Expedition Alaska:part one

i just finished an online article about alaska’s grueling and highly respected dog sled race. the competitiors are 3 days into the Iditarod, which runs 1,100 miles from anchorage to nome, Alaska. the piece drummed up memories of a jolly Frenchman and a burly Canadian kid i met while in Alaska last summer.

i rode dog sleds with them and listened to their tales and dreams which were spun around competing in the notoriously taxing race that lasts about nine days in weather with a wind chill 90 degrees below zero. [all these facts according to the associated press.] and with that it seems appropriate to begin the installments about my Alaskan adventure. i truly regret that I’ve waited so long to record my memories; time always blurs the past, even when it’s as amazing as the couple of weeks I spent on the west coast of North America in late august of 2006. The scenery, new experiences, outdoor adventures, personal challenges and warm company combined to form a surreal vacation that can only be filed in the ‘truly amazing’ mental folder.
I flew into seattle’s airport and camped out, waiting for the arrival of nanny cecil [grandma] and patty and barbara [aunts].

It was the first time in about 9 months that we’d laid eyes on each other. The reunion was cheerful and promising; I was looking forward to some close knit family time as much as I was the seeing the Alaskan wilderness. I’d scoped out transportation to the port during my wait and had decided we should travel as the VIPs that we often pretend we are [how does that worn out phase go…when you’re hot you’re hot, when you’re not fake it.] we piled in a limo [nanny’s first time] and made our way to the ship docked in seattle’s busy port. As it was our first real family vacation [and my maiden voyage on a cruise ship], we’d sprung for the best. Upon arrival, we were whisked along by a personal escort to our spacious cabin with a balcony overlooking the forward deck and all that lay in front of us over the next 7 days. We popped the chilled bottle of champagne that was waiting and soaked in the view of seattle’s waterfront and the warm sun that danced on the surface of the sea.

Then, as drowning can ruin a vacation with the quickness, we obediently turned up for emergency preparation.

Our first day at sea was spent wandering around the ship, figuring out where things were, how to go about utilizing our debit cards to the fullest and locating all the tasty morsels we were entitled to under the ship’s rockin’ “freestyle dining” plan. This is before our snazzy dinner on the first evening.

It gives me a bellyache to recall the humongous amount of food that was constantly up for the taking…there were sit down restaurants that served during meal times, buffets that offered everything from burgers to pasta stations to pizza and sandwiches around the clock, a tapas bar, sushi spot, steak place and if it was in the wee hours or all that wasn’t doing it for you, a greasy-cheesy bar menu was always available. [by the time we returned to seattle, I quite literally couldn’t stuff another thing into my mouth. once i couldn’t even order at an oceanside seafood restaurant cause there was simply no where to put that much food in my belly. How disappointing knowing all the culinary adventures that lively city must have to offer.]
they misspelled our sign in the casino…

The ship made it’s way down the “inside passage,” a waterway that traces alaska’s southwest coast which is comprised of islands, coves, lush wilderness, steep mountains and ice.

This is when we started to realize the sunny weather of washington state wasn’t going to accompany us on the trip. Ketchikan was our first port of call.

It’s a small town, with a total land area of 3.4 sq miles, whose history centers on timber, fishing and gold. The girls split once we hit the shore, with patty and I heading for the rainforest. This was a stressful morning for patty; she was seriously challenging herself with an attempt at the zip-line ropes course. I was also a bit leery, not because I thought the heights or jumping off of tree stands was daunting, simply because I’d never traveled like this before. I usually prefer to plan and coordinate my own adventures, which takes a lot of work, but I think it produces incomparable personal experiences and singular exploits. it also lends a sense of accomplishment, that a seemingly tough task [traversing a foreign country on antiquated trains that leave from stations with broken signboards 16 hours after scheduled, for instance] has been conquered through sheer personal smarts and stick-to-it-iveness. Ok, so I’ll admit it, there was nothing bad about having someone else stress about my time schedule and transportation and decide where my lunch was coming from. The professionals were waiting on the dock to deliver us to our wilderness adventure. We suited up, as patty did her best to be a big girl.

4-wheelers carried us up precariously narrow, steep trails that ran along the border of the Tongass National Forest. after a brief training session we took to the sky, luckily while clipped to high tension cables.

there were 7 zip lines, stretching more than 4500 feet, between spruce, hemlock and cedar trees.

the shortest was about 175 ft, the most thrilling, a line called “ben’s revenge”, spanned 850 feet.

it was quite a rush to stand atop the towering 130 ft. tall platforms without railings, toes hanging over the edge, taking in the amazing scenery that included a salmon farm, reindeer, a waterfall and dense beautiful foliage.

as the wind blew, you could feel the trees you were perched in swaying. the pros explained that’s incredibly important because it means they are healthy and limber. if the trees become rigid, they’re dead and aren’t a candidate for a zip line platform as they’re in danger of snapping. there were also three aerial bridges that bent and swayed in an exhilarating, discombobulating way.

i’m proud to say that patty not only survived but was pretty damn good at the whole nerve wracking process, which involves drawing your legs up varying degrees at certain times, correct body positioning and braking yourself with a gloved hand that presses on the over head line. if you applied too much pressure in braking or didn’t cannon ball just right, you’d get stranded mid-line and have to perform a "self-rescue", which sounded laughable until people started getting stuck, dangling 130 ft above the forest floor by a carabineer. there were a few tears shed.

there were a couple ladies, beth and miriam, who had elected to try the ropes course in an effort to battle a fear of heights. they were a riot and truly earned the hokey medals we were awarded for achievement.


since i was a young tyke, i have been fascinated by oddball sporting competitions. i have espn to thank for introducing me to the world’s strongest man tournie, food eating competitions, sumo and the lumberjack tournaments. was it the woodchips, power tools, flannel sleeveless shirts? who knows, but i had a serious crush on champion mike sullivan back in the day, which meant i was overly excited by the prospect of watching a bunch of mountain dwellers axe and chainsaw logs in cut-throat competition in Ketchikan. patty agreed to join me, which in retrospect i regret cause i will never live down choosing this cheesy, tourist trap of an excursion.

there was real log rolling and serious tree trunk hacking, but there was no real competition. isn’t false advertising a crime? this was not the stihl chainsaw challenge i was looking forward to. if you could manage to let yourself be sucked into the contrived olden days atmosphere, bits of it were good for a laugh. most of it, only for an eye roll.

to be continued...