The Haul Road

So I was sitting in the Denver Colorado airport on my way back to Fairbanks and I received a text message from my dad, "so what do you think about me flying up and traveling around with you?" Well, I thought it would be doable. "lets make it work I told him." So we talked about it for the next few days and before I knew it he told me he has a one way plane ticket and arrives to Anchorage next week. This is the thursday before labor day weekend when I find this out. Friday, I tell my boss at work that this will be my last week working for him and he was sad to see me leave so soon. We were just getting used to you being around, he told me. He asked me if I had plans for this longer weekend and we got to talking. I asked him if he had ever been to Coldfoot and what it was like up there.

 Coldfoot is a small town 250 miles north of Fairbanks up the Dalton Highway. The Dalton, also known as the North Slope Haul Road, The Prudhoe Haul Road and was made famous by the TV show Ice Road Truckers. Coldfoot, is halfway up the highway to Deadhorse, Alaska, the end of the public access part of the highway. Its kind of complicated understanding when and where this road ends. The road goes to Prudhoe Bay and Prudhoe is on the Arctic Ocean, but you can not really get to the ocean, but then you cant really even get to Prudhoe, you can only get to Deadhorse, which is 8 miles away. Make sense? No? Okay, look at a map.
Why Coldfoot? well its half way up the haul road and I thought I would be able to see a good amount of rural Alaska, while also dodging overloaded tractor trailer trucks. Coldfoot was originally a gold mining town, like most towns in the area. It was somewhat of a seasonal town where the miners would spend summers and leave before they got cold feet. Now, the town is merely a truck-stop for truckers, being one of two stops for fuel and one of maybe four places you can get a meal along the highway. When I say a truck-stop I am not talking about one you may be used to. You are greeted by a rutted out potholed 200 meeter long road that leads to a big muddy parking lot with a few small pond size potholes in the middle. There are three fuel pumps and no, you can not pay at the pump. There is no arcade inside nor showers nor any of those gaudy american flag tainted made in china figurines. There are fuel pumps, a restaurant, bathrooms, a hallway of photos picturing trucks who have run off the road, and two land line phones, because everyone already lost their cellphone service over 200 miles ago. This is one of those places that has a long table in its own little nook, like it is a private dining room. There is a 8.5x11 piece of paper taped up before you go in, "Truckers Only" it reads.
  So I was asking John, my boss, about Coldfoot and what was worthwhile seeing up that way and he said I needed to go to Atigun Pass, even further north of Coldfoot. Not too much farther,  but well worth the trip he says. Following the pass is the Atigun Valley and he explained its beauty. It sounded like it was worth the travel up that way. Then somewhere in conversation he mentions something about having two spare tires if I go. And if you have read my previous posts I do not have two spare tires, I drive a Mini Cooper and do not have room for two. Oh, and to make it more unfortunate I do not even have one.   I think about it for a minute and its one of those decisions of: well, do I stick around here and not go, miss out on the opportunity, tell your friends about how you really thought about going to do it but . . . or do I just say, "to hell with it, if shit hits the fan, it hits the fan. So lets hope there is no shit and hope there is no fan."John gives me on of those 'i'm really not supporting your decision' kind of looks and I brush it off and think about making it back alive and well. Now, I hope I am not coming off  too much like Chris McCandless, because I think he was an idiot. I do not like being associated with him, I am better than him. The end. I am also thinking in my mind about a few things, calculating this and that, the risks, probability, and costs if nothing works out well. Whatever, I have to go, its my last weekend in Fairbanks, my dad comes next week, this is the closest I will get to this opportunity in the foreseeable future.
I get off work, I get in my car and I make three stops on the way out of town. First, the auto parts store, I have runflat tires so I see this to my advantage but I pick up some stuff to fix a flat tire just in case and a windshield repair kit. I was guaranteed if I did not get a flat tire I would get an "Alaskan Windshield,"  that just means broken. Yes, everyone here has a broken windshield. And yes, my mother taught me to never say never, hate, always, can't, everyone bla bla bla but no, everyone here has a broken windshield. Stop number two, Fred Meyer, its like the Walmart of good quality things, you would not understand until you go to one. Pure shopping amazement. I pick up a sandwich, two gallons of water and two asian apple pear things, they looked interesting and worth  a taste. Last stop, fuel. Got fueled up and headed north.

The actual beginning to the Dalton highway splits off the Elliott around 60 miles from Fairbanks. All the Alaskan highways are named after people if you were wondering. At this point it turns to gravel, signs then tell its an industrial highway, to burn your headlights at all times, yield to tractor trailer trucks, and the speed limit is 50 miles per hour for the next 413 miles. The highway follows the Alaska Pipeline, full of oil, all the way to the source of the drilling at the Arctic. Along the way you cross the Yukon river and into the Arctic Circle. This is the only road in Alaska which allows you to cross either of these two locations. By the first night I had made it to 5 Mile Camp, just across the Yukon, by 5 miles. It was a circle of picnic tables and fire rings in a muddy lot with an outhouse and trashcan to one side that the bureau of land management controlled It was free camping and you got what you paid for. I camped in the rain, Alaskan rain, it only drizzles here when it rains, thats the extent of excitement when it comes to rain. I made it up to the Arctic Circle, again a muddy parking lot with just a sign saying "Arctic Circle" with the latitude. At this point the few tourists that venture up this far step into the arctic circle, maybe enjoy the picnic they brought with them and go back to dirty little Fairbanks. For me, hell no, I am going to make this 1) exciting 2) memorable and 3) worth it. So what did I do 1) exciting- I made my own little Arctic Circle, circle I called it. Doughnuts in the muddy parking lot   2) memorable- I took photos in my boxers, it was the frigid 43 degree (above zero) arctic that day 3) worth it- Im not turning around, I am going IN to the Arctic.

I traveld up the gravel-paved-gravel road to Coldfoot in the drizzle. I passed through forests of dark green spruce intermingled with the bright yellow leaves of the Birch and Aspen trees with their bright white trunks. I got to Coldfoot with no problem and got gas. There they also have an interagency visitor who answer questions of all the variety of parks in the 500 mile radius that do not really have direct access to them. I swing in and ask an older fellow if there is anything woth traveling past Atigun Pass for. He gives me the most excellent answer in the world in return,"well, it depends on what you consider worth it."He hit the nail on the head, I asked a shallow question and he gave me a brilliant response. He  then told me that he drove up into the arctic tundra recently to see Caribou and Musk Ox and other wildlife. A Musk Ox, I have never seen one and again do not know when I will get my chance to ever be so close to these creatures. So, I began thinking about maybe heading a little farther up the road than I was intending. In my mind I was going to drive up to the pass, a little ways past and depending on the road conditions I would probably turn back and camp somewhere along the way back between the pass and Coldfoot. Well, I got up to the pass and the drizzle just turned into clouds, I could tell I was driving through mountains but had no idea what they looked like because I could not see them. I came down into the Atigun Valley and what I saw did not amaze me at all, drizzle, clouds, a muddy road and a pipeline off to my side. I continued up the road, not seeing any wildlife and only passing tractor trailers, hunters and some road construction workers. One road worker sat in his parked motor grader looked out his window stared at my car as I passed and laughed so hard right at me. I had gotten many looks like this already yet not to this extent. It did not phase me but part of me questioned what more am I up for? I understand I am not driving a truck or SUV but I can sure as hell make it too. I began to see some predatory birds in the rare moments when the drizzle would lift. They were Golden Eagles and many Owls hunting the tundra.  Around an hour or so later I spotted something laying in the tundra. A Musk Ox! I jumped out of the car and took some photos. I yelled at him from a distance asking him to stand up, obviously did not understand what I was asking, it laid there, jaws chewing, just staring at me. I thought about turning around at this point now seeing my Musk Ox, I decided to venture on. I ventured past my 200 mile mark from Coldfoot meaning I would have to continue to Deadhorse to fuel up.

Of corse once I pass my allotted mile mark of turn around or continue the road turns to utter shit. Potholes upon potholes upon potholes. Its just constant potholes. As my teeth chatter, change rattles and well, everything that could possibly rattle, jolt, fall, spill etc. does so, I realize this would probably be when I would get my flat tire, 400 miles away from Fairbanks. However, I could get it fixed in Deadhorse, wait specialty tires, nah, I probably could not. And then the check engine light rattles on. I drive another few miles up the road, find a turn off and decide its time to put the wet tent up, in the rain, again.
I ate some sardines and bread, a nutritious dinner full of omega 3's and stuff and went to sleep. I woke up, packed my wet tent away and got back in the car. The check engine light did not come back on, score. I continue the drive into Deadhorse where the roads only progressively get more horrible all the way to town and in town, that is where they are the worst. I get gas in the shack of a gas station, and turn around to go back. Luckily the clouds have risen from the previous day, still overcast but not as gloomy. I spot some Caribou in the distance, more Musk Ox, Tundra Swans, Loons, more Owls, Eagles and other birds. Getting back closer to the end Atigun Valley snow appears on the ground from the night before and the sun peaks through in the distance, it was beautiful. The mountains begin to appear, the Brooks Range, which I had driven through before but had not been able to see. The sun comes out, I get closer in, fresh snow starts to fall, it was wonderful. I got to the top of the pass and hiked around, the air was still, fresh snow everywhere and there was that quiet that you only get with a still day and snow on the ground and at that moment I knew that this trip was entirely worth it, no matter what happens the rest of the way.
I camped that night just off the pass, near a river, I knew near the river I could find some kind of dried brush on the banks to make a campfire because I am still north of the tree line, wood is rare. A fox visits me in camp that night and I hoped to see the Auroras, I slept with my rainfly half off my tent hoping for clear skier. I was then awoken in the middle of the night, rain. My hopes of a rainless night were too farfetched for this trip, it was not going to happen. I packed up camp in the rain the next morning and headed back. Spotted some wolves along the road on the way back, took some photos and before I knew it I was back in Coldfoot. I topped of the gas tank and got some coffee and began to realize how good condition the road started to become. Before I knew it I was back in Fairbanks. I called up my buddy Chris who I told, if you do not hear from me by tuesday, worry. I told him I decided to go all the way up the haul road instead of just to the pass. He was surprised I made it with out problems and expressed that him and some others were glad I made it back from the trip. He then said "we were worried, but not worried enough to care."
And I sit here, I still do not know how to interpret that.