Once we left the trail, we knew that all we had to do was going 1.5 or
2 miles until we would get to our campsite. As we hiked, our breaks were becoming more
frequent and longer. We were so
exhausted that it was too much work to even walk far enough out of site to go
pee…..we would just turn our heads.
Finally, after almost 3 hours of trudging through Tussocks, mud and
swamp…..for a grand total of 8-9 hours of hiking…. we finally made it to the
most wonderful campsite ever.
Jule had jokingly told us that
this place was like an REI campsite….something so wonderful that it looked like
it was a stage made up for taking stock camping photos for REI. And she wasn’t kidding either. Our campsite for the night was a small patch
of woods with tall trees that created a nice canopy over the ground. The ground was covered with thick, soft moss
everywhere. There was even a little
creek that meandered through this patch of woods. It was a little slice of heaven after what we
had been though that day and it would have been perfect if it weren’t for the
man eating mosquitos! They were so horrible and I had to use so much Deet that
my lips were tingly from all the chemical.
Other than the mosquitos, the rest of the day went fine. We were able to sit by the little creek and
easily get water and eat dinner. I think
we all collapsed into our tents around 8 or 9pm for the night.
 |
| My REI campsite |
 |
| Sonya really captured the tranquility of the area. |
Aug 3rd – 1st day of pack rafting
The next morning, we leisurely got up, ate, packed up all our stuff and
left our REI campsite. We only had to
hike about 30 minutes until we got back to our first drop off location. We dumped our packs and then retrieved our
pack rafting gear from the trees where we had left everything almost a week
prior. We spent an hour or so going over
our equipment, packing everything into dry bags and learning how to secure it
all to the pack raft. We also all got
neoprene gloves and booties and a life jacket.
For some reason, my life jacket was really difficult to get on and had
about 1000 clips and straps to tighten.
“Oh, that’s because you have Carl’s safety life jacket…it’s that way on
purpose so it doesn’t come off if you are rescuing someone”. Of course I get the most complicated life
jacket out of everyone!
 |
| Getting our stuff organized |
 |
| Me and my pack raft ready to go! |
Once we were all packed up and ready to go, we all hopped in our rafts
and paddled off across Circle Lake. For
about 10 minutes we enjoyed the effortless paddling and beautiful scenery. However, because the water was low, part of
Circle Lake had become Circle swamp.
There was just no way around this area, so we had to portage across this
muddy, swamp in order to get across the lake.
One by one, we stepped out of our dry rafts and into this shin deep
mud. Even though we all had neoprene
booties on, the water still seeped into our feet…the booties were just meant to
keep them warm but not dry. As everyone
climbed out and started to pull their boat and gear out of the water, Giles
says, “Hey, there’s a moose over there!”.
Everyone was looking and taking pictures of this moose and her
calf. Jules exclaims, “We need to hurry
and get out of here!”. Because the moose
was with her calf, she will charge if she feels that we are a threat to her
baby. At this point, I was still in my
raft. By the time I was able to get out
of my raft and get some footing on the muddy ground, the moose was almost out
of sight. I was so bummed that I had
missed that sighting! But luckily,
Stephanie got some good pictures to share
 |
| Giles thinks he spots the moose |
 |
| There she is! |
 |
| I'm laughing, but pretty sure I'm crying on the inside knowing what we need to do next. |
Our next step was to just get across this muddy bog. We formed a line and slowly pulled our gear
across. Every step I took I would sink
almost knee deep in mud. And every time
I pulled my foot out, my Croc would almost pull off too (we all wore our
Crocs/water shoes as to not ruin our hiking boots). With every muddy step, I had to pull my
boat/paddle/ and all my gear, which was wrapped up in a huge water tight
bag. Every step was more miserable and
exhausting then the last. We did this
for almost an hour before we finally hit water again! We thought, “Great! Now we can just relax and
paddle!”. Sadly, our celebrating was
short lived!
 |
| Portaging our rafts and gear through knee deep muck |
 |
| Pretty sure Stephanie was giving Jule the finger as she took a picture. |
We continued heading across Circle Lake towards the River. At one point in time, Circle Lake had a small
waterway that connected the lake to the Alatna River. However, over the years, beavers had blocked
off this waterway. Once we reached the
point where the beavers had blocked off the waterway, we had to unload
everything AGAIN and walk it about ½ mile to the Alatna River. This was our last portage before finally
getting on the river! The first trip we
just walked our rafts and paddles, which wasn’t too bad. Our second trip was just hauling our gear. As I mentioned, everyone had their gear in
these huge, water tight bags. Each bag
had straps on them so that you could wear it like a back pack. Everyone took off their life vests and put
their bags on like back packs. I tried
to take my life jacket off, but since I had the only safety vest, it was
impossible to get off by myself. So, I
opted to keep the stupid thing on! I
then looked at my bag and was confused by the straps. I asked Jule, “Am I doing something
wrong? I can’t seem to get the straps
right so that I was wear it like a back pack”.
She replies, “Oh, you have the one bag that doesn’t have back pack
straps”. Of course I do…. As everyone took off easily carrying their
bag on their backs for the ½ mile, I was left behind to drag, pull, and toss my
bag the entire way. It was so heavy and
awkward because it had my entire back pack inside along with my shoes and
poles. AND I couldn’t maneuver well
because I had this stupid life jacket on that I couldn’t get off! I would carry it a few feet like a duffle
bag, then switch shoulders because it would hurt so bad. Then I tried dragging it for a bit, but it
would get caught on brush because the trail wasn’t very wide. By the time I finally reached the beach where
we were going to start paddling down the Alatna, I shouted, “I’M FUCKING DONE!”
and threw that God forsaken bag with more power then I even knew I had. Jule and Sonya saw that I was just about to
burst into tears, and they helped me tie my bag onto my raft and to calm down. After a few minutes I was able to regain my
composure and pull myself back together.
From this point on, I knew it was going to be easy paddling down the
river.
 |
| The biggest beaver hotel I have ever seen |
 |
| One of their dams....there were several because they kept pushing the water farther and farther back. |
 |
| This should have been filled with water...damn you beavers!! |
 |
| I was soaked and way muddier then it looks |
 |
| Lots of wolf prints at the beach |
We got in our rafts and easily floated down the river, only having to
paddle to straighten ourselves out or get away from fallen trees just under the
river’s surface. We only paddled for
about an hour before Jule suggested that we look for a place to camp for the
evening. We found this beach that looked
like a nice, flat area. We pulled off,
unpacked and set up camp. We were
camping on a beach, which sounds like a great idea, but I soon realized that it
was more difficult then I imagined.
Unfortunately for me, the tent I have needs ground stakes in order to
stand up. True to form, everyone else’s
tent didn’t need the tent stakes. So, I
had to scrounge the beach for heavy rocks to hold my tent stakes down and in
place. Luckily, this was not too much of
a problem. The bigger problem was the
sand itself. The sand along the Alatna
is a grey, powdery dust and it gets everywhere and into everything. It’s in your tent, in your nose and ears and
in your gear. It’s not really the most
pleasant place to camp, but at least the ground was soft. We chilled out for a few hours before coming
back together for dinner that evening.
 |
| First night on the beach |
As we were sitting there and chatting away, Giles exclaims, “Hey,
there’s a bear over there!”. We all jump
up and look in his direction. We spied
this black thing downriver a little ways and on the other side of the
river. He was sitting on the beach and
appeared to be checking us out. He got
up and moved a little. The way he walked
we knew he was not a bear. I said,
“That’s not a bear, that’s a DOG!”.
Stephanie had her camera with her and zoomed in to take a picture. Sure enough, there he was: a big, black wolf just sitting and staring at
us from a distance! We were all
entranced by what we were seeing! We stared
at him and he stared at us for a few minutes before he trotted down his little
beach and disappeared into the brush. It
was by far the coolest thing I have ever witnessed!
 |
| I know it's hard to see, but he's the black dot in the middle of the picture |
Aug 4th – 2nd day of pack rafting – reach final
camp site
The next morning was going to be our last day of pack rafting. We took our time eating breakfast and packing
up. We only had 3-4 hours of rafting
before we would get to our final location.
As everyone was packing up, Sonya asked if we heard that ‘splashing
around in the river last night’. Giles
and Stephanie apparently heard it too.
So did Jule. Everyone was talking
about it: What do you think it was? What time was it splashing around? How long did it go on? I’m not sure exactly how, but somehow I had
missed this entire event! How could I
have possibly slept through something like that! Ugh
After we got on the river, things were pretty uneventful. We were just able to relax and basically
float down the gentle river enjoying the view. Since Jule’s GPS was dead, she wasn’t exactly
sure where our final location was supposed to be. Luckily, it was easy to find because there
were a bunch of people walking around the beach. Jule shouted to a couple of them and asked if
this was the final stop for Takahula Lake.
They said yes, so we got off the river.
We had made it to our final destination!
 |
| Giles floating down the river |
 |
| We are not dead....Sonya and I are actually napping on the rocks. #nappingskillz |
This spot turned out to be a major starting and stopping point for a
lot of hikers. There had to be 6 or so
other people that were hanging around that location….just starting their trip
or just getting picked up like us. It
was the most people we had seen in one place for over 10 days!!
We set up camp on the beach for the last time. Again, I had to gather a bunch of rocks to
hold down my tent stakes. As I was
happily putting up my tent, I noticed that my main tent pole had broken at one
of the joints. I just stared at it
thinking, “I can’t fucking believe it’s the last day and my tent broke!”. Then something dawned on me….there was this
metal tube that had come with my tent poles.
I had never knew what the heck it was before, but I realized just then
that I could use that piece of pipe to hold my tent pole together! Sure enough, I was able to slip it over the
pole and situate it in the right location with duct tape so that my tent pole
didn’t collapse. I was so happy that I
had never taken that piece of pipe out of my bag!
 |
| Our final destination |
 |
| Lots of tracks all over the beach |
Aug 5th –Pick up at Takahula Lake and stay the night in
Bettles
The next morning we all leisurely got up and packed up our stuff. The plan was to hike our packs and pack
rafting equipment about ½ mile over to Takahula Lake where the Bettles’ float
plane pilot would come and pick us up around 1pm. As we were all standing around chatting and
packing, everyone started talking about the howling wolves in the middle of the
night. Even another hiker not in our
group came over to discuss it!
“Oh my God, is that what that noise was?”
“I heard it too!”
“Do you really think it was wolves?”
“That is the coolest thing I have ever experienced!”
Needless to say, I slept through the howling wolves and I didn’t hear a
thing! Apparently, I am the Olympic
champion of sleep!
Once everything was ready, we trekked it over to the lake to wait for
pick up. We all just sat around reading
or napping waiting for our plane. As we
sat there, several planes would fly over.
We kept hoping it was ours, but it never was. Eventually, it was after 3pm and we STILL had
not gotten picked up. Jule used the Sat.
phone to make a call to Bettles. Somehow
the schedule got mixed up and they would try and get to us around 5pm. So, we continued to wait and wait. Eventually, another plane landed and a group
of guys got out and met up with a friend of theirs that was waiting for them at
the lake too. Giles was out of ear shot,
but us girls were watching and laughing at these guys….they were such bros and
putting on such a show, Jule even said, “It’s like watching TV!”. It was good entertainment since we had
nothing better to do!
Finally, around 7pm, with much disappointment, we came to the
conclusion that we were not getting picked up that evening. We started to unpack stuff to make dinner
when it finally happened. Here came our
plane over the tree tops to pick us up!
We excitedly scurried around gathering all of our stuff together. We were so happy and excited to Kevin, our
pilot! He landed and maneuvered the
plane close enough so that we could get our gear to the plane. We had to change into our water shoes and
roll up our pants because he couldn’t get close enough to the land for us to
jump. We made a human chain and slowly
handed our gear from the land over to him to pack on the plane. Sonya and I were the last ones on land to get
onto the plane. As we stood there, we were
just getting covered in these nats. They
were so small that if you tried to brush them off, all that would happen is
that you would smear them across your arm or leg. For a good 15 minutes, Sonya and I stood
there just about going out of our minds because we were getting covered in
these things and we couldn’t do anything about it. Finally, just when I thought I would lose my
mind, it was my turn to get onto the plane and get out of the back country!
 |
| Sonya waiting for our plane to arrive |
 |
| Praise Jesus, Kevin is here to pick us up! |
The flight back to Bettles was much better than the flight out of
Bettles. I still had to keep my eyes
closed, but at least I didn’t feel as sick when we landed. We unpacked the plane and Kevin took us back
to the Lodge. Dinner hours were over by
the time we finally arrived, but the staff had saved plates of food for
us! It was the best meal I had had in 10
days! After dinner, I was the first
person to jump in the shower. That was
also the best feeling ever! To finally get a shower after 10 days! Afterwards, I was so beat that I just crashed
into bed for the night.
 |
| Until next time! |
Aug 6th – fly out of Bettles back to Fairbanks. Arrive around 2pm
The next morning we all gathered for breakfast around 10am. No plans for the day other than to gather up
our stuff and fly out of Bettles and back to Fairbanks were we would all part
ways at the Wright’s air base. We got
back to Fairbanks around 2pm. Jule
headed out to Anchorage to meet up with her boyfriend. She had a 7 hour drive ahead of her! Sonya,
Giles and Stephanie all got picked up by their hotel vans and headed out
leaving me there alone. It was so odd to
all of a sudden be back and have the trip over with. My flight out of Fairbanks did not leave
until 1am that evening. I didn’t realize
that we would get back so early….I figured that I would just go straight to the
airport. But, since I could not sit at
that small airport for almost 12 hours, I decided to just pay for a hotel room
so at least I could take a shower and maybe nap a little, watch TV, eat and
better back my stuff for the flight. I
ended up getting the same hotel that I got when I first arrived to
Fairbanks. It worked out great because
they also had laundry service there, so I was able to wash some of my
clothes! After getting to my hotel, I
did some laundry, walked to the store and got some food, talked to my family
and tried to rest. I could not sleep
thought because I was too wound up.
During that time is when Meghann told me about a vet show called Dr. Dee
that is out of Fairbanks. She asked me
if I had seen the place when walking around.
I googled it and realized it was just about 1 or 2 miles from my
hotel. Since I couldn’t sleep and it
never gets dark in Fairbanks during the summer, I decided to walk to Dr. Dee’s
office and take some pictures for Meghann around 10pm! I sent her the pictures and she’s like, “Yup,
that’s her office!”. Once I got back
home, I would have to check out the show.
 |
| Giles, Jule, Stephanie, me and Sonya |
 |
| Dr. Dee Alaska Vet |
Sunday, Aug 7th – flight out of Fairbanks early am and 2nd
layover in Dallas
Because my flight left out of Fairbanks at 1:15am Sunday morning, I
really didn’t sleep in the hotel. Around
11:30 I had the hotel van take me to the airport. I got checked in just fine and was on my
way.
Around 1:30pm I landed at DFW for
another 5 hour layover. I was planning
on meeting my friend from high school, but she informed me that she was sick
and couldn’t meet up. However, I was
bound and determined that I was somehow going to get my butt downtown Dallas so
that I could see Dealey Plaza….it was the one thing that I wanted to see since
I was there for 5 hours. Once I got off
the plane, I ran around the airport trying to find where the DART (Dallas Area
Rapid Transit) was. I didn’t have a car and I figured it would be the easiest
and cheapest way to get downtown. Once I
found the train, I check the schedule.
It would take an hour to get down town, then I would only have about an
hour to tour Dealey Plaza before getting back on the train for the hour long
ride back to the airport and still have enough time to get through security
before my plane took off. I could have
done Uber, but I though the train would be more fun anyway! So, I hopped the train and headed
downtown.
Once I arrived, I just had a
couple of blocks to walk to Dealey Plaza.
I was actually quite surprised as to how many people here there walking
around and taking pictures. It was just
a random Sunday….it was not any sort of anniversary of the shooting of Kennedy
or anything. There were a couple of guys
selling newspaper reproductions from the day Kennedy was shot and selling
DVDs. The grass in and around the plaza
was worn down to the dirt from people walking across it. People would even run out into the street to
take a picture of the big ‘X’ that marks the spot where Kennedy was shot. I walked around the plaza…taking pictures and
reading the history markers. Then I
headed over to the Book Conservatory to tour the museum. The museum was just as busy as the plaza the
was! It was interesting to listen and
read all about that day. We were not
supposed to take pictures; but I couldn’t help myself! I just covered the screen of my phone so no
one could see and I snapped away! That’s
why most of the pictures are at weird angles and not centered properly.
After touring the museum, I just headed back to the train station and
waited to board and get back to the airport.
I made it back and got through security with plenty of time to spare!
 |
| The book repository |
 |
| The grassy knoll |
 |
| View out the same window Lee Harvey Oswald (supposedly) looked |
 |
| The Book repository building marker |
 |
| One of the original transcripts that came 'over the wire' after the president was shot |
 |
| The corner where LHO waited..supposedly |
For some reason, my plane was delayed at DFW, so I don’t think I finally arrived to Grand Rapids until 11pm or so. I checked my ‘find a friend’ app to see if Gary was there waiting for me and I just happen to see that my mom was there too! It was nice to arrive after a long, hard vacation to a bunch of people welcoming me home when I got off the plane!
 |
| So long Alaska......until we meet again |
Frequently Asked Questions
How heavy was your pack?
It was 40lbs without water or fuel.
I carried 2 quarts of white gas and around 2-3 liters of water. So, my pack at its peak for the first 2 days
was probably around 50 lbs.
Did you have a gun?
No. The DNR really discourages
people from carrying them into the park, but you are allowed to do so if you
want. However, it’s a lot of added
weight to carry a gun and ammo for 10 days.
Second of all, the DNR said that if you kill a bear, then you need to
follow all these procedures so that you don’t get in trouble and fined. You need to have GPS coordinates of where the
bear is so that the DNR can retrieve it.
You’re not allowed to keep anything from the bear. You need to bring the paws back with you and
turn them in….so they know that you killed the bear in self-defense and not for
poaching purposes. Also, the DNR said
that of all the recordable shootings they had in the park, they were all of
people accidentally shooting at other people.
Overall, it just seemed like a huge pain in the butt to even have guns
in the park, but we did see people with them.
Were you worried about bears?
Actually, no. Bears were not
really on my list of things to worry about.
My biggest worry was if I had enough food. Everyone has food for themselves and if you
run out then you are kind of SOL unless someone else has some extra to
spare. My second biggest worry was if I
was going to be able to handle this mentally.
Hiking in Alaska with no trails is HARD.
I was with 4 strangers for 10 days carrying 50ish pounds of gear
fighting my way through tussocks, brush, swamp and boulders. Since this was my second time doing this, I
knew what I was getting into better, but I was still nervous about handling it
mentally and physically.
Bears really are not as dangerous as the news perceives them to
be. If someone gets attacked, it usually
because the human did something wrong.
As we hiked, we just always made a bunch of noise as to not scare them. If you spook them; then they can attack. Also, we just needed to be conscious of our
food. We kept it in bear proof barrels
and kept it far away from our camp. And
we could not hang our food because most of the time where we camped there were
no trees to hang the food on. If you
want to see some funny footage, look on youtube for “bear proof barrel
testing”. They actually have bears test
the strength of the food barrels and it’s unbelievable what the bears will do
to try and get into them!
Did you see lots of wildlife?
We saw lots of evidence of wildlife present, but we really didn’t see a
lot of wildlife. Alaska is so huge, the
wildlife have a lot of room to roam around, so it’s not like everywhere we went
there were animals present. We did see bear
tracks, wolf tracks, moose tracks and antlers.
We did see 1 moose and her calf which was cool….She looked like a giant
horse standing there in a swampy area. The most amazing thing we saw was a black
wolf! It had come out of the brush to
check us out and we were lucky enough to get a picture. I had a DNR guy tell me once that if you see
a wolf, you just won the lotto because they usually watch you, but don’t let
you see them.
What did you eat for 10 days?
For breakfast, I had oatmeal and sometimes a spoonful of peanut
butter. My lunches/snacks usually
consisted of granola bars like Cliff bars or Kate’s Real Food bars, some meat
bars, M&Ms, peanut butter, and Shaklee Meal bars. All my dinners were dehydrated Mountain House
meals.
In order to have the right amount of food, I just had to count
everything out for each meal and snack for each day. We were told to prepare for a certain amount
of calories a day…but I didn’t really like that idea because it seemed too
rigid. So, I just planned my food for each day and added a little bit extra
just in case.
I did pay attention to the calories in the meal bars. Shaklee/Cliff and Kate’s Real Food have super
dense and high calorie bars which are awesome!
They really fill you up and I am so glad that I brought them. By the end, I only had a couple of things
leftover, so what I did worked out well for me.
How was the weather?
The weather was fantastic! It
only rained one day and that was the day which we hiked all the way back down
to the lake where we were going to start pack rafting from. It was definitely the day from hell, having
to hike for 8 or more hours in the rain with all of our gear. Otherwise, it was sunny and cool. It would warm up during the day to maybe 70
degrees, but then at night get down into the 30s-40s. There were only 2 mornings where I thought it
was super cold and I really didn’t want to leave my tent, but otherwise it was
pretty bearable.
Did you see any people?
I was actually shocked as to how many hiking groups we encountered
during our trip. I figured we would see
evidence of people…that was clear by all the stuff that we found along the way. (I can’t remember what the others found, but
I found a tent stake, a carabineer clip and a bandanna.) When we encountered another group, we always
had the same question for them: “How
long have you been out here?” If the answer was less than the amount of time
that we had been out there, then the follow-up question was “What does the
weather look like for the next few days”.
And they would basically have the same questions for us: How has the weather been? How long have you been out here? Have you seen any bears/wildlife?
The only place where we did not run into anyone was while we were pack
rafting along the Alatna River. I would
always feel a little bit of excitement and disappoint at the same time running
into people. Excited that we could ask
them questions about what was going on in the real world, but disappointed that
they were honing in on our trip!
Because we were so disconnected, we joked a few times wondering if
something crazy had happened in the world and we didn’t know about it. A couple guesses were: The Olympic stadium
collapsed in Rio or someone shot Trump.
