Spirit, Not a Ghost: The Deadly River AKA AK PT 7

Once upon the time there was a couple who worked in Alaska for the summer. They liked backpacking and really wanted to see Denali up close. They almost died. Again.* This is their story.

So there is this awesome new item called a pack raft. It is for the intrepid backpacker who needs to float down rivers and such. Captain got it into his head that he desperately wants one, and bought himself one for his adventures in Alaska. Because of this item, he almost died about 3 times, lost two $200 paddles, my bear spray and my awesome home-made first aid kit. I still haven't forgiven him. Anyway, because of this pack raft, Cpt persuaded me that we could cross the McKinley River without getting too wet. Basically, he lied or is very stupid. I was stupider for believing him.

But that's neither here nor there. Cpt decided that he desperately wanted to see Denali up close and personal, and get some great pictures of the amazing glaciers that form the source of the McKinley River. When Cpt gets an idea about a hike, there is no dissuading him. So I went along with him.

By now, we've had enough close to death experiences in the wild of Denali that we were prepared for most things. We made sure we had enough food and warm clothing to last us through that three-day, two-night backpacking trip. The plan was to hike down one of the few trails in the park, cross the McKinley River, head up to Turtle Hill, and hike up into McGonagall Pass and see the Muldrow Glacier and some awesome mountains. It was about 20 miles each way. When getting the zone permit, the Ranger was very concerned about the McKinley River crossing, but we managed to persuade him that we would be fine.

So the next day, we hopped on the bus and slept the whole way to Wonder Lake, waking up every so often to check out the bears that were near the road. At Wonder Lake, we took the McKinley Bar Trail to the river, passing large groups of tourists who braved enough of the wilderness to stick to well-trodden paths. It started raining on the trail, much to our surprise.** This little bit of wilderness was quite beautiful, with elegant rocks, beautiful little creeks that flowed through grasses, and nice tall-ish spruces. It was quiet, with the sound of the rain on the tundra muffling the breeze. The rain lowered the temperature, so when we got to the McKinley River, I was already shivering.

This is the view from Turtle Hill looking North. You can see the McKinley River, and Wonder Lake in the background.

It's difficult to describe the McKinley to someone who had never seen a glacier-fed river, but I shall make an attempt. Picture 36 degree Farenheit water (very cold). Picture a 10 ft wide creek that is very fast-flowing. Imagine entire trees going by, carried on the current. Now look at the water, and realize that you can't see the bottom, because it is so silty. You can't even see your hand a centimeter in the water. You have to wear your shoes, because otherwise your feet might get stuck between the rocks. So, you step in, your shoes fill with water and silt, making them 10 times as heavy, the current is trying to push you over, your walking stick is trying to flow downriver, there's a tree coming at you and your feet are completely numb. Now, the McKinley is all of these things, but it is also made up of many many channels that are at least 10 feet wide, and some are deeper than your head. You can't tell which ones are deep, and it is extremely treacherous. It looks about a mile wide, all channels combined. That's what we were dealing with. Not to mention the chilly rain and colder wind. It looked like death. Cpt blew up the pack raft, and we attached ropes to it to haul ourselves across it. Because the ropes kept tangling, every time we crossed a channel we would have to untangle it. It took us three and a half hours to cross, wherein Cpt fell in the water up to his chest, we almost lost the paddle (we didn't because we tied it to the raft), and we almost lost the pack raft. I started sobbing before we were halfway through, I was so cold, so miserable and had nothing to look forward to except more cold and misery. But we kept going, and somehow we got across.

The little ponds, McKinley River, and Kantishna Hills in the sunset.

After deflating the pack raft, we immediately started moving, trying desperately to stay warm. The tundra hiking was its usual annoying self. Every step my foot sunk at least five inches, every wobbly step up meant more effort for the next step. We passed several beautiful little ponds, but did not see many birds for the wind was blowing rather fiercely. We climbed up Turtle Hill, fighting gravity, cold, and brushy trees. We reached the top after about an hour and a half, maybe two hours, for I was going pretty slow. We set up camp, and Cpt cooked the rice and tuna like he always does. (I refuse to cook during the backpacking trips because Cpt always sets up these impossible trips wherein I am completely exhausted. So usually he cooks and I set up the tent/sleeping bags, and what not. Then I eat most of the food. I like this arrangement, hopefully he won't catch on. Anyway, men seem to like cooking outdoors...) After dinner we went to bed rather early, determined to do at least 15 miles up to McGonagall Pass the next day.

Heading into Mordor/McGonagall Pass

The next day we were taking down the camp when I looked down the hill to the north. I thought I saw a bear, it was a big animal at the bottom of the hill. Cpt grabbed the binoculars and I realized that it was WOLVES!!!! TWO WILD, WONDERFUL, BEAUTIFUL WOLVES!!!!!! They were grey and white, and seemed to flow/bounce along the tundra, moving at a nice jog that covered a lot of ground. With the exception of possibly Yellowstone, this was the first time we had seen wolves in the wild while backpacking, though every time we go somewhere, our mission is to see wolves. This was the cumulative moment of our Alaskan summer. My heart was in my mouth and my soul was running with them. They were out of sight within minutes. We broke up camp and I was more enthusiastic for the rest of the day because of that sighting.

Lone Caribou

There is a trail that runs from McGonagall Pass to the river because mountaineers who climb Denali sometimes hike down Denali to Wonder Lake. It was hard enough just doing the regular hike, but having to do it after climbing Denali? Almost insane (in my opinion, but it's still pretty impressive!) Anyway, we found this trail extremely quickly from Turtle Hill and followed it across Clearwater Creek. We saw a nice lone caribou and I was able to snap a picture of him. Clearwater Creek is beautiful, exactly what I think of when I think of nature. It wasn't too deep, but compared to the McKinley, anything is better! We lost the trail where it crosses one of the feeder creeks (I think it's call Cache Creek), but we knew which direction we were going. This made us lose a lot of time because we quickly ran into more brushy terrain. It was almost impossible going. This is truly a beautiful hike, but it is hard to get to due to the McKinley River. Le sigh.

Clearwater Creek was a breeze!

We pressed on, and finally got to the foothills where we found the trail again. There are some cool cairns made of moose antlers, and we saw a couple of pikas and lots of birds. I didn't take many pictures because if I did so, then Cpt would be miles ahead of me. He don wait fo nobodi! At the beginning of the pass, we had to cross a fast-flowing creek, and it was difficult with the backpacks on. We eventually left the packs on a rock under a poncho (because, of course, it was raining), then took a small pack and continued up the pass. It was eerie. The mountains loomed on either side, and there wasn't a single thing growing there - but there was always the sense of being watched. There were plenty of big boulders teetering on every side. At one point we heard something screaming, it sounded so much like a human we called out to see if there was a reply. No response. We climbed and climbed (I gave up three times, but Cpt kept refusing to) and climbed! Finally we could see the top of the pass. As we took the last couple of steps, we came over the rise and saw the Muldrow Glacier.

McGonagall Pass was eerie.

This Glacier is terrifyingly huge, with big gaping holes, dark rivers flowing under it, cracked ice, and tortured tall mountains looming over. The clouds were lower than the mountains, and every once in a great while the clouds would part and we would see Mount Brooks, Silverthrone, Mather, and a couple others, but no hint of the great Denali. We had walked to the foot of the mountain, and the clouds defeated us again. The Muldrow Glacier was very impressive and scary though. You can see on the closer mountains the rivers of ice that clung to the sides to join the larger glacier. We could see where the Trakleika Glacier joined the Muldrow and it was fantastic. It was a deadly, freezing, barren, and tremendously beautiful place. Somehow the pikas and ptarmigan live here, (we saw a bunch) but it was no place for us. After taking too many pictures and walking around a bit, we headed back down McGonagall Pass to our packs and set up camp, cooked and slept.

The next day we headed back down to the river. We followed the path the entire way, though we stopped to collect some blueberries for our breakfast of oatmeal. At the point where we lost the trail coming towards the Pass, we put up some rather obvious cairns so that in the future someone else won't lose the trail. We came back to the river in half the time it took us to get to the pass, for which I have to thank the trail and downhill. We were dreading the river again, but this time we were more prepared. I was wearing my awesome underarmor pants under my pants this time, and I was so much warmer because of it. We lost my gloves in the process of the river crossing, and my knife (we always lose our knives). We got across the river in an hour instead of three and headed up to the road, looking for a good place to camp. By this point I carried the paddles and the raft because it fit better on my backpack, and Cpt's strings were falling apart. So my pack was at least 10 pounds heavier than when we began. We were completely exhausted once again, and picked a spot that was in total view of the road, but we figured since it was so late that nobody would care since no one was driving by. Or at least Cpt didn't, I was freaking out but he managed to persuade me. We woke up at 5:30 and caught the bus, after having some tea, then I tried to sleep even though finally DENALI was not hidden by clouds and it was a perfect photo opportunity. I was pissed, but so tired that I managed to sleep through the whole thing. Not even food would have woken me up at that point. I also missed two cubs playing in a river while I was sleeping. But I don't regret it because I just wanted to sleep.

In the end, the McKinley River could have killed us, but for some reason, we survived the whole Alaskan summer. Sometimes I can't believe it, there were so many opportunities for death or injury to come a-knocking, but we both survived, though Cpt now has a bad fear of water. Too bad, 'cause I want to go white-water kayaking at some point.