Fate of the Packs

Bob ponders the fate of our packs high atop Mount Waters. We both had new packs and we kept imagining that stupid bear tearing into them to get the little bit of food that we had left in them.

Looking toward Fredrick sound in the background. A small glacier fills the valley about a thousand feet below.

We decided to do a group photo before heading down the mountain and learning the fate of our packs.

Fortunately the bear decided to leave our packs alone. We followed his tracks across much of the Nelson glacier. This is a view of the old mining camp building. A refrigerator is still visible on the top of the old camp floor. I wouldn't mind having a camp here if I were a miner. What views!

Mountain Goat

On the way back to camp, we stopped at Marsha Peak for a little while. Bob tried to fly his kite but it would not cooperate. I don't know if it was the wind or something else.

As we relaxed and snacked on a narrow saddle several hundred feet above camp and away from the mosquitoes. A mountain goat appeared in front of us. He spotted us without a problem and it seemed like we were in his way. He decided to go down the other side of the ridge instead.

Some people have called me a mountain goat. And I admit that I do have a good sense of balance and can move around steep ground without much difficulty. But I am NOT a mountain goat. This is a mountain goat doing what only mountain goats can do. He walked down this cliff until he was in the middle of the orange colored rock. He scrambled around there for a while before I decided I should get a photo of him from above. I tried to sneak around and was almost there when he decided to go up the cliff. He did it in not time flat. Goats are unbelievable.

Once again, the mosquitoes were beyond bad. Bob decided to go to bed without cooking supper just to get away from them. I decided to go back to the saddle where we had taken a break earlier. So I rounded up my stove and food and headed up the mountain. I couldn't stop because a large herd of mosquitoes were following right behind me. There wasn't any noticeable wind to blow them away which meant that taking a break would also mean a blood donation to a swarm of insects. When I finally got to the saddle I was extremely disappointed to find that I had not escaped the tormentors. But there was no water around and I decided that I could probably kill most of them off and enjoy a decent meal. So I sat down and started swatting (I had a t-shirt and shorts on). They were so bad that I would make a swat unless I could kill at least 5 to 10 of them. That is not an exaggeration. Not only is that the truth but I was constantly swatting. I kept that up for about ten minutes when it seemed like I was making headway. The mosquitoes were finally thinning out. But then I looked behind me. The faintest of breezes had gently blown the mosquitoes out from in front of my face. The sight behind me was another story - the sky seemed full of mosquitoes. I gave up and pulled the rain gear out of my pack and put it on, I pulled the hood over my head and cinched it down. After doing that I heard a familiar noise. It sounded just like rain on the fly of a tent. But it wasn't raining, at least it wasn't raining rain. The mosquitoes were hitting my rain gear in a manner that made it sound like it was raining. But at long last, I was safe. I was finally able to eat my meal while pacing back and forth to keep the mosquitoes at my back. As I hiked back toward the tent I looked down at my hands. It looked as if I had been handling charcoal. My hands were black. I had swatted so many mosquitoes that my hands had become stained with the residue from their wings. Trust me, I was never happier to crawl into a tent.

By the time I got back to the tent I thought Bob was a genius for deciding to go to bed without supper.

The End

We woke up to lovely skies the morning of our decent.

Bob looks back toward the Porterfield valley while saddled by his pack as he waits for me to hurry up and get ready.

Decending down toward Virginia Lake.

The end of the line for my good 'ol Rocky boots. I purchased them when I was 17. They lasted until I was 29. 12 years - pretty good investment. They have been with me all over the place, from snowshoeing in Alaska to logging in Michigan to fishing in Wymoming. Unfortunately the soles disintegrated before they took me down off the mountain. But I don't think it would be appropriate if they breathed their last anywhere but in a place like this. Sure beats my smelly feet.

Three Sisters Traverse

We were unsure as to whether we would even begin this trip. Bob was concerned about the weather, as was I. The forecast did not look real good but I was really anxious to do the trip because I know I didn't have many changes to do this kind of thing in my few months remaining in Wrangell. After a couple trips out the road, many evaluations of the forecast, we finally decided it was worth a shot. We would at least hike up to Bessie and if we were clouded in, we would hike back down the next day. This photo is of Zimovia Strait. My trusty orange boots rest on the floor of the boat.

Bob walks along the Kunk Trail, next to Kunk Creek. I like this photo but I have to admit, it was not intentional.

A bridge in need of replacement. One of the sills is being scoured out. If I remember correctly, the trail will be reconstructed in 2010.

Newt

Bob and I pose in front of the skiff that will take us across Kunk Lake. After this trip, Bob returned to the lake with his pack-raft and retrieved the skiff.

We found several newts. I don't know I didn't squash this guy. Bob found him either right in, or right next to my track.

Up the Ridge

Do you feel daredevilish? No, I don't think I actually said that, but I did think it.

I got tired and need a break and fortunately I convinced Bob that he should take a break as well. It was misty, damp, and foggy and I was sweating up a storm. The brush was so wet that I couldn't afford to take off my rain jacket but eventually the inside of my rain jacket got soaked from perspiration anyway. Sometimes you just can't win when playing the "dry" game, and this was one of those days. Fortunately I had a dry bag so at least I had dry clothes to change into for the following day and a nice dry sleeping bag as well.

That night we couldn't see much of anything but the following morning the clouds broke up a little and welcomed us to a lovely day. Yup, those are some faint rays of sunshine striking Bob and the tent. Really faint. In most parts of the country they would call that cloud induced shade but in SE, it qualifies as sunshine. In fact, any time you can see your shandow, no matter how faint, it means that the sun is shining. Bessie peak is in the background.

Bessie Peak at last. It didn't really take us too long to get up here. Just checked the time stamps on the photos - there was about two and a half hours between the first photo and the summit photo. When you consider packing up camp and breakfast, it must have been just over an hour hike to the summit.

Bessie Peak

Lupine blooms as Bob peers over the edge of Bessie looking for a reasonable route down the Helen.

Steep, very steep. A nice time to have a mountaineering axe. My axe was more blunt by the time we completed our trip.

Bob looks toward Zarembo Island as the clouds move all around us and occasionally surround us.

Bob and myself with the ridge bordering Chichagof pass in the background.

Change of Plans

Bob trudges across a snowfield in the saddle between Bessie and Helen. After eyeing the situation in front of us, we decided that this was not the time of the year to attempt the traverse with the gear we had.

So we set our sights on Red Mountain instead. Yup, that's Red in the distance.

Bob calls in our change of plans to Jill and Jen who would be picking us up later. Bessie Peak stands out in the background.

We decided to try to skirt around Bessie's flank and cross a saddle that I had seen when flying through the area a few years before. It worked, but it wasn't a whole lot of fun. Getting down to the saddle and up on the Red Mountain ridge system was quite a chore. If there weren't steep slopes, it was because there were cliff bands. Nothing quite like Tongass tree mountaineering.

Wildlife

Bob looks back at Bessie's serious side. Quite the pack eh?

As we side hilled our way down into the valley to a saddle where we would get onto the Red Mountain ridge system, we came across some wildlife. This happy black bear was contentedly grazing on some greens. We decided to take a break and watch him for a while. He never seemed to notice we were there. Eventually he made his way up toward the top of the ridge and disappeared.

Camp! This is actually the next day. By the time we got to this elevation the previous day the weather was deteriorating. We set up camp and then dived into the tent and read until falling asleep. When the rain abated (but the wind did not) for a short time so we got up and made a quick supper before going to bed for the night. The wind eventually died down in the night but it continued to rain until 6 or 7 am. So after a quick bite to eat we headed up red mountain. I decided that my ski boots needed a little time to themselves and decided to hike up the mountain in my sandals.

One of many not-so-recent cairns.

On Top of Red Mountain

Not that you could tell we were on top of Red Mountain in this particular photograph. It is a good thing we continued because we discovered that this was not the real peak. We had to continue another half mile or so.

Now this is Red Mountain. I am reasonably sure that this was the first ascent made with sandals. My feet appreciated getting a rest from my ski boots. My feet remained comfortable even in the cool weather. The heavy wool socks helped a lot.

Musty the muskox stands on the top of the cairn marking the summit while Bob watches from nearby.

Musty and some alpine lupine in a standoff. There was no clear winner.

All Downhill from Here.

Alpine Lupine show off their dew from the mountain.

Bob poses next to one of many very old cairns along the ridge line. Just before getting to this level point on the ridge we had walked down a snowfield. Yeah, a little snow got into my sandles but it wasn't too bad. At some point I decided to sit down a see if I could pick up some speed going down the hill. I didn't get going too fast but it was still fun.

Back at came. I heated up some miniture ski poles for lunch (They are a little bit like spaghetti.) before packing up our gear and resuming our trip down the mountain.

Another very old cairn, this time on top of a boulder. We found one recent cairn as well right next to our campsite. Near this location we found wolf remains. Bob found a skull and I found a tooth or two. It was in pretty good condition, so we added it to our packs.