Broasted Chicken and Frozen Niblets

“Broasted Chicken and Frozen Niblets”

       “Antlerless moose hunt in 20A continues”.  The headline caught my eye on the crumpled newspaper while I unwrapped the beers packed neatly in my tattered soft cooler.  I had just arrived at our cabin up the Yentna river for a get away weekend of martin trapping and beer drinking.  The fifty mile ride by snowmobile can have a detrimental effect on loosely packed beverages.  After reading the short article crouched on the floor of my cabin, I learned that this registration hunt was open until Feb 28^th, over a month away.  A flourishing moose population south of Fairbanks had apparently outpaced the habitat’s ability to sustain them.  This overabundance of moose, left unchecked, could set the stage for a crash of the population.  Hunters could apply for an antlerless registration permit allowing them to harvest any moose without antlers, including cows.  I stuffed the newspaper into the woodstove, under the kindling and cordwood and lit a match.

      Over the course of the next few days the wheels began to turn in my head about the possibility of making a run north for meat.  A few months before, the fall hunting season took us to Kodiak Island where we were fortunate enough to harvest ten black tail deer among four of us.  It was a gratifying hunt with wonderful hiking above tree line and spectacular wildlife viewing but fell a bit short on the freezer filling.  The black tail deer, arguably the tastiest of Alaska’s wild game is about a tenth the size of a moose.

    “I’m in!” said Kirby after a brief description of my plans.  He enthusiastically volunteered his Arctic Oven, recalling several successful winter trips with the cozy winter tent.  The “oven” part of the tent is a wood fired stove.  My own experience with winter camping wasn’t nearly as cush.  Four season mountaineering tents and snow caves were the extent of my cold weather camping.  The tents provide excellent wind protection and do manage to trap some body heat but accumulating moisture is always an issue.  Snow caves on the other hand require sufficient elbow grease to construct but are cozy “bomb shelters” when done right.  I was looking forward to trying out the A.O.

Arctic Oven (A.O.)

        Another one of Kirby’s prized possessions, I would find out, is his Skidoo Skandic Super Wide, or “Super Wide” as he calls it.  This snow machine had taken on some interesting modifications over the years including a GPS mounted on the handle bars, a sandvik mounted with brackets on the tunnel, and a sweet winch setup that could easily relocate from the back to the front of the machine depending on your predicament.  The seat on the Super wide opens up for storage where there is room for nothing else as Kirby has every square inch packed neatly with anything we might need in case of a Holocaust, or natural disaster.

     We were all ready packed up and were able to leave right after work.  Our destination was the tiny community of Clear on the way to Fairbanks.  Since the forecast was cold, Kirby made arrangements ahead of time to have his cold blooded diesel truck plugged in at the Clear sky lodge.  We arrived at the lodge around eight in the evening decided to throw some patronage their way since they were allowing us to plug in.  Earlier that week I was checking out the Lodge’s web site and I noticed that the dinner special was “Broasted Chicken”.  “Broasted”, I found out, meant pressure cooked in hot oil. This sounded dangerous and tasty, a rare combo.   The chicken was incredible and went nicely with a couple of ambers.   Over the course of our brief dinner stay our radar turned to the opinionated sentiments of some of the local enthusiasts working busily on their dinner buzz.  Heated discussions ranged from the ethical objection of shooting defenseless cow moose to at least one local mountain lion sighting.  Welcome to Clear.

       We packed our sleds and prepared to venture down the famous Rex trail. At the time we knew nothing of the trail except a few anecdotal references to some trappers’ cabins.  Jeanne Proulx at the Alaska Division of Natural Resources writes this; “The Rex Trail is an important access route which has been in use since the 1920's, and serves as a vital transportation route for mining, hunting, private property access, recreation, and trapping.  Several placer mines currently operate in the vicinity of the Rex Trail and private landowners have properties in settlement areas of Gold King, Southwind, and Wood River.  Both miners and residents rely heavily on the Rex Trail in the winter for hauling supplies.  More recently, the Rex Trail has become popular with moose hunters from around the state as a land-based access route into Game Management Unit 20A”.  We were both happy to be seeing some new country as neither of us had been down the “Rex” before.

     Earlier in the week we found out that some of the sub units closer to the highway were already closed, so we had to travel to sub unit four to hunt which was about thirty miles from the truck.   Thirty below temperatures had us bundled up from head to toe.  Bryan neatly tucked his I-pod ear buds under his seal skin hat. I was sporting my trusty beaver hat that was cinched tightly under my chin along with a neck gaiter and balaclava to cover my face. Off we went feeling the bite of the wind chill stabbing at any opening or flaw in our gear.

     The trail itself was very flat, straight, and wide. The snow was only a couple of inches deep. Truck tire marks intertwined with four wheeler and snowmachine tracks.  Thick stands of white spruce gave way to aspen and bushy scrubs of willow the further we got. Several tree stands revealed themselves on the edges of clearings, and a couple of territorial trappers’ signs warned us not to trespass.

       Heading down the trail I saw several rabbits dart in front of me.  Was that last one a lynx?  I wasn’t sure. We did scare up one cow moose which helped remind me why we were enduring this biting cold.  Kirby was following me jamming some AC/DC.

Cow Moose

      We were happy to reach a large wooden sign marking Unit four.  As soon as we crossed Tetlanika creek we could start hunting on the right side of the trail.  After crossing over some exposed overflow, we safely reached the far bank.  Looking back we watched the white vapor rise from our fresh tracks.  From there we drove another mile or so past a thick stand of black spruce until we found a decent camp spot overlooking a giant field.  The temperature was drawing colder as we went about setting up Kirby’s Arctic Oven.  It’s times like these that necessitate a little hustle.  Standing around is a recipe for getting cold or worse.  I was reminded of Brian Dennehy’s character Rosie in “Never Cry Wolf” when he advises the shivering main character to “Keep moving Tyler, keep moving”.

     The Arctic Oven is a heavy duty tent outfitted with a small woodstove that folds down flat for transport.   The telescoping stack is shoved though a tight rubber sleeve in the ceiling and fits nicely into the top of the stove. After securing the outer “fly” of the tent outside, we started a fire and settled in for the night.  Kirby thought ahead and packed the first nights’ wood from home.   It took no time at all to warm up the place. 

     When I finally rolled inside the heat hit my cheeks and put a smile on my face as my beard slowly started to melt.  I flicked the chunks of my face ice onto the hot woodstove; the distinctive hiss added steam and a little humidity to the room briefly fogging it up.  Soon I could peel the facemask off my beard and I started hanging my gear up to dry.  Drying out wet gear is not something I’d ever associated with winter camping.   In the mountains you can get away with drying one or two small items in your sleeping bag with you at night, but nothing like hanging all your gear above a hot stove.  In the morning we would start dry and warm!  We had a couple cocktails, told a few jokes, and then went to sleep on top of cots at one thirty A.M. 

     It got colder that night, exactly how cold we could only guess.  Sometime after we drifted off, the woodstove burned through all its wood quickly dropping the temperature in the tent to the outside equivalent.  The only skin exposed outside my sleeping bag was the tip of my nose.  I woke up to the sensation my nose getting numb. Experience has taught me to “rotate” face parts in this situation. A quick turn to the right buried my nose, but exposed a cheek.  After about my fourth roll rotation I heard Kirby say “Hey, Should I stoke the fire?”

“Hell yeah, I’m freezing my niblets over here!”.

     We made it through the night, vowing to keep the stove “stoked” all through the next night if we decided to stay another one.

      We woke in the morning before sunrise.  We stoked the fire back into shape as the first thoughts of emerging from our sleeping bag cocoons floated through our heads.  Kirby produced some sausage biscuits neatly wrapped in foil and carefully situated them onto the top of the woodstove.  Breakfast in bed! I fumbled through my bag to find my MSR cookstove and pot.   I methodically prepared coffee by carefully pouring boiling water through a coffee filter precariously perched on top of my Nalgene bottle.  A hasty pack job, precluded the use of my French press that was missing in action somewhere in my garage.  A conical coffee filter would have to do.  With one hand pinning the filter against the rim of the Nalgene, the other clamped the cook pot gripper.  With a careful tilt, I filled the filter with just enough boiling water to soak through. Ten minutes later the pay-off was worth the trouble.  I could almost imagine Juan Valdez peering in through the rain fly.

Senior Valdez

      Our efforts turned towards the task at hand.  After bundling back up we decided to take a short walk through the field we were camped on to make sure we weren’t missing an easy animal.  It was a crispy morning indeed with the slight haze of an ice fog blocking any chances of a blue sky.  The field was about forty acres of brushy, moosey looking country.  My binoculars revealed no moose though.  I wiped the lenses clear to double check.  Ravens circled an area across the field where I suspected a gut pile must be. It wouldn’t be long before the raven’s spectacle coupled with their unabashed squawking would eventually bring in other scavengers like the foxes, wolves, or maybe even a wolverine.   We returned to camp and fired up our frozen snow machines and prepared to go for a ride.

     We pulled out of camp onto the main trail keeping a watchful eye on the right side of the trail for moose.  The temperature prevented us from cruising too fast.  It had to have been forty below.  One long side trip turned out to be someone’s trap line ending at the top of a narrow valley, oops.  We turned around being careful not to disturb the area.  As someone who has dabbled in recreational trapping, I know how frustrating it can be to have someone carelessly blast through your trap line.  We checked out several other leads with no luck.  We did find six frozen gut piles including the one with all the ravens.  It was looking like we were several weeks too late. When we got back to our camp Kirby broke out the chainsaw from under the seat of his SuperWide.  What else did he have in there, I wondered?  We bucked up enough firewood for the remainder of our trip.  The super small woodstove would only accept the shortest of logs.  We neatly stacked these “hobbit logs” next to the stove as we settled in and started to thaw back out.

     As luck would have it, the next morning was another cold one but we were battled hardened and convinced we could still find a moose.  I grabbed the pull cord on my Polaris 550 and leaned back hard.  The nylon rope reluctantly fed out of the cowling even with my whole body into it.  It took about nine pulls to loosen the frozen metal enough to turn over.  The machine roared to life sending off a cloud of exhaust vapors that engulfed the whole machine.  

‘Whew!” I huffed as I too was throwing off exhaust vapors of my own.

“I’d better start mine up too” Kirby quipped.  He casually reached over and turned his key.  With his fancy electric start his SuperWide whined to life.  The Kirby-esque chuckle I’d come to know lightened the mood as we readied ourselves for another cold ride.

       I strapped on my backpack and slung my rifle. We decided to head up into the mountains on an old mining road we discovered near our camp.  The view from the top was a pleasant contrast to the wooded flats we’d been traveling on. We scanned the hillside for moose with no luck. On our way back down I managed to lose Kirby.  Where could he be?  After I turned around I drove back a mile or so down the trail.  I came around a corner and I could see a yellow snowmachine in the distance but no Kirby.  As I got closer I noticed him lying on the trail next to his beloved SuperWide.  Was he injured? Was he dead? As I drew nearer I realized that he was not dead or injured at all. It was his precious SuperWide that was injured or dead.   Apparently he had bottomed out his Super Wide on a large bump and snapped his rear spring.  It’s always a gamble snow machining in really cold temperatures. Everything is super brittle and ready to shatter at the slightest miss step. 

     We spent the early afternoon jerry rigging his suspension up as tight as we could with some rope I brought.  The ride out would be a rough one for Bryan but at least we were mobile.  I didn’t feel too sorry for him because he would probably be rocking out to “Back in black” or “Dirty Deeds” the whole way back anyway.  Licking our wounds, we packed up camp and pointed our snow machines toward the truck with thoughts of the savory chicken at the lodge dancing in our heads.   Sometimes when you go hunting, all you get is broasted chicken and frozen niblets.