Where are the people in these photos? They where beside me enjoying the same view. Or... Hell, I don't know. They just did not seem to make it in front of the scenery in these two photos.
Yes, there are stories....... and more exploring. I'll save for later.
Alaska, as legend has it, is chock-full of amazing places. One of those amazing places, believe it or not, is a large complex of sand dunes north of the arctic circle. Yep. It's true. I first heard about the Kobuk Sand Dunes roughly ten years ago. Ever since then I've have had an itch to travel there and see what they are all about. It was everything I expected... a bunch of sand. But it was more than just a bunch of sand. It was close to 25 square miles of sand in the middle of a boreal forest, the Sahara of the arctic. It was hot sand on bare feet in a place underlain by permafrost. It was a climax of contrast. It was more than my imagination ever expected.
Four of us flew into the Kobuk Dunes for a two day base camp before moving on to Agiak Lake in the middle of Gates of the Arctic (more on that later). Two days gave us time to wonder around the dunes and get a good sense of what they had to offer. While endless miles of sand may seem sterile and lifeless at first, they proved to be quite the contrary. During our time there we saw three wolves which is a pretty good number considering wolves are classic evaders of humans when they know of our presence. Wolf tracks were everywhere telling us there were far more wolves than we were seeing. On one occasion we walked down the dune to our camp then twenty minutes later walked back up the dune to find fresh wolf tracks in our 20 minute old shoe prints. Our shoe prints were in view of camp but we never saw the wolf that left them.
Most of the dunes are without plants or have very few hearty plants loosely scattered about. One of the greatest contrast in this area is the transition from dune to forest. It's sharp! The west side of the dunes where we were camped is bordered by Kavet Creek. On one side of the creek you have nothing but sand, on the other side nothing but spruce forest. And flowing right down between the two is a beautiful little clear creek full of small grayling.
What an extraordinary place. From the dunes we slung our backpacks over our shoulders and hiked off of the sand and 1.5 miles through the forest to the Kobuk River where we were picked up by a float plane. The clients had a great time everywhere we went except for this 1.5 mile hike through the woods to the river, which they termed "the hike from hell". It was a challenging hike through brush, tussock, bog and such but without hiking it they would have never really known the true arctic. 
Our pilot picked us up around noon on the Kobuk River and had us on the shores of Agiak Lake in Gates of the Arctic in time for dinner in the middle of the Brooks Range.
Over Fairbanks.
Charlie
Black spruce and clouds. 
Nolan in the foreground. Leo in the back ground. Sally Michael's kids at Steve and Lauren's wedding.
We only had to get out and drag the canoes through shallows a few times to go from one lake to the other.
Ahhhhhh.........
While Beck was out of town I left Fairbanks to guide a seven day backpack trip in northwest Alaska. Our destination was a thirty mile long ridge running between the Utukok and Kokolik Rivers. Our goal was to place ourselves in the middle of the Western Arctic caribou calving grounds. A few things to note here. The Western Arctic caribou herd is about 400,000 strong at last census. That's a shit load of caribou. Also, we are not the only ones that know about these calving grounds. The resident predators (aka, bears and wolves) also are very familiar with and fond of the calving grounds this time of year.
The group was fairly small, just myself and two other guys. Group sizes this small can be really easy or really difficult, depending on the group dynamics. Fortunately both people were laid back, easy to get along with and great conversationalist.
Our first day found us following the classic hurry up and wait program to get to our destination. Pick up, drop off, wait for plane, ride in plane, land in Kotzebue, wait for smaller plane, load, leave, fly over stunning land scape, land on gravel bar of Utukok river, unload, plane leaves, silence..... Our trip begins. The feeling you get as you see the plane slip off into the distance, out of ear shot, is liberating. There is no more planing or preparation. All you have left to do is explore the landscape.
It can also put you a bit on edge at first if you are not sure you have everything. Did I pack the stove? fuel? what about food? is there enough?... It doesn't matter though. You have what you have and make due with it. I've always had everything but the thought still crops up. With the plane gone we threw our packs on our backs and headed for the ridge. To get to the ridge we had to traverse a few tussock fields, cross a few streams and gain roughly 800 vertical feet but it was well worth it. Once on the ridge we had the grandest view of the surrounding area for the next 6 days. Along the way we saw a few thousand caribou, long tailed jaegers, rough legged hawks and seven brown bears. Six of the bears were far off, down in the valley below, hunting for caribou calves but one bear.... one bear was close up on the ridge above us. I about pooed myself when I saw it at two hundred yards ahead of us in the direction we were walking. It was a large guy with an incredibly beautiful thick bronze coat. Once it was obvious that he was not to concerned with us we were able to relax and watch him for a bit. After a while we walked down and around the bear and continued on our way with the bear lazily laying down and watching us as we carried on. A few days went by as our packs got lighter but some how seemed heavier, our feet got sorer and our sense of wilderness and solitude got stronger. On our next to last day we descend the ridge down to the Kokolik River, our final destination.
For the entire backpack we encountered maybe 10 mosquitoes. That's the definition of a good trip in the arctic, very few mosquitoes. Once we got down to the Kokolik we figured out where all the mosquitoes had gone. BAMB! We were in the thick of it. Hard to escape from. Our time camping on the river kept us either in our tents or spraying ourselves down with the toxic wonder chemical known as Deet (I've seen it melt car dashboards but it keeps the bugs away). Our final adventure was getting picked up by Dirk of Coyote Air and flying back to civilization. What a flight. We were able to fly our the path we just hiked and examine the terrain and caribou herds from the air. Along the way he had us open the plane door (while we were airborne) and drop food off to a camper below. Good times were had by all.
Over the past few years Beck and I have gotten to know a group of boaters, mostly canoers, that like to make an early season pilgrimage to the Delta-Clearwater River about two hours south east of Fairbanks. After all it's traditionally the first river to flow clear of ice in the area. The first half of the trip is on the Delta-Clearwater, the second half on the Tanana River.
The trip can be done in one long day but the whole point of going down there is to be on the river and socialize with good folks so we take it slow and keep the paddles out of the water when we can until we get to camp. This year we pulled over on the Tanana to set up camp on a large sandy/grassy field where we had spectacular views of the Alaska Range off in the distance. The moon rose slowly while the sun set slowly. It felt as if the sunset took hours as we roasted hot dogs over the camp fire and laughed until we could stand no longer and had to crawl into our tents.
The next morning we woke to a beautiful still day and another 4 hours of paddling to make it to the take out. We stopped for a short hike along the way to a bluff where we saw the first signs of flowers coming out of the ground. Oh right. I almost forgot. On the first half of the float, the day before, we saw three different moose sightings, a lynx (really really cool), and too many migrating birds to count including a group of over 30 trumpeter swans we startled into flying right in front of us. Once again good times were had by all.
Our trip started out of Flagstaff so we loaded up the rental car along with Garrett and Brenda and drove two hours north to meet the rest of the group. With Phoenix being so warm and sunny it seemed out of place to arrive in Flagstaff with several feet of snow on the ground. But that's what happened. With a few days in Flagstaff we gathered our wits and picked up much needed last minute provisions like beer and sun screen. We were told that once we started the trip the weather would change to warm and sunny again.
The morning of our departure Moenkopi (our outfitter) loaded up our bags and drove us two hours north to Lee's Ferry where we would start our on-the-water portion of the trip. 17 days of exploration and adventure lay ahead of us. Out of the 8 of us on the trip, not a one of us had seen the Colorado River as it runs through the Grand Canyon. 9am, February 25th we met with the Park Service Ranger and got permission to launch. What happened next can't really be summed up is this tiny amount of space. I'll give you the highlights as a teaser.
Regardless of what we did we were normally laughing while doing it. Needless to say, we had a fun loving group of good folks.
Most days we took short side hikes and longer day length hikes on layover days. Hiking potential was limitless, only bound by our imagination and sense of safety.
With roughly 225 river miles covered we ran something like 190 rapids (more or less). Five or six of them were pretty big and hair raising but for most part the majority of the rapids were just good clean roughty fun.
Viewing and admiring the landscape was an ongoing event too. What's around the next corner? "Wow! Did you see that waterfall back there?" "What about that arch?" "Yep. I was so tied up admiring the waterfall I must have missed the arch but did you see the sheep on the cliff side?" 
The Colorado River ran either brown or your typical dark blue river water color. It depends on what the damn is releasing and if rain or snow melt is washing muddy water down side creeks. Out of the many hidden gems along the way Havasu was probably one of my favorites. The water in this side canyon is a surreal pastel baby blue color engulfed in tall dark orange canyon walls will miles of hiking to be done. 
As we started our trip, Rico the shuttle driver left us with some sage advice he credited to Brady (owner of Moenkopi) who tells folks that "If you're not having fun, you are fucking up!" It is safe to say we did not fuck up once on this trip.
This photo is of a great group of folks from Maine we kept running into along the river. We happened to catch up with them at the scouting point for one of the largest rapids on the river, Lava Falls. They had just scouted the rapid from above and were loading into their rafts as we arrived so I grabbed my camera and headed for a clean shot of the rapid. They went for a wild ride but all eights of their boats got through unscathed. Our turn was next......
Not much snow has fallen this winter but due to a lack of wind allot of frost has been able to accumulate on the top side of branches. It's a pretty cool visual looking up from the base of a birch tree. Dark branches outlined with the white of frost backed by a rich blue sky....
Full moon night at the house. House?... Cabin?... what ever you want to call it. It's our cozy little home in the woods.
For some reason this door knob on an old dilapidated shed fascinated me. It exuded character and projected a mysterious history which put all kinds of stories in my head.
I mentioned frost collecting on branches this winter. This is a great example where the frost accumulated on a young tree making it heavy enough to bend to the ground.
Becky and I frequently go for walks with the dogs around the neighborhood. It's a quiet part of town where you can hear the wind blowing through the trees and the bird singing instead of cars buzzing down the road. We've lived in the same house for just about three years and have been walking the same trails and roads during that time. You would think we've seen it all.... I certainly thought we had but I was wrong. Last week we went for a walk with some neighbors down a road we had walked down too many times to count. The sun was going down and our backs were to the scene in the image above. For some reason I decided to turn around to see where the dogs were. To my amazement there was a clear view of Denali at what seemed like the end of the road. In reality Denali was still over one hundred miles away as the crow flies but what a view. After that walk I've started looking all around me, not just where I'm going. It's become an Easter egg hunt for views. What fun.
We bounced around from Washington state to Washington D.C. then down to North Carolina and back. Talk about head spinning visits, we managed to fit allot in in a short time. We were in the small town of Ronoke Rapids, N.C. where my Grandparents live, for New Year's eve. My maternal Grandmother (Gran) is a bit of a social butterfly and asked if we would accompany her to a dance with live music at the local American Legion to bring in the new year. It sounded like fun and something we would not normally do on our own volition so we went. There was allot of dancing to a cover band playing everything from Patsy Cline to Rockabilly. I had a chance to dance with Gran and Becky had the chance to dance with a man three times her age and half her height, and of course we danced together the rest of the time. Out of all the places we've been on New Year's eve, ringing in 2010 will go down in our memory banks as a notable one. My Dad and Agnes were in town so they joined us for the festivities.
After N.C. we had one full day in D.C. before heading back to the sub-Arctic. We had hoped to have lunch with Barack and Michelle but they were busy so we took a tour of the museums instead. To save you some time reading I'll just hit the D.C. highlights: 1)letting Becky pilot the F-16 flight simulator at the Air and Space Museum (spent much of the time upside down), 2)the Holocaust museum was highly emotional and exceptionally well designed... a must see if you can only go to one museum and 3)riding the Metro everywhere and watching people get transported through tunnels underneath their city like mole rats. We are back home now. The days are getting longer and the temperatures are comfortable above normal.
I reserved the public use cabin at Fielding Lake well in advance of our departure. Food was packed and gear organized and loaded into the car the night before. The morning we were to leave Fairbanks we woke to an obnoxious -32F temperature outside. Damn! That deflated our dream of skiing into the cabin. Even if we were to dress well enough to hide from the cold there would be no assurance that our vehicles would start after sitting in the those kinds of temperatures overnight. We still needed a get away for the day and since everything was already packed we decided to met Mother and Skeet in town and caravan down as far as Delta Junction, two hours south... maybe the weather would change, but unlikely. The drive was so beautiful that even though the temperature was still around -30F in Delta Junction along with a howling wind that was not present in Fairbanks, we decided to keep driving south toward the trail head of the cabin. As we approached the mountains the wind started to blow so hard I had to really concentrate to keep the truck from blowing around. At this point I figured there was no way we would be skiing into the cabin but what the hell, the drive through the snowy mountains was spell binding. An hour later we arrived at the trail head, climbed out of our vehicles and were blown away (figuratively this time, not literally). The wind had stopped and the temperature had risen to around zero Fahrenheit. That is down right cozy in these parts this time of year. It was simply amazing how much the weather had changed while driving through the mountains. It was perfect for a ski into the cabin so we did.
The ski in was perfect. Once we got the fire going in the cabin and warmed up a bit we proceeded to relax for the evening. The dogs ran wild and free outside chasing their shadows while the people stayed inside by the fire playing board games and cooking dinner. All was well for the 35th anniversary of Becky's birth. The next morning we woke to a beautiful sunrise and slowly made the return journey back to Fairbanks.
