales in deep grey and blue coloring. Until that day all I can say is this; I am getting pretty good at casting! My fishing, however fruitless was still a wonderful experience and I am looking forward to having another go at it next year.
The next morning after packing up camp we set off, up the trail hoping to finish our cart-pushing duties by the end of the day. “Hey look”, I pointed ahead in the road. There, thirty feet ahead in the trail was a nice ptarmigan in half plumage. Luckily in addition to a fishing pole we also brought a 4/10 shotgun. I unclipped Corey from his harness and handed him the gun. Keaton was bungeed to the front of Corey’s harness and so as Corey advanced towards the bird, so did Keaton following closely behind tethered by the bungee cord. This hunting technique is probably not recommended in the hunter safety course but at least it was closely supervised by Pete and I. After a fleeting miss on the first shot, the bird took flight and Corey expeditiously dispatched the bird mid-flight. “Nice shot Corey!”
Corey and Uncle Pete and ptarmigan
From there the work would become much harder as the grade of incline increased with each passing hour. Luckily Pete’s wife Amanda, bless her heart, provided more than just her consent for Pete and Keaton to go on the hunt. She also provided a mega Costco pack of Tic Tac’s of which the boys took full advantage of. (She also sent a jumbo pack of Extra gum wintergreen flavor, more on this later.) Keaton, popping Tic Tac’s during every stop of the cart exclaimed “Hey these things have 1.5 calories each” He was reading the label, “I’m gaining back some calories!” I mentioned something about a five gallon bucket of Tic Tacs but we were so bushed that I think my joke fell flat. I knew that the Tic Tac’s weren’t adding anything to Keaton’s efforts but he sure did have some dynamite breath.
Eventually we topped out and the pushing was easier. We were surprised and bit saddened to see that the mining company had scraped in a new road effectively destroying my self named Wolverine trail. Although the new trail proved “nice” I couldn’t help but to loath the visually abrasive scar on the mountainside, a trail that didn’t roll with the terrain but rather “B-lined” around the mountain in a long ugly scrape. The trail gained us further use of our cart and saved us a half a day of work but be both agreed that we wished it wasn’t there. It’s hard to accept such brash environmental development when it’s been such an integral part of my life for the last 31 years. We set up camp in the wind, Pete made dinner, and we went to sleep.
I got up earlier than the rest of the crew and decided to pack the raft down to the creek. I grabbed the 4/10 on my way out of camp. On my return hike I roused some ptarmigan, missed several shots but returned with one nice bird. By then the rest of the crew was up and ready to start packing. Maybe it was all the shooting that woke them. Over the course of the day we would shuttle all of our gear down to the creek and prepare ourselves for the next phase of operations.
Water was high. After puffing up the rafts and loading the gear we set-off down creek and although most years we are dragging at this point, this year we were actually floating but as I have come to learn, not all floating is the same. The boats, narrow and long would bump and grind their way downstream. Corey and I were positioned in the bow and stern doing our best to fend off the encroaching bushes. Pete and Keaton were behind us doing the same in their own raft. At one point half of the creek disperses into a beaver pond and the rest of the creek spills down through the bushes in a tangle of loosely defined channels. Nice. I’ve learned through the years to take the beaver pond route. An easy paddle over the pond takes you to the dam. A quick dismantling of a small section of the dam creates enough flow to literally “flush” us down and over the dam into navigable waters.
A few more bends in the creek would take us to our next camp and from here we could finally begin to hunt. At one point that night Keaton and I were sitting in front of the campfire. He had the thousand-yard gaze on his face as he slowly churned his gum. He was mesmerized by the fire and appeared to be in some kind of trance. As I watched, he pursed his lips producing a teal blue ball of gum which he then proceeded to expectorate into the flames just as his left hand slowly raised to his mouth with a fresh piece already unwrapped. “Keaton, what are you doing?” I asked barely able to contain my laughter. As if jabbed by a sharp stick he quickly came out of his trance and explained;
“It wasn’t minty anymore.”
Thanks Amanda.
The next morning had me up early and I took my coffee up onto the hill. Something caught my eye on the creek below and I turned to see a small two year old bull moose crossing the creek. From a little higher up on the hill I glass the lower valley for a few minutes until I noticed that the small bull had noticed me and wanted to know more. I had scoped out the valley well enough and decided to return to camp but this bull was making his way up to me. I decided to duck around a bush lower on the hillside hoping to lose him. Sure enough there he was chasing me down.
Bulls in the rut are a strange breed indeed. In his hormone induced state this guy was looking for a scrap! Since I wasn’t armed I (other than my coffee, which by now was less-than scalding) I figured that I should avoid confrontation with this disgruntled youngster. I ducked, hid, shuffled my way back to camp where Pete was now awake, with his own coffee and ready to glass. “Hey did you see that little bull?” I asked
“Yeah he ran past camp, he went up the creek.”
“Good.”
By now the boys were awake and after scarfing down some cold leftover spaghetti, we gathered our hunting packs and set out for the day.
It was indeed a great day for us that will not soon be forgotten. I will say that a certain amount of pride swelled in me when Corey was able to take down a large bull with the 30.06 that was handed down to me by my dad when I was his age. That evening, at this very camp, we would all return from a long day of hunting and feast on the juicy tenderloins of Corey’s first moose using our traditional kill-day recipe.
Corey's first moose
Harrison kill day tenderloin recipe:
1 white onion
1 bell pepper
1 half pound bacon diced or chunked
4 sliced jalapenos
2 tbsp minced garlic
1 6 oz. bottle of soy sauce
Moose tenderloin medallions (enough for all)
Fry bacon in frying pan, add onions, all peppers and garlic. Saute until onions and peppers are soft. Remove all ingredients to another pot or plates temporarily leaving all bacon grease in the pan. Heat grease to just before smoking point before dropping the tenderloin medallions into hot oil. Since tenderloin is best rare to medium-rare flip meat after 1 minute or so. Add the rest of the sauted ingredients, dump in all of the soy sauce, bring up to a boil. Turn off the heat. Done. Serve over rice or mashed potatoes. ***It is important to thank the hunting gods while savoring in such a glorious meal.
The next morning Corey and I packed up camp while Pete and Keaton took off after another moose. A few hours later Corey and I floated down the valley and eventually caught up to them as they put the “sneaks” on a bull we could not see. I had Corey help me set up both tents and organize camp when suddenly we heard a shot ring out. We quickly grabbed our packs and set out to help. Sure enough Pete had killed another large bull less than a mile from our camp! We all cheered and hugged and eventually started the process of field dressing another big moose.
This had been an amazing trip and we all knew that our time in this valley was coming to a close. The next day we would pack up camp and float down to where we had dropped the meat. It would take us the rest of the day to float out to the road but we didn’t care too much about that. I spent a lot of time thinking about what a wonderful trip it had been to share with my son and I hoped that by the time hunting season rolls around next year he will want to go with me again.
I’d been giddy about the trip since early Spring. It was called simply “The King’s Sheep”. The route was named appropriately by intrepid back country adventurists Forest McCarthy and Brad Meiklejohn and it begins in Chickaloon.
It was a grand plan; We left on foot up the Permanente trail, ascending 20 miles up the King River valley on foot. The trail was a tidy four wheeler trail that we abandoned when we crossed into the West channel of the King.
Nap on the Permanente
From there we made our way along the gravel bars, crossed the river plenty of times and had to bushwhack quite a bit too. Once we made it to the the headwaters of the King we picked our way up into it’s Northeastern pass past the watchful eye of a bull caribou. In the saddle we punched through knee deep snow and then stood in awe at the expanse on the other side. It would be our next obstacle; The Talkeetna Glacier.
Brian on the divide
Descending the pass and picking our way onto the glacier around obvious crevasses was delightful. An easy two mile walk down the glacier had us below firn line and although we walked on solid ice, it was littered with every manner of silt, sand and gravel; boot traction couldn’t have been better. Bigger rocks and boulders were also present and grew in number as we approached the terminus. All during our glacier travel we followed countless glacial run-off streams of various sizes. Once crystal clear, the water grew murkier the lower we got. “Brian look.” We were near the terminus of the glacier and the streams had gathered into well-worn ice trenches. The water here was now a milky/tan color. Rolling and boiling in the mix were dark rocks of all sizes and they were caught-up in a gravel conveyor belt. “It looks like chocolate chip cookie dough.” I told him. The streams joined each other in a gnarly water park slide that spiraled down a moulin that disappeared into the bowels of the glacier.
strolling around a well defined crevasse
Carefully we picked our way over the medial moraine dividing the Talkeetna and Sheep Glaciers eventually making our way down and eventually off of the glacier. Glaciers are always tricky to get off of and this one was no different. As we passed under the giant toe of the Sheep Glacier it’s many veins of cookie dough run-off spat it’s rocks down upon us as we scrambled quickly underneath. The raging Sheep River roaring next to us was so loud that we had to shout to communicate. “Keep your head up for rocks. We need to move quickly.” We scrambled over the rocks that varied in size from beach balls to refrigerators. Many of them had been deposited in their current position recently and were not particularly stable. Some would move, roll and settle underneath our feet whereas others didn’t budge. It was hard to judge which was which. After a few near misses with wayward overhead rocks, we made it passed the fall zone, took off our packs, and took a break.
Talkeetna Glacier
Meltwater draining into moulin on left
Over the course of the next several hours we would continue our journey over, around and through the terminal moraine of the glacier traveling adjacent to the Sheep River that was an amazing spectacle in itself.
First decentest Andrew Embick, in his book “Cold and Fast” calls the Sheep River a class IV run with a mandatory portage around a class VI gorge below the glacier. This seemed about right to me as we hiked our way as far downstream as possible. Often our path took us to river’s edge where, again, we were impressed by the power of the river. McCarthy and Meiklejohn by contrast, found the float to be mostly class 3. We found out later after comparing photos taken from similar locations, that they had completed their trip in much lower water, which Brian and I both agreed would have been much easier. McCarthy’s blog post video shows a leisurely float and is set to Canned Heat’s “Going up the country" Although I jokingly sang this cute little jingle throughout the trip, this was not the song that would set the tone to our own float. I’m thinking more along the lines of Metallica’s " Through the Never " More on that later.
Mars
We camped in the valley of an old lake bed that had drained in dramatic event that geologists call Jokulhlaup. There was no doubt in our minds that such a powerful event could have happened in this place. Immense power of erosion was not only evident all around us but was actually happening right before our eyes and ears. At night in the tent we could hear the deep rumble of boulders being rolled down the Sheep River. We were passing through ground-zero of glacial erosion and it was quite austere. We found a lone sandy oasis situated in the dry lake bottom. There wasn’t anything green besides our tent visible in any direction and and it felt very much like Mars. The next day we descended the valley into the bushy lowlands where I exclaimed, “It’s good to be off of Mars.”
After carefully negotiating our way around a lone brown bear that was making his way up the valley, we continued hiking downstream as far as we could. We wanted to get as far downstream where we hoped the river would “settle-down”.
I pushed this boulder in. It was fun. I cheered.
The Sheep was still a raging torrent and we weren’t ready to begin floating in such fast water.
Brian demonstrating textbook form on a
small tributary of the mighty Sheep.
There were several times that we had to climb up-and-over spots where the river was pinned-in by canyon walls. One such traverse require a bit of technical climbing to scale a rock face covered by loose moss and alders that were by-and-large dead, brittle, and of no use.
Brian topping out after a good scramble.
Finally after hiking as far as we could, it was time to camp, collect ourselves and prepare for our first day of pack rafting. We launched into the Sheep River the next morning.
The first half of the day was amazing. The water was fast and decisions had to be made quickly. There were several large wave trains that we negotiated brilliantly and things were looking up. As we got lower in the valley the river spread out into multiple channels. The water was still fast but the volume in each channel was smaller than when the river was all together but now we were into the wood.
Suddenly as if we were in slow motion, we got tangled up into a sweeper. Thinking that we had plenty of time to stop ourselves and get to shore, the swiftness of the Sheep kept us under it’s power and we could not stop. After grabbing a volleyball sized rock on shore, I finally came to a halt with twenty feet to spare but Brian was having the same trouble as I was. As he came barreling by I attempted to grab him with my other hand. When I did it dislodged the rock I had a hold of and we spun into the sweeper hide, guts, feathers and all.
Brian had the presence of mind to work his way on top of the tree that sucked us in. In the fracas, we swapped boats, lost a paddle, and Brian went for a cold, cold swim. Up shit creek with out a paddle...literally.
After weighing all options we decided to utilize my newly acquired Delorme inreach. With it I messaged my wife who was on-point and got us the help we needed. Within a couple of hours our friend Bill Starr was flying overhead and was able to drop us a spare paddle. In the meantime I whittled a spruce-pole insert that fit into half of my kayak paddle in case Bill couldn’t make it. That way, I figured we could each at least have a canoe paddle. Looking back I’m glad we didn’t have to make-do with such a set up because as it turned out, we weren’t out of the woods yet. A single paddle wouldn’t have been enough to maneuver us well enough in the swift waters to come. We made the right decision.
Soon we were back in action floating our way down the valley. The water was still swift and braided but we proceeded with caution and pulled-over to scout anything questionable. That night we camped on a sandbar and prepared for what we thought would be an easy float out to the Talkeetna River and then on to Talkeetna.
As it turned out the Sheep wasn’t done with us and although the river was mellow to start, it didn’t last long. We were floating side-by-side telling jokes and stories when Brian cut me off. “What’s that?” I turned to look and I could hear the upcoming roar and I could see the dancing water dropping away from view. We got our game faces on and prepared ourselves mentally for what was to come.
At this point we had learned to become exceptionally cautious and we pulled over several times to scout corners that we could not see around. On the third scouting stop we hiked a half a mile on an island so we could check out any obstacles. When we got the the end of the island we decided that it looked good as far as we could see down river. We hiked back up stream, dragged our rafts a bit and then set off once again into the mighty Sheep.
I led and negotiated around an overhanging birch and a boulder mid-stream. Just as I was about to join the larger channel, I noticed a whole 60 foot spruce tree coming down stream essentially cutting me off. It was coming from the other channel upstream. “Whoa”, I thought. I let it pass and then turned my boat upstream and paddled to give myself some room. After it passed and I saw Brian coming down behind me and I turned myself downstream. After a moment, I turned to check on Brian and suddenly and quite unexpectedly he had flipped; his raft was upside down. Although we had negotiated what we thought were much trickier sections thus far on the trip, the seam of the two channels traveling at different speeds sucked his leading edge under catching him off-guard.
Although the water was still moving quite fast we were luckily at the top of a fairly straight section without obstacle. Brian fought to flip his raft back over without success. His forty pound pack was strapped to the top of the pack making it cumbersome and awkward to flip. I threw him one end of a throw bag and I held on to the other. I grabbed his paddle and tried to tow him. This didn’t work. He let out a bunch of line on the throw bag and I tried to tow again. This too was not going to work. I found it hard to bare down on my paddle while trying not to lose his. Finally he let go of the rope and his raft and made for shore.
It was a sickly feeling when I lost sight of him and I tried to focus. I had floated to the bottom of the straight stretch of the river now and it was decision time for me. I wanted to grab his raft but I didn’t want to get flushed down the channel to my left that I discovered later was littered with four spruce sweepers that spanned the whole channel. I kept my eye on Brian’s raft and was glad that it seemed to be following me. I decided to paddle quickly to the island between the two channels, ditch my own raft on shore and catch Brian’s raft.
I grounded my rafted, ripped myself from the confines of my spray skirt and threw my raft up onto the beach. I sprinted down the beach and jumped into the water only to discover that Brian’s raft had taken a different flush of the current and was way out in the middle. I floundered up past my waist and soon realized that there was no way on God’s green Earth that I was going to grab his raft unless I swam for it. Since I wasn’t even sure of Brian’s well being I decided against it.
I ran back up to my boat, crossed the swift channel above the sweepers and crawled onto the bank that I hoped to find Brian on. I ran down the bank and finally I found him standing safely on the bank, wet and cold but alive! Words cannot describe how glad I was to see him there. And it was at this point that we both realized that we were in a bit over our heads. We started a fire.
Few words were exchanged as the gravity of the situation began to seep into our bones and it wasn’t long before we set into motion the destiny of the completion of our trip.
Although we were about 20 miles from Talkeetna as the crow flies. We both knew that it would be a serious undertaking to bushwhack our way over land through some of the wildest country on earth. If we had to, and if we wanted to burn up another four or five more days of our summer we could have hiked out. But as it was we had no need to prove ourselves in this way and it wasn’t long before I sent another message to Tamra. Within an hour and a half we heard the whump whump whump of the chopper blades making way up the valley towards us.
“Hey Paul.” It was Paul Roderick. Paul is owner and operator of Talkeetna Air Taxi and as a matter of coincidence he flew Brian and I out to Denali base camp on our summit trip a few years ago in a fixed wing plane. I did not know he was a helicopter pilot too but it was comforting to see someone that I knew.
In the end I was just glad to have achieved my lifelong goal of staying out of the newspapers and we did not have to initiate the emergency response team. A sweet chopper ride with Paul sounds much better. For a fleeting moment I felt like Magnum P.I flying over the expanse below albeit not Hawaii.
“Hey Paul, do you think we could see if we could locate Brian’s raft on the way back?” I asked. This was an option that I knew the Alaska State Troopers would not afford us. “Sure.” We took off down river and finally about eight miles downriver there it was upside down at the front of a big log jam. We landed on the skinny sandbar, jumped out and grabbed it. And then it wasn't long before we were back in Talkeetna.
