Sometimes you just have to take a flyer. This summer, Judy and I signed on for an REI trip from Fairbanks to Deadhorse, 500 miles on the Dalton Highway in the Alaskan Arctic. We violated a long-held belief—don’t take a tour; that’s what other, less adventurous people do. Our risk was rewarded; it was a great adventure from beginning to end.
Picture a group of nine 60-somethings jammed into a van with two guides, a basil plant named Hazel, and supplies for a 10-day camping adventure. We nine adventurers had our cameras, sleeping bags, bug nets, rain coats, and Scotch. (One person also brought a case of Diet Pepsi!) The two guides had our tents, food, bear spray, and knowledge of where we were going and what we might find along the way.
Following a 150-mile drive, interrupted by a beautiful hike through mushroom-dotted tundra, we arrived at Manley Hot springs. The place was muddy and buggy. We set up camp for the first time, explored the local terrain, and with some trepidation awaited dinner. Bonanza!!! We had the first of nine absolutely incredible dinners cooked in a Dutch oven over an open fire by Steve, our chef de cuisine for the trip. He was, in addition to being a wilderness guide and a concert cellist, a professional chef, certified by the American Culinary Institute. This night’s repast featured a fabulous fresh halibut stew. After an equally excellent breakfast we traveled to the home of a famous mushing family, the Redingtons, who are well known for breeding sled dogs, organizing the first Iditarod race, and successfully summiting Mt. McKinley with a sled dog team. All these accomplishments were nothing compared with raising a family where the temperatures in the winter average 40 below zero, the dark surrounds you 20 hours a day, and you have only three neighbors within a 100-mile radius. After the inspirational Redingtons, it was an afternoon canoe paddle down a lovely slough, another great meal, and a visit to the best hot springs I have ever encountered.
After the first couple of days, the trip settled into a familiar pattern. We drove the Dalton Highway north, hiked on the tundra, told tall tales over a nightly campfire, all primed by fine food, drink, and company. We camped at Marion Creek near Coldfoot and at Galbraith Lakes just beyond Atigun Pass, did the limbo in celebration of crossing the Arctic Circle, spent one night in a man camp in Deadhorse, toured the drilling rigs at Prudhoe Bay, and put our fingers and toes in the Arctic Ocean.
Along the way we visited Jack Reakoff, a third-generation Alaskan who fished, trapped, and grew wonderful vegetables in Wiseman, Alaska, the northernmost garden in the U.S. As if subsistence living were not enough, Jack is also an advisor to the University of Alaska on plants and animals of the tundra. Another detour off the Dalton Highway was a flight from Coldfoot through the Brooks Range to the Native Alaskan village of Anuktuvuk Pass. The flight was stunning and the destination equally remarkable. We spent an evening with two community members who shared stories of their life in the Arctic village that had become the permanent home of their formerly nomadic Eskimo tribe. Our return flight was after midnight, and the sun had not yet set.
Our last night in the mountains was graced with a spectacular moonrise and a saxophone concert by guide Jeff. The beauty of that night had an even greater impact when compared with our final night stay in Deadhorse, the home of the Prudhoe Bay workforce. Imagine several thousand people living in converted cargo containers parked in the dark and frozen Arctic landscape. The oilfields and the pipeline, which we had traveled for 500 miles, are the lifeblood of the Alaskan economy. The Dalton Highway, built to allow construction of the pipeline, changed everything for those Alaskans who live north of Fairbanks. It’s the only north-south road for 800 miles. It brought better access to supplies, but also a lot more people. The road now brings trophy hunters from the lower 48. Jack Reakoff told us the story of sport hunters killing the female caribou who lead the herds during migration. These matriarchs are the only ones who know the migration routes and are always spared by Alaskans who depend on their annual return for food and clothing.
And that story demonstrates the best of our trip. It was not the food, or the scenery, or the beautiful colors of the tundra, or the amazing sightings of bear, moose, caribou, musk ox, Dall sheep, and snowy owls, or the camaraderie of our group, or the skill and humor of our guides, although these were all great. It was gaining an understanding of what it means to live in one of the harshest, most unforgiving, and most beautiful places on the planet.