After a short discussion we decided to continue to Emmonak rather than try an alternate route, and Tom and Steve chose the same. Having to break the ice in our water bottles helped make our decision. It was hard to get enthusiastic about Jining canoes up a cold river with the temperature below freezing. We said good-bye to our new friends and pushed off. I wished we had met more canoers. One old man told me, “Most years we have forty or fifty canoers go by. This year, I guess everybody quit because of all the rain. You guys are about the third to pass this year.”
Late in the afternoon as we were deciding where to camp, Byron thought he spotted Tom and Steve on an island. Doug scanned the island and announced, “You’re seeing things.”
Just then a plume of smoke rose and Byron retorted, “Seeing things, huh? I think you better get those binoculars adjusted.”
Tom and Steve had thrown willows on the fire to attract our attention, but I wondered how they felt about camping with us. Tom answered that unspoken question by saying, “We camped in the most obvious place we could and hoped our smoke would attract your attention.”
Next morning, with a strong wind blowing, I jumped up and shouted, “Look, a tailwind. Today’s the day for sailing.”
Byron scoffed, “Yeah, sure. What do we do for a sailboat?”
“We’ve got one right here,” I urged enthusiastically. “We’ll tie our canoes together to make a trimaran, put a mast up in my canoe, and use Doug’s tarp for a sail. Just think, we’ll be sweeping down the river with the sails full and billowing, just lying back and watching the shore rush by.
Byron christened our craft the ‘Hairbrain” and so it was. When we pushed it into the river, the wind rapidly died and then completely reversed itself blowing us backwards. So much for sailing. We dismantled our craft and faced a rapidly increasing headwind all morning. At noon I saw Tom and Steve eating lunch. Steve said, “To put it straight, we didn’t spend much time looking over our shoulders for three canoes with a sail to pass us.”
After struggling on for two and a half hours, we covered only five miles. Waves washed over my canoe requiring me to stay busy bailing, so when we found a cozy cabin, we called ita day. Rain fell all night, and the next day, a foggy, drippy day was perfect for staying in a snug, dry cabin swapping canoe stories. In spite of more rain, we started again the next day, but the sun came out and we welcomed it with open arms. It’s easy to see how people could worship the sun.
That night I wrote in my journal, “I’m happy to be in Alaska, canoeing down the Yukon. Right now that’s where I should be. There is nowhere else I would rather be. When I reach the ocean shore, I will be ready to close the book on a great chapter of my life and move onward to see what the next chapter holds. But not until I finish writing this chapter. I want to live fully between here and the ocean.”
At Grayling the good weather had many natives out in boats, and the sound of chainsaws filled the air as they cut their winter’s supply of firewood. One of the residents pulled his boat along mine and asked, “Why are you paddling that canoe when a motorboat is so much quicker?”
“A canoe doesn’t take any gas,” I told him, “and it doesn’t make any noise. You are right in the scene rather than just watching it rush by. Every breath of wind affects you. You can hear the birds. It’s a good way to travel if you want to experience the world instead of just covering the miles. Besides, I couldn’t afford a motorboat.”
He smiled a toothless smile and replied, “The reason I asked is that I plan to canoe from Fairbanks to Anvik, where I live, next spring, and I just wondered what it was going to be like. It sounds like you are enjoying your journey.”
Later I noticed something red on the far shore but didn’t think anything of it. As the river pinwheeled us around, we looked upstream and there were Tom and Steve paddling hard to catch us.
Tom exclaimed, “What are you guys doing lollygagging in the sun? Don’t you know that snow is coming? Winter is on its way. Come on, onward to the Bering Sea.” And he cracked an imaginary whip over our heads. The red thing I had seen was Steve’s sleeping bag that he had hung on a bush to attract our attention, and when that failed, they jumped in their canoe and came after us. Now four canoes drifted on the big river.
Even with our laziness in the afternoon we went a respectable 43 miles and camped at the mouth of the Anvik River. We sat by the fire with honey in our tea and peace in our hearts, friends linked by the land. The Milky Way spread a faint ribbon of light across the sky and stars appeared in the billions. Our breath condensed in the chill — puffs of silver dew — and rose toward them. The Northern Lights flickered on the horizon. How long we watched I do not know; it was one of those experiences more restful than sleep.
Very early in the morning I heard Tom starting a fire but went back to sleep. When the sun came up, I asked him, “Why were you up so early?”
He answered, “A fox running around here kept getting into packs and stuff, and I couldn’t seem to scare it off. So I built a fire hoping that would keep it away. I glanced up on the bank, and there was the fox, calmly keeping an eye on the situation. We scared it away, but almost immediately it circled back into camp and started sniffing around in Byron’s canoe. We scared it once more, and it finally decided we weren’t worth the bother and left.
Hot sunny days followed each other and the dark suntan I had hoped for became a reality. One afternoon I kept hearing voices but couldn’t see anyone. Then I saw a paddle flash and realized I was hearing Tom and Steve’s conversation from about two miles away. When I caught up to them, Tom had just finished a bath and lay naked across the packs in the canoe.
Usually in the afternoon we let the canoes drift side by side through the hottest hours, but one afternoon we had a race. I expected to see the tandem canoe pull away easily, but instead Byron and I in our solo boats took the lead. Paddles slashed through the water in rapid rhythm as we put every fiber in our bodies to work. The wake of my canoe made a steady hiss as it screamed across the water. Byron and I were neck and neck for a while, and then Byron took the lead and was declared the winner. I expected my foot shorter canoe to be slightly slower, and that’s just what the race indicated.
At our camp north of Holy Cross Tom wandered to a side channel and returned with a big bundle of mint saying, “Tonight, for your drinking pleasure, we have imported straight from the banks of the Yukon river, the finest Alaskan Mint and not a single sprig without blossoms. We brewed mint tea almost every night for the rest of the journey. My chocolate supply rapidly disappeared as I’m addicted to hot chocolate made with mint tea, but when I ran out of chocolate, I had to kick the habit cold turkey.
Tom and Steve bought more supplies at Holy Cross. They lived on the simplest foods, oatmeal or pancakes for breakfast, bannock for lunch, and beans or rice for supper. Tom’s lifestyle fascinated me. Essentially, he was on a journey without an end. “When I left New York ten years ago, my idea was to go as far as I could. That’s all there was to it — just to go as far as I could. Now, I won’t be the one to close the book on this journey; if someone else closes it, I’ll accept that, but I won’t be the one.”
Tom wouldn’t say what he planned during the next season. He talked of crossing the Bering Straits near the Diomed Islands and paddling through Russia. When pressed, he said, “I don’t know for sure where I’m going, but I’ll find out when the time comes.”
One afternoon Tom pointed out, “You guys have a prejudice against the left side of the river. You never camp there and almost always paddle on the right side.”
“But it’s not just us who are biased toward the right side. Almost all the towns are on the right side also. Let’s see. Fort Simpson’s on the left side and Arctic Red River; any more?”
“Just Ruby and Ramparts,” said Tom. “Maybe we should camp on the left just to give you guys a change of scenery.” That night I ate one of my few freeze-dried dinners. My rule of thumb assumed that if the label said ‘stew,” it was generally inedible. One of my friends assured me that beef stew was good. I stand by my rule. Some freeze-dried food is good, and it’s convenient, but I don’t think it’s worth the high cost.
Swarming no-see-ums and rain drove us into the tent after eating and Doug asked, “What are you going to do for your next adventure?”
I had thought about this subject and replied, “I was thinking of a shorter trip, maybe one to squeeze into a summer vacation from college. I have all the maps for a trip from the end of the Pacific Crest Trail in Manning to Jasper where we started this one. An unbroken wilderness journey from Mexico all the way to the Bering Sea. The only gap would be the rapids on the Slave river— got to go back and do those some day.”
“Yeah, that would be neat.” And we lapsed into silence, the wind howling through the tips of the trees, writing and singing wind-music into the night.