"Birthplace"

BIRTHPLACE

In the photograph, a tow-headed boy of perhaps four is standing next to the open back door of a blue Ford station wagon of late 1960s vintage. The boy, with his crew cut, maroon-gold-and-white cotton short-sleeved shirt, and brown corduroys, is smiling and pointing at the backseat. Although the photo itself does not make this clear, he is pointing at the behest of his father, for whom this simple gesture is simultaneously humorous and deeply meaningful.

The boy is my younger brother, Lowell, and our father was Calvin Munson Fair. On what is likely an early spring day in 1971 or 1972, the station wagon is parked on the somewhat snowy garage apron in front of our old homestead house (which at that time wasn’t so old, having been completed in late 1967). On the far-right edge of the photo appears the back bumper of our other family car, a brown four-door Dodge Dart Swinger, which is parked inside the garage. The photo is indicative of the progression of our family: First, Lowell was the third and last of three Fair children (after me and our sister, Janeice). Second, the appearance of two cars is important because for many years we had only a single vehicle, which meant that my mother was often left without transportation (other than our 1948 Ford tractor) on the homestead when Dad traveled in to Soldotna to work at his dental practice. Third, the big white colonial-style house replaced the single-wide trailer that we had lived in since October 1960. Fourth, inside the house was the family’s first telephone (a rotary-dial affair on the wall of the mud room) and first color television (replacing our old Zenith black-and-white set), and somewhere roaming around outside was the first family dog (an independent-minded German short-haired pointer named Queen).

But when it was taken, this photograph was more about looking backward than looking forward. Dad had captured the image to forever remind him of a story….

On a cold and stormy Jan. 25, 1968, Dr. Paul Isaak was preparing his single-engine aircraft to carry two passengers on another flight to the Seward hospital. Isaak had made hundreds of such flights—in fact, in 1983 he would estimate that he’d made at least 2,000 such trips—through Resurrection Pass between his medical practice in Soldotna and the peninsula’s only full-service hospital in Seward, where he often performed surgeries, delivered babies, and responded to emergencies.

Here’s how (in the book Once Upon the Kenai) Isaak described the Jan. 25 flight: “I was going to take one of my obstetric patients and her husband to the hospital in Seward for delivery. This man was a prominent citizen in the community, and it turned out that when we got about five miles out of Seward, the weather deteriorated rather rapidly and I was unable to continue, so we turned around and came back. And so he [the prominent citizen] drove to Seward, and about seven or eight miles out of Seward she [the obstetric patient] decided that she was going to have that baby, and indeed did have it in the back seat of the car. Fortunately, I had some of the bare necessities with me to manage the delivery in the car, even though it wasn’t the most ideal situation. Everything turned out fine for mother and baby, and they spent several days in the hospital after that experience.”

Of course, it’s no great surprise (given my set-up in this story) that the “prominent citizen in the community” was my father, and the “obstetric patient” was my mother.

Even now, my mother is terribly embarrassed by this story, despite the nearly half-century that has passed since it occurred. For the last two or three years, I have been wanting to write about this story in my local history column (the Almanac) in the Redoubt Reporter newspaper, but my mother has forbidden me to mention her name or to use the photograph of Lowell. I realize that I don’t technically need her permission, but I would like her blessing.

Her response: “You can write about it when I’m dead.”

On Oct. 10, 2012—unbeknownst to our mother—my brother told the story in Anchorage as part of a presentation for his Toastmasters group. A couple of years ago, I told the story in the newspaper, but I left out all the names and the crucial photograph. Writing it up in this blog is probably the best I can do right now.

But I do have to add this: In the photograph (displayed above), my brother is gesturing toward the backseat of the family station wagon because my father had (a) opened the back door, (b) stationed my brother there, and (c) told him, “Lowell, point to where you were born.”

I can imagine him laughing almost too hard to press shutter button. And I can imagine that when his yellow box of slides came back from the Kodak Company, he laughed again. (He may or may not have shared the photo with my mother at the time.) And I know he laughed when I placed the photo in a special photo-memory book that my siblings and I created for Dad’s 70^th birthday back in 2002.

My mother, however, still is not laughing.

"One Day's Difference"

 

ONE DAY'S DIFFERENCE

On a Tuesday morning in early August 2007, I was reveling in the fact that the weather had finally changed from rain and wind to bright sunshine, that my current diet (instituted to combat some lingering health issues) had left me about 20 pounds lighter than the previous winter, that we had finished our mowing jobs earlier than usual that week, that meteorologists were calling for a string of beautiful days, and that I had only a get-together with friends (on Thursday) and my son’s 12^th birthday (on Sunday) as firm commitments for the rest of the week. (The start of my 20^th, and final, year of teaching high school was only one more week away.)

 

Full of energy and enthusiasm, I set up a moderate hike for Wednesday, and then a longer, more difficult hike for Saturday. The Saturday excursion, up Cecil Rhode Mountain in Cooper Landing, was one I had completed several years in a row and was particularly looking forward to. It includes over 5,000 feet of climbing and spectacular views of the Kenai Mountains, Mystery Hills, Kenai and Cooper lakes, and much of the upper Kenai River valley.

 

Then, when Karen said that she was taking the kids to go mountain biking up on the Tsalteshi Trails at Skyview High School, I said I’d go along. Skyview sits atop a large forested hill just across the river from the city of Soldotna. In the surrounding hills over the years, crews have constructed miles of meandering, undulating trails for cross-country skiing and running (and also mountain biking, snowshoeing and walking). And so we pulled our vehicles into the school parking lot, extracted our bikes, donned our helmets, and headed out into the warm late-morning sunshine. For about an hour on the trails, I enjoyed zipping easily on the dirt paths, climbing and coasting, rolling along, until it was time to go. Then, as Karen cruised down a long ridgeline trail that skirted the school grounds, I told her I was taking a shortcut and veered off the main trail.

 

I headed down what, in the earliest days of Tsalteshi, used to be the main entrance to the trail system but was now abandoned. I took this route because I could see my son biking below me on an open grassy stretch of the main campus, and I thought I could easily catch up to him that way. The old trail descended fairly rapidly and was overgrown with tall grass and fireweed. As I started down, I saw what appeared to be the tracks of a previous biker, which gave me greater assurance that the trail was still okay.

 

But it was not okay.

 

Another trail had been cut with a Caterpillar blade perpendicular to the bottom of this one, chopping off the base of the hill and leaving a sudden drop of perhaps two feet right at the end. I did not notice this drop at first because I was traveling swiftly, was looking out briefly at my son, and was unable to see the drop-off until I was nearly on top of it. I’m not sure whether I hit my brakes. I think that my front tire simply dropped off the ledge and propelled me over my handlebars. Regardless, I inverted in mid-air and landed on my head. I heard a crunching sound and then I twisted over and slammed to the ground.

I knew instantly that I’d really hurt myself. Images of movie-star Christopher Reeve and his broken-neck fall from a horse flashed through my brain. I saw him in his wheelchair, paralyzed from the neck down for the rest of his life.

 

Honestly, besides the pain and the fear (that I might have broken my neck), what I felt most at that moment was anger because I knew that all my sunny-weather hiking plans had just been blown out the window.

 

I forced myself to try to move. As I heard footsteps racing toward me, I rolled to my left side and curled into an agonizing fetal position, pleased with the movement, regardless of the pain.

 

Then Karen and Kelty were there. Karen assessed the situation and ran into the school to find a custodian and get a bag of ice. Kelty tried to give me some support and keep me comfortable on the ground, but I struggled to my feet, anyway, straightened myself the best I could, picked up my bike and used it like a crutch to hobble back to the car.

 

About an hour later, a naturopath told me that my neck was out of alignment but didn’t appear to be fractured, that I had pulled the middle section of my right hamstring, and that I had also twisted my lower back and sprained the middle and ring fingers on my right hand. He recommended lots of ice and an adjustment on my neck after a week of allowing the swelling to subside. (Later at home, I realized that I had also pulled my left hamstring and hyper-extended my right elbow. And even later, an MRI revealed that I had herniated two vertebrae in my lumber region.)

 

I felt achy everywhere for days and had a mild but consistent headache. It’s possible that I had suffered a concussion; I know I wasn’t thinking clearly. For days, I found it very difficult to sleep comfortably or even change positions in bed. But the biggest problem—other than the psychological disappointment involved in sitting or lying around doing nothing while the sun shone brightly—was that I was having muscular or nervous spasms around the top of my right hip and I knew I was in for some extended medical treatments.

 

It took me weeks to heal up superficially and—with decompression therapy and chiropractic treatments—months to heal up completely. As the culmination to a three-year period of health problems that had included pneumonia, mastoiditis, hives, and more than two years of a terribly itchy body-wide rash, the injuries left me wondering whether I’d ever feel truly well again—and also doubly determined to take fuller advantage of opportunities when they arose.

 

Still, old habits die hard, and it was more than two years (and a divorce, and perhaps even some depression) later before I seriously embarked on real change. (See related stories concerning some of that change.) A shocking experience can prompt a transformation, but the heart and mind must unite in action before any meaningful alterations can occur. I’d spent so many years making excuses that I needed time to establish newer, healthier patterns.

 

“Carpe diem!” doesn’t sound so trite to me anymore.

 

 

"Another Loss, Coming Soon"

ANOTHER LOSS, COMING SOON

The changes keep coming in 2012, whether I’m ready for them or not.

Most recently, my daughter left for her freshman year of college. This week, my son began his last year of high school. In the next two weeks, my mother will give away her English setter—my father’s hunting dog until Dad died—before she moves off the homestead and into town. By sometime in September, I will be the only permanent, full-time resident of the homestead land that is still owned by the Fairs.

And soon—perhaps by year’s end—another piece of the family will also disappear: my father’s Model A Ford, which has been here on the homestead for 46 years. Mom believes that she needs to (a) divest herself of things that she won’t use herself, and (b) sell off property and items that can bring her money to pay for her new home. The Model A will, I believe, bring her perhaps $15,000-$20,000—not much in the grand scheme of things—but it’s her choice. I certainly do not have the money to buy it from her and preserve it in the family, and my brother and sister have no apparent interest in it.

So I’ll do the next best thing now: I will preserve it in words and pictures.

This, then, is the history of my father’s Model A, according to my memory and the few notes about it that I have jotted down over the years:

The Model A Ford, which superseded the popular Model T, was manufactured in various permutations by the Ford Motor Company from 1927 through 1931. Dad’s Model A was built in 1931. My father bought it in the early 1950s—the oldest photo I have of it is from 1953—mainly to give him a mode of reliable transportation between his boyhood home in the very small, very rural environs of Walton, Indiana, and his college life at Purdue University in West Lafayette, Indiana. I seem to remember Dad telling me that he paid only a few hundred dollars for it at the time. (Somewhere in the many notes Dad left behind may be more precise information; if so, I’ll correct this detail later.)

In fact, Dad bought two Model A Fords at once that day. The body of the sedan he kept was painted a flat pink, with a black roof, running board and fenders; on the back window, still today, is a Purdue Boilermakers sticker. The body of the roadster he gave to his younger brother, Steve, was a flat light-grey. I remember Dad telling me that Steve basically ruined his car by trying to alter its body and then running it into the ground.

After Dad got married, completed college and dental school, and before he joined the Army and headed to Alaska, he put the Model A in storage somewhere in Indiana, and it stayed there until 1966, when Dad decided that he wanted to bring his old car home to the homestead.

Enter Wayne Finley, another transplanted Hoosier living with his family on the central Kenai Peninsula. Finley, a commercial fisherman among other entrepreneurial endeavors, would occasionally gas up his cargo-hauling box truck and drive all the way out to the Midwest to pick up a load of something he thought he could haul north and sell at a profit. Dad paid Finley to load the Model A into the cargo hold with whatever else he was hauling. On this trip, it turns out, he was hauling butter.

Yes, butter.

Cases and cases of butter were stacked around the Model A and hauled from Indiana to Alaska. (Oh, how I wish I had a photo of the Model A surrounded by all that butter! Instead, I’ve got only a photo of my dad’s mother standing near the partly open side door of the cargo hold; clearly visible inside is the Model A, along with two blue suitcases and a small cardboard box. On my grandmother’s face is a sort of Mona Lisa smile.)

When the Model A arrived on the homestead, we were still living in a trailer. Dad drove his precious vehicle out onto the open dirt area that is now the center of Mom’s lawn, and he parked it there so that he could photograph Mom and me and my sister, Janeice, posing along its left flank. Janeice and I stood on the running board, while Mom stood on the ground. The photo he took that day is one of only a handful of images of the old car in the condition in which Dad bought it.

Dad occasionally drove the Model A to work, which allowed Mom to have a car at home (instead of only our 1948 Ford tractor). And at least once, he let me ride with him so he could drop me off at Soldotna Elementary School. I remember distinctly once riding along then-gravel Binkley Street and having my door fly unexpectedly open. Fortunately, I didn’t fall out.

I think my father was pleased to have his old college car back, but I know that he regretted what he did only a few years later.

After Uncle Steve moved to the peninsula in the early 1970s, Dad began contemplating refurbishing the Model A, perhaps transforming it into a Re-Model A. And Steve, who loved to work on cars, convinced Dad that he should order all the parts, and together they could perform the makeover. So in the old meathouse, they disassembled the Model A, and as new parts (including new seats and other interior fixtures) arrived, they were left in boxes and stacked in and around the vehicle. But for some reason the big rebuild project never really got started.

For at least 20 years, the Model A sat in pieces—its big black-painted chassis and pink-painted body packed with boxes and spare parts, its engine covered with old rags to ward off the dust—as life went on all around it. All three of us kids (Lowell was born in 1968) grew up and moved away. At least half a dozen bird dogs hunted with Dad and passed on into Doggie Heaven. I got married. Dad got prostate cancer and battled it for the rest of his life. On and on, as the Model A waited in the dark and the cold … until at last Dad had had enough.

Our old family mechanic, Paul Reger, volunteered (not for free) to take on the rebuilding task, and Dad finally agreed. The chassis, the body and engine, and all the spare parts (old and new) were hauled over to Reger’s garage, and over the course of about a year a “brand-new” Model A took shape—a process completed when Paul took the finished vehicle to a detailer friend of his who gave the old car a shiny new coat of paint.

The old pink beast was gone. In its place was a sleek machine of forest green, with cream-colored hubs and spokes, and black fenders, roof and running board. Dad was justifiably proud of his new car. He drove it or allowed it to be driven a few times in Kenai’s Fourth of July parade and Soldotna’s Progress Days parade. He and Mom occasionally took it out for a brief spin on a sunny summer day, after which he washed and wiped away all of the dust.

But mostly he babied the Model A, parking it again in the meathouse and later in his new shop, and protecting it with a specially fitted grey cover to prevent scratching or scraping of any kind. He uncovered it periodically to check the charge on the battery or change the oil or fiddle with the levers and buttons. And then he covered it right back up. He fretted over it, although he rarely ever looked at it.

By the time Dad died in 2007, he had owned the Model A for more than half a century. The car itself is now 81 years old.

And soon, most likely, it will be gone, leaving not just an empty space in the shop but an empty place in the heart of this family.

 

"After 32"

Me, sprinting to the finish of the 1980 Mount Marathon race in Seward, Alaska.

AFTER 32

I should have written about this weeks ago, when it was still fresh on my mind.

Of course, there are many things I should have done sooner than I did.

For instance, I should have never waited 32 years from the time of my first running race as an adult until the time of my second.

But that’s what I did. After running my first race on July 4, 1980, I waited until June 9, 2012, to run my second race.

Then a week later I raced for a third time.

Now it’s possible that I’ll race again soon, and in the fall, if my body holds up, I may even attempt to run a relay leg in a marathon.

We’ll see.

The possibilities boggle my mind, whereas the reality of it all seemed like an impossibility only a year ago.

Let me explain, starting with a brief history lesson—a personal history:

·         I grew up liking to run. I was good at it. However, although I exhibited good endurance, I rarely ran long distances or for long periods of time. I made lots of one-, 1.5- and two-mile forays, but rarely anything more. I ran track in ninth grade; in my only meet, I finished second in the 440-yard dash, a gut-sucking torture event I was pleased to never run again. In high school, I ran in P.E. and exercise classes, but that was about it. If I remember correctly, I was timed in under 9 minutes for the mile and a half.

·         Mainly, I enjoyed other forms of exercise—playing football or basketball with friends, mountain bike riding, and hiking—lots and lots of hiking, especially in the mountains—and that’s still my favorite.

·         Then in 1980, during my first summer as a journalism intern for the Peninsula Clarion, my editor, Ronnie Chappell, asked me if I’d like to run the Mount Marathon race and then write about it. I said I’d do it, and proceeded to participate, despite almost zero training prior to the race, and despite having never even been on the mountain before—in fact, without even knowing how to GET to the mountain. On a 71-degree Fourth of July, I survived, and even out-sprinted another runner to the finish line to capture 139^th place in 1:28:58. That race remains for me one of the most difficult things I have ever done. It hurt, and it took a lot out of me.

·         But I never thought it’d be 32 years before I raced again.

·         In the early 1990s—only 3-4 years into my teaching career—I signed up to complete the biking leg in a local triathlon. Two miles from completing the big loop that comprised my leg, my bike got a flat tire; I had to push it up a long hill to finish. Other than that, however, I did not compete in a single biking, skiing, paddling or running race from 1980 until 2012.

·         To begin with, I professed not to enjoy running. But that was only partly true. Running, I began to think, really didn’t like me. I had back problems, and running exacerbated them. My teaching job kept me sedentary, and I did little to fight the inertia, so my physical limitations grew. I still hiked every summer, but each spring I had to endure a painful transformation from desk-bound slug to peak-bound mountain goat. And each autumn I allowed the process to reverse, binding me once again to my seat and bad habits.

·         In 2010—the year I got divorced after nearly two years of separation—I joined the Kenai Peninsula Outdoor Club and began working out with a  personal trainer, Darin Hagen. I was not fully committed to either, but I didn’t give up. Starting midway through 2011, I ramped up my participation and dedication, strengthening my core and losing 35 pounds and half my body fat in the process. And late in that year I met Yvonne, a member of the KPOC and an endurance athlete who enjoyed my company enough to keep walking and snowshoeing and skiing and, eventually, running with me throughout the winter and right up to the present time.

·         Actually, the “running” part of our relationship originated when I said I wanted to try the adventure-racing event called “Bushwhack This!” In order to participate, she said, I’d need to do some running—and that included some training runs. She took it easy on me at first, I think, running with me slowly on Ski Hill Road and at Tsalteshi Trails, and then, at higher speeds, down the Skyline Trail, the Slaughter Gulch Trail, the Fuller Lakes Trail, the Red Shirt Lake Trail.

·         Just before “Bushwhack This!” I decided to run my first five-kilometer race—the June 9 “Run for the River,” part of last month’s Kenai River Festival. I set a goal for myself of running under 30 minutes, and I finished in 26:13.

·         A week later, on June 16, Yvonne, Mike Crawford and I competed in the 12-hour adventure race. There was very little running—mostly biking, trekking and paddling—but there was certainly exertion, and it was definitely a race. We finished fourth overall.

·         Now I’m looking at another couple of local 5-K races, and I’m considering committing (and maybe, in fact, I already have committed) to running the middle leg in the Equinox Marathon in Fairbanks in September. Times have certainly changed….

So what was my first race—after 32 years—like?

I was nervous, gathering with a herd of milling real runners just before the race began. I remember needing to pee. I remember wondering how I would do compared to people I knew who ran all the time. I remember hoping that I wouldn’t embarrass myself, that I wouldn’t have to walk part of the course, that I wouldn’t get hurt, that I would have enough reserves at the end to finish strong. I also remember that first stretch of sidewalk running before the big right turn onto East Redoubt Avenue: I found myself moving more swiftly than several of the people I’d been worried about—some older, some younger, some male, some female—and wondering whether I was starting too swiftly.

By about the mid-point of the race, I’d passed numerous other runners and had not been passed a single time. Again, I was concerned about my pacing. I knew nothing about race strategy. Would I flame out and find a flood of other runners zipping by me in the final few hundred meters? I tried not to look back, only forward.

Then my calves grew tight, and my shins began to ache, and I thought about walking but was too stubborn to allow myself to do it. So I continued to focus on runners ahead of me and try to reel them in, passing one after another.

Far up ahead was Liz Cristiano, the very fit mother of a friend of mine and only a year older than me. I pushed myself to catch her. With a half-mile to go, I had her within 50 yards, and at about that same time I came up on small thin girl of perhaps 10 or 12 who was dressed in pink and white and was walking with her head down as if dejected or upset. After I lumbered by her, she looked up and began to run again, easily passing me—only to suddenly stop a few seconds later and resume walking, allowing me to go her again. She was the only person to pass me during the entire race. And about a minute later I passed Liz, and then I made the big left turn back onto the sidewalk where we’d begun and accelerated. As best I could, I sprinted to the finish line from about a hundred yards out.

I knew that things had changed for me. I knew I could do more and do better.

And I will. Barring an unanticipated disaster, I will.

It just seems like a shame that I waited 32 years.

Maybe old dogs can learn new tricks.

"The View"

THE VIEW

I wonder whether even the experienced mountaineer

Sometimes stands atop the summit

And sighs to think

That he’s seen it all before:

Just another valley down below.

Just another ridgeline.

Just another endless sea of mountains.

Does he feel as if he’s climbed them all before somehow,

As if experience after accumulated experience

Has blended into one—

A single scene,

Still beautiful,

Still worth the exertion,

But bereft of uniqueness—

More geological curiosity

Than emotional attachment?

Well, I’m no mountaineer,

But I climb.

I love to amble to the top

Like some old billy goat

And drink in the pasture of possibilities.

If ever I have taken for granted

The view,

I will no more.

"Keeping My Eyes Open"

Me, shambling down the trail above Wonder Lake, Banff National Park, Canada. (Bryan Edwards photo)

KEEPING MY EYES OPEN

(This piece originally appeared in the Redoubt Reporter in 2009.)

Along the eastern shore of the Spray Lakes Reservoir, our taxi shuttle came upon a sight common to most Alaskans: a cow moose browsing on fresh willow leaves. The taxi slowed, and my fellow passengers became animated. Cameras appeared and windows opened.

The three Oregonians gesticulated and chattered, as I smiled. As much as I enjoyed watching moose, I couldn’t raise my level of enthusiasm to match theirs. I hadn’t traveled all the way to the Canadian Rockies just to see what I could view easily at home on the Kenai Peninsula.

On the other hand, I was amused by our driver: Our French-Canadian cabbie, who had lived for 20 years in Canmore, just southeast of Banff in Alberta, had just finished telling us that, although he knew moose lived in this area, he had never seen one.

And, after thus losing his moose-viewing virginity, he seemed doubly surprised when, five minutes later, we spotted another one.

I smiled again, knowing even as I did so, that I myself had been equally delighted by the sight of western Canada’s familiar white-tailed deer the day before, on our drive north from Portland.

Moreover, I knew this: It is easy for any of us to take for granted what we see every day—sometimes even what we see only on occasion—and to fail to look deeper. On this trip, I intended to do better.

Like many young Alaskans nowadays, I had (back in the late 1970s and early ‘80s) driven back and forth through western Canada, traveling between my peninsula home and college out in the States. And, I suspect, like many young Alaskans making such a drive, I had mostly hurried to get from Point A to Point B, giving barely a nod of acknowledgement to the countryside through which I passed.

On this trip, at this place, I was going to take a closer look.

With my friends—Monte and Bryan Edwards and Jim Bell, all from Gresham, Oregon—I had come to hike through a stretch of the Rockies that began at the Mount Shark trailhead (elevation = 5,807 feet) and traveled generally northwest over several high mountain passes for approximately 60 miles to our truck parked at the Vista Lake trailhead (elevation = 5,643 feet).

We would begin in Spray Valley Provincial Park, cross through the southern end of Banff National Park, hike inside the northeastern edge of Mount Assiniboine Provincial Park, climb back into Banff, and finish just outside the northeastern tip of Kootenay National Park.

Among the many passes we would ascend were four of at least 7,500 feet, including the highest, Wonder Pass, at 7,857 feet.

According to everything we had read, we expected spectacular mountain peaks, the possibility of encounters with big game, weather ranging from pouring rain to hot sun, mosquitoes along the many lakes and creeks, and a tiring yet exhilarating trek.

Once we shrugged into our 50-pound packs, the first surprise was the frequent pulse of helicopters on the first two days. Near the Mount Shark trailhead lay a helipad, and throughout each day dozens of visitors were transported over alpine passes to view the area glaciers before finally settling down on the helipad at the Mt. Assiniboine Lodge, two days and some 20 trail miles from our starting point.

The lodge (built in 1928 by the Canadian Pacific Railway) and its surrounding guest cabins are a popular destination for those unable to make the long trek from Mount Shark, or for those desiring to use the lodge as a starting point for a series of dayhikes into the surrounding countryside.

As convenient as that $160 chopper ride might have been, however, I wouldn’t have wished to miss the trail we took. After a stretch along Watridge and Bryant creeks, mostly through thick stands of spruce, fir, pine and hemlock, we camped along a middle section of Bryant Creek and in the evening watched Columbia ground squirrels pop in and out of myriad holes scattered across a marshy alpine lea.

When lightning began piercing the skies, and thunder rumbled up and down the valleys, we were already ensconced in our sleeping bags, waiting for sleep to claim us.

Our plan for Day Two included veering southwest along deeply turquoise Marvel Lake before turning northwest again and grunting up and over Wonder Pass. From the pass, we would hike past the lodge and lakes Gog, Magog and Og, named for archetypal enemies of God found in the Book of Revelations, before making camp for the night.

As we approached the pass, we met a group of six hikers going in the opposite direction. They warned us of a sow grizzly with three cubs up in the pass, then assured us that the bear appeared more interested in foraging than in humans. Just before we continued on up the trail, one of the women in the group smiled and said, “By the way, there are six switchbacks going up into the pass, just in case you get frustrated and wonder when it’s going to end.”

I admit to counting the switchbacks. When I got halfway along the fifth one, I looked at the mass of mountain above me and wondered briefly whether she’d been telling the truth. She had.

The only disappointment, after all that work, was failing to see the grizzlies.

We moved through the pass and down the other side, arriving at the Assiniboine Lodge just as lightning began to crack and thunder began to boom. We settled in under the gable above the front porch, ordered $7 beers, and relaxed with a milling population of friendly Canadians and a single German man on holiday.

Directly out from the front door of the lodge lay Lake Magog and, on its opposite end, magnificent Mount Assiniboine, a spire of layered stone often referred to as the Matterhorn of the Canadian Rockies. Clouds played around the nearly 12,000-foot summit as the storm provided us with a natural theater.

Arriving in the mist at the Og Lake campground some hours later, we barely erected our tents before a drenching rain began to fall.

Day Three featured a 10-mile hike, about six miles of which was waterless, through the rugged Valley of the Rocks and then over high Citadel Pass. Once again, after pitching our tents near Howard Douglas Lake and enjoying a freeze-dried repast in the sunshine, the skies darkened, the thunder and lightning returned, and the rain fell.

It wasn’t until Day Four that we spotted our first (and, unfortunately, our only) big game on the hike: a single white-tailed deer. Later that day, we would twice be warned about grizzlies ahead, once ascending Healy Pass through the largest mountain wildflower meadow I have ever seen, and once going down the other side toward Egypt Lake. Neither bear made itself visible to us.

Our camp at Egypt Lake was our first (and again, our only) camp sans precipitation. We had a beautiful, cold night beneath the stars, followed by a warm, sunny day in which we followed Pharaoh’s Creek down to its confluence with Redearth Creek, then climbed to our final camp near Shadow Lake Lodge, where were sat in the sun, swatted aggressive horseflies, and drank $6 beers.

That night, once more, the thunder and lightning returned. The following morning, we once again packed up wet gear.

On the hike up Gibbon Pass, our adrenaline kicked in when we recognized fresh cougar tracks in the mud. Alert for the remainder of the climb, we could not spot the elusive cat, and at the top we had to accept that, despite the incredible landscape surrounding us from the beginning, we were not going to see the critters we’d hoped for by leaving the road system.

Descending through a sprawling copse of larch, we left Gibbon behind and marched over rolling ridgelines of conifers toward Monte’s distant truck. That night, we toasted our success as we feasted in The Bison restaurant in Banff. I ate until my stomach was swollen and then smiled as I limped back to our motel.

The next day, on the drive south, I was reminded why so many people are satisfied with staying in their vehicles and just passing through: Shortly after we turned out of Banff National Park and into Kootenay, we spotted our first grizzly. The chocolate-colored bear stood on its hind legs at the edge of the opposite lane of traffic, before dropping to all fours and ambling slowly into the woods.

A few miles later, we spotted three timber wolves trotting through the grass just off the blacktop. Shortly after that, a coyote padded past. Then we started seeing more white-tailed deer, and a rabbit, and—just before we exited the park—a herd of seven bighorn sheep, including a pair of small rams.

Although I still believe that looking deeper is beneficial, the animals seemed to be telling us that sometimes, no matter where you are, you just have to keep your eyes open.

"Right Where I Was Supposed to Be"

Monte and Bryan Edwards and me, in Cottonwood Creek bowl above Skilak Lake. (Monte Edwards photo)

RIGHT WHERE I WAS SUPPOSED TO BE

(This story originally appeared in the fall of 2008, in one of the first issues of the Redoubt Reporter.)

I had just turned to see my fellow hikers, Monte and Bryan, perhaps a hundred yards back, stopped along the high mossy terrace above Benjamin Creek, gesturing and pointing at something I could not see. Another ptarmigan, perhaps. Or maybe just another element of the unbelievable scenery.

I didn’t wait to find out. In the contemplative “Zen” of the moment, I was eager to keep moving. So I put my trekking poles into motion and moved forward again over the undulating caribou moss and between the patches of scrub birch and willow.

Striding over a gentle rise, then, I saw a mass of red-blond hair, and for just an instant I flashed on my golden retriever back at home. But I knew immediately that I had stumbled upon a brown bear, and a moment later I realized that there was more than one: a sow with at least one cub.

I had my wits about me enough to realize two things: The wind was in my face, and the bears were feeding with their backs to me.

I retreated.

Within seconds I was below the rise again, turned 180 degrees, and hastening back to my companions, poles held above my head in an X, as if to say, “Stop! Don’t come this way!” I glanced behind me as I hurried along, hoping to see no furry forms in rapid pursuit.

“Brown bears!” I hissed. “Two or three of them! Just over that rise!”

“Bryan just saw a brown bear, too,” Monte said.

“Yeah,” said Bryan, gesturing to open terrain below us and about a third of the way to the creek. “Down in that grassy spot. It was big, too. It went into that brush over to the left, but I don’t know where it is now.”

Then my own bears appeared, feeding as they ambled slowly to higher ground. There were four of them, a sow with three cubs. Palms gravitated to pistol butts, just in case.

Ten minutes earlier we had been blissfully unaware of the danger. We were a day and a half into a remote-wilderness experience, and, despite multiple black bear sightings, we had felt confident and enthusiastic about our ability to cover great distances safely.

Suddenly, we were in the midst of five brown bears—no help within miles of us, should disaster strike. And although our confidence was somewhat shaken, the truth is that we couldn’t have been happier. We were exactly where we wanted to be.

It’s easy to become a part of the madding crowd in our attempts to escape to the great outdoors.

We troll for king salmon among an aluminum armada on the Kenai River or cast for sockeye in a thicket of limbs and rods on the sparkling Russian River. We cram ourselves into overflowing campgrounds and share community outhouses, or we hike groomed, well-marked trails throughout our state and federal lands.

And we accept it, often, because the burgeoning number of people who occupy the Kenai Peninsula—particularly in the summer months—means we must share our experiences, must move in close proximity with others. Or at least that’s what we’re led to believe.

But the reality is that we can still have true wilderness adventures. Getting away from it all may be more difficult, but it doesn’t have to be prohibitively expensive, and the reward is well worth the extra effort.

Within the Kenai National Wildlife Refuge lies a massive wilderness, isolated within and given special protection among the refuge’s nearly 2 million acres, and entering that wilderness can set visitors far from the hubbub of civilization, grant them a humbling sense of insignificance, and test their mettle in ways beyond the ken of those bound to the usual highways and byways.

It had been many years since I had entered this wilderness, opting instead for quick day-trips closer to the roads. And it had been many more years since I had hiked with my old high school buddy, Monte Edwards, each of us having allowed careers and family and distance to limit our friendship mainly to annual Christmas correspondence.

Last week, however, we changed all that.

Monte and his 21-year-old son, Bryan,  who had never been to Alaska or seen a bear in the wild before, arrived Aug. 2, geared up and ready to go. The following morning, my friend, Drew O’Brien, acted as our portal to the wilderness as he ferried us across the smooth surface of Skilak Lake and deposited us at the Cottonwood Creek trailhead, promising to return and pick us up on Aug. 6.

From that moment, we were on our own. Our rough-hewn plan: ascend the Cottonwood Creek trail to treeline, climb over the top end of the drainage, descend to and cross Benjamin Creek, then follow its high terrace to a notch in the mountains that would lead us down to Twin Lakes, nestled at the foot of an unnamed 5,200-foot crag. There, if we had time, we hoped to make a quick side trip over to Skilak Glacier before returning to Cottonwood Creek via a scree-strewn pass on the northeast side of the drainage.

Some things went according to plan: Bryan got to see his bears—12 blacks in addition to the five brownies. He spotted his first ptarmigan, first hoary marmot, first bear den, and caught his first grayling. He missed out on caribou but we did gather one discarded antler.

With Monte and me, he also crossed four icy stream channels barefoot, logged at least 30 miles of challenging travel, and climbed an aggregate of more than 6,000 feet. But his badly blistered feet, nearly 36 hours of intermittent rain, and the constraints of time—in a land seemingly apart from such considerations—kept us from going beyond Twin Lakes to the glacier.

Still, in four days we saw no one else in our travels, walked on only 4-5 miles of actual trails, and reveled in a sense of vastness and isolation impossible along the winding blacktop of civilization.

In the end, the sow and her trio of cubs eyeballed us for a few minutes, then wandered over a snow-splotched sidehill and disappeared from view. This time, in this place, she seemed as content with her isolation as we were with ours.