Life in Healy Lately

HORSESHOE LAKE

I woke up on my day off on July 3rd determined to do something with my day off. So I packed a small lunch in my backpack, threw on my boots, and caught our shuttle to the canyon to catch the shuttle at Chalet into the park. Horseshoe lake is a popular short hike just a few miles into the park. Its simple and just a mile each way and I as I was told takes you to along a nice, well-groomed trail to a lake shaped like a horseshoe (go figure) that a pack of beavers call home.

The bus driver was kind enough to drop me off at the railroad tracks and point me in the direction of the trail-head some 50 yards down the tracks. I made my way through the trees and just five minutes into my decent I caught my first glimpse of the lake.

Its hard to tell by this photo taken by my weathered and beaten blackberry but the lake is shallow enough and the water clear enough to make out the bottom of the entire lake. I took off at a little faster pace excited to reach the bottom and explore the banks and surrounding trails. I wasn't more than ten minutes into the trail however, when I was stopped again, this time by a mother and daughter who explained to me (very out of breathe I might add as they were apparently excited by the news they were about to share and had been making the climb back up) that a moose was just a few minutes down the trail in the brush to my left. I thanked them and sped up my pace even more but moved quietly as not to scare the moose away. I began to wonder if I'd unknowingly passed it when I came across a large group of people standing with their cameras pressed to their faces, facing the bushes. Tourists are the worst when it comes to moose. Everyone was walking closer to it as it stood their sizing up each and every one of them, munching on its breakfast all the while. Children were running around, yelling at it, their parents too preoccupied with their new fancy cameras to care that their kids were wandering far too close to the animal, which by that time I'd confirmed to be a young bull. I snapped a quick picture and moved on.

I reached the lake in just a few more minutes and was pleased to find no one else down by the bank. I spotted a trail beyond the benches that marked the end of the hike and made my way to the northern most bank of the lake where I came across a beaver dam and subsequent pond and a few energetic beavers. The video's shaky since I was using my zoom and sometimes strays away from the beaver since the sunlight made it nearly impossible to see what I was pointing at but I spent a good half hour mingling with these guys.

I eventually parted ways with my new found friends and made my way back to the end of the trail and caught a small game trail that my boss had told me would take me to the Nenana river and followed it through some thick brush to the river bank. I enjoyed a bit of my lunch there and made my way back up the trail and then from the railroad tracks I walked the mile or two out of the park to the highway and caught a ride with the first car to pass me. My luck hitchhiking that day was phenomenal. I enjoyed some pizza and beer at Prospectors and watched the dodger game (a rare luxury up here) and caught a ride with the first driver to pass me on the highway again.

MY NEW ALASKAN RIDE

A few weeks ago I was sitting around fiddling with my computer when I decided to check craigslist for any ridiculous deals on a car in the area. I was surprised to find an ad in Fairbanks for a 92 Dodge Dakota that ran great - albeit with loose steering and a broken speedometer - and for the reasonable price of $500. I called the guy to see if anyone had taken it yet and was excited to find out it was still available. So I told him I'd call him back once I'd arranged a ride up to Fairbanks to check out his truck. After talking with Kyle and switching a shift with Travis we arranged to meet on June 28th in the early afternoon so that I could be home in time for work at 4:45, hopefully with a new ride. The seller was in New Hampshire for work but said he'd arranged for a friend to show me the truck. So we woke up early that morning, made the two hour trip up stopping at the DMV for Nick and me to take our written test for our CDL. I passed the CDL portion with just a few hours of studying under my belt but failed the passenger endorsement section. Regardless I was pretty happy to have the harder of the two tests out of the way.

After a few other stops we arrived at the guy's house and found the truck waiting in the driveway, but with no friend in site to let me have a look at it. Instead we found the doors unlocked and the key in the ignition. I took this to mean I was to feel free to take a look at it and start it up, but didn't feel comfortable taking it for a spin. This is Alaska after all and I was confident I was already drawing attention from the dude's gun-toting neighbors, so I didn't want to press my luck. It needed an oil change but other than that the thing seemed to run like a champ. It also roars like a boat because it has no exhaust. I was in love. So I called the guy to find out where his friend was since I had the cash in my hand. No answer. I texted. No reply. After waiting 15 minutes we reluctantly left to take care of a few more errands. I texted the guy one last time in desperation saying "I traded a shift and drove two hours to see this truck, WHERE ARE YOU? I have to leave in 5 minutes." Still no response. It was a long two hour drive home to say the least.

I texted him twice in the next couple of days only to get no reply still. I figured the guy had sold it by now or was just leading me on the whole time. But then one day I finally got that text I'd been waiting for - "Sorry dude, been in the bush since that afternoon for work and had no service. My friend had to leave to catch a plane. Did you take the truck?" This whole time I could have taken the truck and left the money. SON OF A BITCH. I texted him back -"No I didn't. I didn't know if I should." So we settled on meeting again the following Wednesday - July 6th - and I would buy his truck.

We made our way up there, stopping again at the DMV for me to take my passenger endorsement test and get my general Alaska Drivers License.

After that we picked up Kyle's new snowmobile and rushed over to the guy's house for a second time to buy my truck. We caught him just before he had to head out to work and after a short test drive I gave him the cash and took the title and got out of there with my new ride. The best $500 I ever spent.


BEST DAY OFF EVER

Kyle was nice enough to give me the day off the day after I bought the truck. I wasn't sure what I was going to do but I knew I wanted to wake up early and ride somewhere. Of course I ended up staying out way too late the night before and when I woke up at 8:30, I exchanged those plans for some later plans and shut off my alarm. I was woken up again a half hour later though by a text from Kyle telling me it was the nicest day of the summer and to get my ass out of bed and do something. I pulled my shade back from my comfy spot in my bed to find he was telling the truth - it really was ridiculously beautiful out. Not a cloud in the sky. So I pulled myself out of bed and threw on some clothes and jumped in the truck. I couldn't think of anywhere to go so I just started heading to Stampede Road.

If you're unfamiliar with Stampede Road, its the road that Chris McCandless (Into the Wild) took to the Stampede Trail that takes you to the "magic" bus approximately 30 miles into the wilderness. We run a tour that takes customers 9 miles down the same trail he walked. There's also a great place where the dirt road turns to the narrow trail that we normally stop on a clear day for customers to get a good glimpse of Denali. So I figured I'd drive myself out there and see if I couldn't see the mountain on this beautiful day. I was pleased to find no campers or hikers there when I arrived and posted up on the roof of my truck for some quiet meditation before one of the greatest spectacles in the world. It was as peaceful as it was beautiful, and a fantastic way to begin my day off on wheels.


I started my drive home, and began making plans to head into the park. This time of year you can only drive 15 miles in but I figured it'd be a nice drive in my own vehicle for the first time. I got a text from my friend Brian on the way down Stampede so I invited him to come along. When I got home we had a bite to eat and headed out on our adventure into the park.

Just a few miles in we had our first wildlife sighting - a WOLF walking slowly across the road directly in front of us. We were so surprised by this rare sighting neither of us had time to get our cameras out to grab a picture, but I assure you it was stunning. So many of my customers who have taken the 8 hour tour into the park aren't lucky enough to see wolves and here I was just a few miles in and so close to one. I felt pretty lucky. We continued on down the road to find a few cars stopped. I was hoping they were looking at a bear since I've yet to see one in the two years I've been here but it turned out to be just an old cow moose eating on the side of the road. We continued on down the road, stopping to take a few shots of Denali which was still looming completely unimpeded by clouds or any trace of haze.



We arrived at the the Savage River turn off at the 15 mile marker in the park and parked the car to hike down river a bit to the bridge that takes hikers to the Mt. Margaret trail (see previous blog) and turned around and came back. It was a nice short hike beneath a perfectly clear, sunny sky.
We got back to my truck and made the drive home stopping at the grocery store for Brian to pick up a few essentials (beer). Then Emily called. She wanted to go swimming seeing as though it was such an awesome, warm day. She'd heard of a secret lake off the highway a few miles south of the park near the railroad tracks. She picked us up at the gas station and we headed down the road. There was some sort of construction or maintenance going on at the railroad tracks where we were supposed to park so we stopped to ask if the workers new where the lake was. He directed us to a parking lot a few thousand feet down the road and said to walk from there. We did as we were told, not a hundred percent sure where we were going or if it was even in the right direction. We had to hike down the road a bit but we found a lake hidden by the trees off the highway and decided it was our swimming lake. We found a little rock that served as our beach and cracked open a few beers.

It was difficult to tell if it was deep or shallow where we were standing near the water. Emily was certain it was shallow, but the weeds in the water made Brian and me think it was deep enough to jump in. Anyways, Brian was the guinea pig and made the plunge first, only to discover it was only knee deep after jumping in. I snapped a few pictures with Emily's camera before getting in myself.

I ended that night with a few beers at Totem with Emily, Kyle, and Mike. Needless to say I slept very well that night. And that is the BEST day off I've ever had in my short time here in Healy.

Mt. Margaret

I awoke last Friday at noonish and immediately started making plans for my day off. It was to be a laborious day spent reading at the lake and laying around on the couch. I began prepping myself for the mentally and physically taxing day ahead of me when I got a text from my friend Emily. Apparently she had the day off too and was looking for a hiking buddy. I suggested "Triple Lake" near the park, a simple, mostly flat, stroll through the forest that leads past 3 lakes and a few beaver homes. Emily had bigger plans. Steeper plans. More difficult plans. She suggested Mt. Margaret, a 4,900+ foot mountain at the 15-mile/Savage River turn out in the park.

I agreed to go mostly because by the looks of the sky outside it would be raining on us before we could even start hiking. So I packed my bags (without snacks dammit) and walked the mile to the highway and caught the bus that Travis was driving with the customers returning from the morning Stampede. He dropped me off in the canyon and I met up with Emily across the highway at the office and we took off for the park in her wheels for the summer 'Chez.'

A few minutes into our drive into the park the clouds started to spit. Just a few drops here and there dotting the windshield, nothing serious. I was feeling pretty confident that neither of us would be doing any hiking that day. But as we neared the Savage it began to clear up a bit. We were surrounded by clouds and we could clearly see rain over the mountains opposite of Margaret, but a ray of sunshine cut through the clouds directly over Margaret. I still held out hope for a long hike cut short by the rain, but when we reached the ranger station at the head of the trail they told us the storm had basically stalled across the valley and we should be able to enjoy our hike.


The reality that there was a journey ahead of me sank in. I was excited, but my lethargic start to the day left me feeling a bit unprepared. None the less we began our ascent around 2:15.


Emily lead the way for the first half-hour or so before we switched and I took up the front.

photo by Emily Sullivan

I was inching up the hill with my head down when behind me Emily jumped and shouted "WOAH!" We'd been talking to the bears on our way up to keep them away, so of course I thought she'd seen one and momentarily freaked out. When I looked up however, I spotted the reason for her surprise. A young dall sheep was glaring down at us from a rocky point above us. Dude was creepin.

photo by Emily Sullivan

We passed without any problems snapping a few pictures along the way and continued our way up the mountain.

photo by Emily Sullivan

We reached the peak in only two hours. The top of Margaret is interesting because there are several peaks surrounding a big flat bowl the size of a few football fields. Its a strange sight to see such a big field on top of a mountain.

photo by Emily Sullivan

We snapped a few pictures before we looked around and spotted a few hundred feet away a peak that was obviously a few feet higher than the one we were standing on.

photo by Emily Sullivan

Since we'd come so far we figured we had to get to the REAL top and took the 15 or so minutes to walk to the other peak.

photos by Emily Sullivan

We started our descent down the way we came and watched as the weather that had been threatening our hike all day remained unmoved above the mountains across the valley from us. We also could clearly make out four dall sheep grazing directly on the trail about halfway down below us. We made quick work of the hike down stopping to take pictures of the sheep and work our way around them.

photos by Emily Sullivan

I forgot to mention that about halfway up the mountain Emily realized she'd left 'Chez's' lights on. Or at least she thought she had. We figured that if she had indeed done that,the battery would already be dead, so turning around would just be a waste since the car would be just as dead a few hours later anyway. But now on our way down it began to become more of a concern. We were both pretty hungry and just wanted to get down and go eat. When we got to the car our suspicions were confirmed. 'Chez' was dead. Poor 'Chez.' Luckily for us an elderly couple from upstate New York (who apparently drove to AK in 7 days. What the hell?!) were hanging out by the river and had jumper cables on them. We were saved! After a few minutes of awkward conversation with the couple - they both had strange speech impediments and seemed a bit spacey from the drive - we were on our way to pizza and beer at Prospectors. At the end of the day I'd say it was accidentally a very beautiful/productive day off.

Cracks In the Ice

The winter in Healy was apparently a cold, lingering one. When I arrived on May 16th there was still snow on the ground and the surrounding mountains and Otto Lake was still mostly covered with a generous coat of ice.


Last year when I arrived, aside from the snow on the tops of the mountains, everything had long since melted away. A week before I arrived this year our little city was hit by what has been described by most of the guides who were here as the "Great Healy Blizzard." It wasn't so much a blizzard as it was a day or two of substantial snow fall, but any snow falling in early May deserves such a grandiose title.

Consequently, Travis' little boat was full of snow and ice in its winter resting place on the shore of the lake below our house. It took a week or two of some decent sunlight and temps in the high 50s to mid 60s to melt it away, leaving in its place a puddle of water that required four guys to turn the boat on its side and empty it.

Travis and I had been working on building the deck on our now finished employee housing. You may remember last year that we spent the majority of our time between tours building a thirteen bedroom structure to house the employees beginning this season. After putting in 5 or 6 hours constructing our new deck on this day, Travis and I thought it'd be nice to get away and check in on the progress of the thawing out of our noble vessel. When we got down there to find the puddle of water where the ice and snow had once accumulated, plans for the first lake adventure of the 2011 season started coming together quickly. Those plans were quickly dashed when we realized that we couldn't upturn the boat to empty the water. But no sooner had we started to realize our maiden voyage would have to be postponed, Tim and Brian came walking down to see what we were up to. The four of us together were able to get the boat up on her side and empty her belly of all that water.


The electric motor that we used last year wasn't charged and ready to go out. Though I think all the ice in our little cove wouldn't have allowed us to use it anyway. The four of us decided that we wanted to see if we could make our way through the ice field into the open water using the two orrs we'd left in the boat from last year. I stood at the back while Travis stood at the front and we shoved off from the icy bank with me using the orr to push the boat along from the lakes bottom and Travis rowing up front to steer us into the thinner sections of the ice. We didn't get far before we ran into our first thick section and became stuck. Travis and I started stabbing at the ice around and in front of us to free our boat and try and keep moving on to thinner sections and hopefully out to open water. We freed ourselves and repeated the process 3 or 4 times before we finally became STUCK. At this point it was either turn around and head back or get out and start really chopping some ice. I had my big boots on and work jeans and figured we were probably only still in knee high water since the lake is only 8 feet deep at its deepest point and we were still in our cove only a hundred yards or so from the shore. So I volunteered to jump out and start hacking. The ice held me fine. I could hear it whispering quiet warnings to me as it cracked in the thinner areas and used this to navigate my way to more stable patches of ice.


I kept stabbing and eventually found myself floating on an island of ice no bigger than 4 feet by 4 feet. At this point we were all laughing and the boat was beginning to drift back to shore away from me. I thought they were messing with me and were going to leave me stranded but I guess keeping control of the boat with only one orr was pretty much impossible. So with my work mostly done and the boat freed I started making my way back to the boat jumping to a larger piece of ice and trying to inch my way to where they were floating. As I got within two bounds of the boat I heard a loud pop and felt my left foot start to sink so I lunged forward to try and regain my footing but my right foot just plunged through the ice and into the water below.


The water came up to about two inches over my knees before I got a grasp on the boat and pulled myself in. We rolled around in the boat laughing as I lay their soaked. We all knew I'd go in eventually but the way it happened made for a really good laugh. We pulled it together though and started on our way through the last couple yards of ice.

We eventually made it through to open water, but our excitement didn't last long. It turned out the ice that we'd been working so hard to get past had been protecting us from the waves being made by the blowing wind. With just two orrs we were making little to no progress on making our way out into the open water and already drifting back into the ice in our cove. So we agreed our victory against the ice was enough for the day and decided to head back. Unfortunately the path we'd created with our boat through the ice had already closed up and we would have to repeat the entire process all over again.

We worked faster now like seasoned deckhands (I am an avid Deadliest Catch fan after all) and made our way into the thick of the ice quickly. But as we got closer to the shore we found ourselves in the same situation; stuck with no where to go but backwards unless someone got out and chopped a path. I jumped out and started making quick work of the thick ice but noticed the cracking was more consistent and louder where I was now standing. The ice was definitely thinner. We were almost out so I started to make my way back to the ice when suddenly there was a loud crack and I looked down and realized I was standing with both feet in water up to the top of my thighs. I quickly pulled myself into the boat, but the damage was done. Water had soaked my jeans and, worse yet, made its way through my water proof boots. Major bummer. My efforts weren't in vein though. We made it through the ice, pulled ourselves ashore and I waddled back home to change with my first lake adventure of the season under my belt.

Downpours and Lake Adventures

About a week ago I was on my bed, laying on my back, having just completed my morning shift of tours when I was shaken by what sounded like a gunshot in my backyard. I jumped from my bed and pulled the shade back to find my backyard as I'd left it, but shrouded with dark, ominous clouds. A storm was coming in. I'd never heard thunder like that. In California thunder and lightening are two very different weather occurrences. Most of the time you don't see the lightening that caused the thunder to boom, and the noise comes rolling in, growing in decibels as it travels across the valley. The thunder that had disturbed me from my rest was completely different. You could HEAR the crack of the lightening. It didn't shake the windows or the structure of the house, it cracked and moved across the surrounding valley and reverberated off the surrounding mountains, probably rolling on through the canyons and on up the highway for miles and miles. I was beside myself with excitement for the storm that had descended upon us. I ran downstairs and outside to where our tours are launched to find Travis, having just launched one of our evening tours, grinning from ear to ear and this beautiful rainbow


I told Travis I was going down to the Lake where it appeared the rainbow met the ground for a good picture and a better view of the lightening storm. By the time I made it to the lake, about a 200 yard walk from my front yard, the rainbow had gone, and had been replaced by sparse light that was burning its way through the still very active clouds, draping the hillsides with gold and green like something out of a picture book. I snapped this picture, not knowing that seconds later I'd find myself in the thick of the storm.

No more than 5 seconds after taking this photo I heard a loud noise on the water to the left of me. I snapped my head around expecting to see a moose in the water, or some folks motoring about in a boat, but was faced with a wall of water swiftly moving across the lake. The storm was coming on top of me and I knew I had less then a minute to find some shelter before I was drenched. At this point I had wandered down the bank of the lake some ways and knew there was no way I could make it back to the house in time. I took off at a full sprint hearing the splash of the rain on the lake growing louder and louder as it came bounding on top of me. I made it to where the trail begins that leads back to our house and dove beneath a black spruce just as the downpour began to pound everything around me. The small spruce surprisingly provided good shelter and provided me with 5 blissful, dry minutes to finish my smoke and enjoy the show mother nature was providing. This is single handedly my favorite memory so far in Alaska and no words or pictures will EVER do it or the feelings I felt at that moment justice.

I figured I'd wait a few minutes for the hard rain to pass and make a run for the house when it calmed down. That moment never came, and the spruce that was my shelter from the storm became saturated and was no longer keeping me dry, so I made a run for it through one of the biggest downpours I've ever experienced. I made it home out of breathe and with no words to describe the what I'd experienced to my friends sitting with their face to the windows watching the storm I'd just come sprinting out of, only my picture of the calm before the storm, my drenched clothes, and the biggest smile I've ever had.

Later that week, after the storm had passed and after another morning shift, Travis pulled into our driveway and pulled from his car a big battery. Last year Travis found a boat on the banks of Otto Lake and bought a small electric trolling motor from our only local guide, Sterling. The battery was the last necessary item to put the boat in working order. He said, "We're going out on the lake, lets go," and Chris, He, and I set off for the lake. We dragged the boat down to the bank and assembled the modest engine set up and Chris shoved us out into the water.

After figuring out that we had the charges backwards which was making the motor operate in reverse and quickly righting that we were off (albeit at a slow speed) on our first boat adventure of the year. I named Travis my first mate, and Chris the wench, and of course myself the Captain.


We trolled on down to the South side of the lake where we encountered a beaver flapping through the water using his tail as his propeller. Or at least I think it was a beaver, Chris swears it was too small and thinks it was a muskrat. For the sake of a good story we'll maintain that it was a beaver. We took to chasing him around the lake and he proved to be a formidable chase, disappearing under water and emerging back on the surface on the other side of the boat. At one point he even returned to the surface and came swimming full speed ahead right at our boat in a game of chicken, ducking below the surface only 10 feet before we overtook him. After about 10 minutes of this cat and mouse game he finally had enough and took to the reeds that make up the southern bank of the lake and disappeared from sight.

Travis steered the boat to a break in the reeds, no wider than 15 feet and into a channel no deeper than a foot and a half as the mountains beyond the water were drenched in the alpenglow from the midnight sunset. I used the ore to check our depth every 15 feet or so and we slowly entered a cove I'd never noticed from our side of the lake, or even from the overlooks on our tours.


As we rounded the corner and entered the cove we came upon a small house and a moose standing on the bank munching on the tall grass. As we got closer to the moose we realized it was a bull moose, with a modest rack, being that its still early in the season. This was my first bull moose. Travis named him Roosevelt.


We circled around that cove a half dozen times, Roosevelt never taking his eyes off us and chewing on his dinner all the while. We came within 30 yards of him several times and he never moved an inch. The sunset grew more and more incredible with every passing moment until the entire sky was burning with vibrant shades of pink and red and blues. It was the greatest sunset I've seen this year and probably will be unmatched the rest of this season.

It was getting to be late, about 1:00 a.m., and a bit cold on the water so we decided to make our way slowly back home. We said our good byes to Roosevelt and he kept chewing on the grass, as unmoved by our departure as he was by our arrival. As we exited the cove and rounded the corner to the final stretch home the sunset continued to burn.