Hope to Homer: The Scenic Route 1997

 

 

Tim's moment of truth comes early on the morning of the sixth day of the Hope to Homer Ultra marathon. We are crossing the Tustumena River which flows directly out of the glacier making the silt laden water 0 C. Dick Griffith was first across the river which is almost waistdeep and swift enough to roll boulders. Tim goes higher to where it is not as deep but faster. Half way across he is knocked off his feet and is fighting to get up with the current tearing at his pack. Barney Griffith and I move into the river to try and grab Tim and his pack if they are swept into Tustumena lake. We had hoped to paddle around the mouth of the river here but the adiabatic wind is blowing about 40 m.p.h. off the Tustumena glacier. Most of us are wearing all the clothes we have but it is still bitterly cold and windy enough to almost knock us over. If Tim Willis is swept into the lake and pushed by the wind he might not get out. Finally, to our relief, he struggles to his feet and stumbles across to the far side, his shins weeping blood. When we do cross cross I estimate we are in the glacial waters about seven minutes and I can feel nothing below my knees.

It has been five days since we started in the Hope to Homer race which is the 16th annual Alaska Mountain Classic Ultra marathon. The sign up sheet warned us,"This race is not easy. Route selection is difficult, river crossings treacherous. Some areas have such thick brush that covering only a mile in four hours is fast. There's lots of bears and lots of climbing, up and down mountains and canyons. Most people don't finish the route. They drop out."

Gordy Vernon and Thai Verzone, who won this fifth day, are somewhere on the beach heading for Homer having passed Jacques Boutet and David Kelly in the swampy area at the mouth of Kachemak By. Closing in on 5th and 6th place were Claire Holland and Angelika Castaneda. At the start I had talked to Angelika having recognized her from an article in the latest Outside magazine which reported that she spoke five languages. I started talking to her in French and learned that she won a triple Ironman where I skied alpine events for the Université de Grenoble. Her Spanish far surpassed mine no doubt because she lived in Mexico and made 25 films there.

Soaked to the waist we stagger across the wide glacial plain to Tustumena Lake to inflate our backpack rafts and paddle. We are the last seven in the race and there are only six in front of us. Once again of the 27 entrants less than half will finish. Every racer inflates his raft but has a different way of getting across the lake, seven solutions to the same problem. My raft weighs as 18 oz. and appears to be little more that a rain jacket with the seems sealed and filled with air. Dick represents 'directisme' and donning his hat with floppy ears paddles a straight line to the opposite shore. "Look at that, if he lost the air in his raft he would be swimming a quarter mile from shore and the lake is liquid ice."

"Yes, but it is the quickest way across." John Lapkus, an Anchorage orthopedic surgeon replies, as he inflates his raft and takes a slightly different tack. The wind starts to blow them about in the lake.

"To heck with that," Tim replies, who has just started to warm up, "Lets hike down to the cliffs and start there." No one expects anybody to wait for them. We all end up paddling our own route to the Fox River portage.

 

It was a beautiful day for the race start in Hope on June 8. "Where are your skis," Roman Dial asked me. Roman recently completed an 800 mile traverse of the Alaska Range on mt. bike.

"I did a circumnavigation of the geographic center of the Harding Ice with two friends last summer. We had perfect weather for five days, ropes, crevasse extraction equipment and lots of food. I still felt like I was looking down the barrel of a gun. I'm going to walk to Hope."

"I've been across the ice four times, and every time it scares me."

Roman won the race in 1982 and three times since. The Hope to Home was invented by George Ripley but has been moved around the state to traverse sections of the Wrangell St.-Elias, Alaska and Brooks Ranges. Roman with his wife Peggy, Vern Tejas (first ascent of Mckinley in winter), Bob Kaufman and two others will take mt. bikes the first 50 miles, pick up skis and do the Harding Ice traverse but not as official race participants.

As the 27 entrants start down the road out of Hope it is a most eclectic parade. There is every imaginable type of pack from under 20 lbs. to more that twice that. Many are wearing shorts over polypro and one man has moosehide pants and shirt. One racer even packs heat in the form of a .44 magnum. "Hey Dick, shall we go down to tidewater and dip our toes," someone yells.

"No, we are already past the start time, let's get out of here."

The tone of the race is set the first 100 ft. when a third of the racers go right and the rest left. Then we divide again before the Hope highway, essentially taking three different paths within a quarter mile of the start. I stay with the group that seems to be following Dick. In a few miles Roman peddles up, "Dick you are ahead of the Eco-challenge people."

It is the last we will see Roman. They cross the Harding ice, paddle down the Fox River and pick up canoes to paddle Kachemak Bay as Vern Tejas told me, "A little training run for the Dyea to Dawson canoe race."

About six miles into the race I am passed by Claire and Angelike and say, "I'll say goodbye because I probably won't see you until the finish."

"Don't be so sure, you never know," Claire adds in passing. Angelike seemed to have as much anxiety as myself at the start even though she has won ultra marathons across the Sahara desert and the Death Valley to Mt. Whitney. Like many of the Alaskan racers I have extensive back country experience but don't know how I will do after six days of hiking for 17 hours/day. Angelika told me she had never been to Alaska and the well publicized and televised ultra-marathons she raced in with vast rescue apparatus were a far cry from this race that had listed as rule #11, "Rescues cannot and will not be either promised or offered. Any individual failing to show or call before Noon, June 15 will be considered overdue. The emergency contact supplied by the racer, the Alaska State Troopers, and the Alaska Mountain Rescue Group will be contacted. This will be the extent of the Alaska Mountain Wilderness Classic's involvement."

Sounds clear to me. Claire was at the breakfast after the race beaming. She seemed no worse for wear except that both of her hands were swollen up like boxing gloves. She was on top of the world even though there was not one square cm. of her arms that was not cut from going through the alders and devil's club.

The race starts a tidewater and crosses over Resurrection Pass trail to the Kenai River. Every racer who finished did the first 41 miles the first day. That is the easy part. The traditional route continues up the Russian River to Aspen cabin and then over Confusion Hills to the Skilak River. One route goes up the Skilak glacier across the Harding Ice and down Tustumena glacier. The traditional route follows the Skilak glacier for about six miles and cuts down Benjamin Cr. and up the Killey River to parallel the ice field to Tustumena lake-a bushwhackers dream.

There is a third route, the Cottonwood Cr. route. For this racers descend the Kenai River in pack rafts and paddle across Skilak Lake to traverse to the Killey River. This was the route Gordy Vernon was going to take he told me as we hiked along a section of the Resurrection trail together. During the hour we spent hiking, Gordy told me about going to school in Florida as I hurry along trying to stay up with him. Then looking at my pack which was almost twice the size of his he added, "You are doing this right by taking your time."

Tim and I camp near Juneau Lake not far from Dick Griffith. We pass him in the morning and continue down passing several racers who are already limping badly. There is a 'blister clinic' at the Sterling highway crossing. Several people have needles out to drain their blisters. Jim Renkert, a winner of the Mt. Marathon race, decides his blisters are too bad even though he brought two pair of shoes. Like the Iditarod, if a racer drops they are allowed to give their food or equipment to other racers but there are no resupply points in this race. He offers some of his smoke salmon and sausage and starts a free for all as hands reach into his pack. "Hey wait a minutes guys, let me have some of that back, I haven't had any lunch yet," he yells. The course continues up the Russian River to Aspen Cabin and then across Confusion Hills to the Skilak River. Confusion Hills got its name during one race when George Ripley was traversing them map and compass in hand and ran into two other racers traveling in the opposite direction with map out and compass in hand. There opposite directions.

After Aspen cabin the real bushwhacking begins. Roman told me about one racer who taken 6 hours the first race to cross Confusion hills, but then returned to work out a route and cut his time in half. So I hiked into them the week before the race hoping to do the same and only succeeded in getting 'lost' going both directions. The hills are formed as lateral moraines from the Russian and Skilak glaciers, with no valleys running the length. There is 90% beetle kill of the Sitka Spruce and then the '91 Pothole fire burned through it leaving piles of timber like match sticks. One must crawl over trees piled five high and then under others. Devil's club and alders grow in profusion. Even following Dick we end up taking six hours to go three miles.

After about five hours I am ready to call a helicopter. I just want out. We end up cliffed out and start to descend a waterfall as it is the only place the brush and deadfall will allow passage. We are down climbing in a stream when Dick falls six feet and lands on his head on a rock. My first thought was, "Medivac." Dick leaped to his feet and with a few choice words continued the lead the next 120 miles to Homer. A fall like that would have left me in a heap in the streamed. I was astounded and asked Barney his son, "Did you see that?"

"Yes I did. Hey Dad this is getting too steep. Let's head right and see if we can't get out of these cliffs."

We are cliffed out. Below the alder thickets cliffs drop away. We continue edging right until we find a passage. Barney and I scout ahead and literally slide to the gravel plain of the Skilak River. Later Dick offers a laconic, "Good work."

When Steve and Rocky Reifenstuhl won the Wilderness Classic last year on the Blackrapids to McKinley Village route, Steve told me, "We slept only about one hour each night. With no bags and no tent we would just lie down on the tundra and pull our raft over us for the darkest hour of the night."

We sleep about six hours and are away before 7 A.M. When we reach the Skilak River the rafts are inflated then we stand in the glacial river and sit down pulling our pack in on top of us. During last years race in the Alaska Range, Andrew Embick, a world class kayaker, had the bottom of his raft rip off in class IV rapids and was saved only by his drysuit and level of expertise.

Dick paddles across first with his pack and then returns for Sue Kruse who will return with him on his second trip. Everyone inflates their boats except Tim who wants to try wading until he plunges in up to his waist, retreats, and finally paddles across with the six of us. I am happy for every river I have run in the last 25 years. Dick tells me that one racer almost drowned here in 1983 when he tried to swim across. That was the year Dick pulled a Sherpa raft out of his pack on the Fox and outfoxed some of the best in the world by paddling while other struggled through a jungle of brush.

Passing on the west side of Skilak glacier we climb past a lake formed by icebergs that was not there in 1984 last time the Hope to Homer was run. We parallel the glacier for about six miles at several points climbing on rock right next to the jumble of ice on the Skilak glacier. At one point the lateral moraine turns into a rock that directly abuts the glacier. While it is relatively easy climbing, a slip would send a racer careening into the bergschrund and down 200 ft. to rest under the river of ice. Several people who were previewing the course prior to the race had come this far, decided that it just wasn't worth the risk and returned. The climbers take to the rock, others go back and into the heavy brush while still others try narrow couloirs that run up the face.

At this point Mike Sirofchuck catches up to our group. It never ceases to amaze me that three days into a race in the back of beyond we could run into someone who was headed to the same place and yet we have not seen his since the first day. He had been with Gordy Vernon the day before crossing Confusion Hills, "We got lost. We bushwhacked out, decided it wasn't the right way, came back, tried again."

"How long did it take you to cross that three mile section?'

"About seven hours."

Mike added that Gordy crossed the Skilak and kept going, "I've never seen anyone go through brush like that guy, he was like a bear going through alders."

Dick, who has raced with Gordy, added, "Yes, Gordy is something else. He doesn't take a map and just goes straight. He doesn't even take a water bottle, just a cup to dip water from streams. See that mountain, I'll bet he just went right over the top of it."

From Twin Lakes Pass one can see Harding Ice where I was skiing just a year ago and Roman is crossing today with his party. We turn right and descend through alpine zones to Twin Lake basin.

I am hiking with Mike Sirofchuck who is also a teacher living in Kodiak. "I have only met one other teacher from Kodiak. She is a botanist who paddled up the coast from southeast with George Dyson, you remember The Starship and the Canoe."

"That's my wife, Stacy Studebaker!" He exclaims stopping in mid-stride to look at me.

We descend Benjamin Cr. and camp. After six hours of sleep we continue down Benjamin following game trails. In previous races Dick has gone over the top of Killey Mountain and descended into the brush jungle of Killey River, something he has sworn never to do again. We have heard a rumor about the presence of a horse trail on the west side of Benjamin so we scout for that. We spread out each looking for well used game trail and then call to the others when it is found. Crossing and recrossing Benjamin Cr. becomes more dicey each time. It was in this area that both Gordy and Thai were knocked over in the river causing Gordy to remark in the "Homer News", "Every time I do this race, at least once I put my life at risk." Gordy lost parts of three fingers climbing Everest.

Near the junction of Benjamin and Killey River we are following a bear trail down a steep alder thicket when I shout, "Hey Dick there is something up here."

"Who's that?" comes a strange voice from the alder thicket.

Jeff Mailloux steps out of the alders wearing neoprene gloves which protect his hands, "Have you guys seen that cliff and rapids?"

"We are trying to avoid it. Let me see the bottom of your shoes."

When one is in a race like the Wilderness Classic a shoe print can tell a story. It is a story of tracks and what the person in front is doing. Jeff holds up his shoe. Nobody has shook his hand yet but we all gather around to look at his shoe print.

"That was you that went over the ridge west toward the Killey?" (Yes)

"Did you go direct over the mountain north of Twin Pass?" (No)

"Were those your tracks coming down the steep snow couloir?" (No)

When we come to the junction of the Killey and Benjamin we now have ten solutions to the crossing. Several break off and scout a riffle downstream. Here there are two trees across the river, a spruce and cottonwood. The water is cold and it is fast. Within minutes Tim is struggling through the branches of the spruce, Dick is clambering up onto the cottonwood, John and Brian Hall are fording below and Jeff is hanging from the branches of the spruce in the river pulling himself and swimming across!

Dick falls from his precarious perch on the cottonwood to the boulder covered stream bank, lets out a yell and scrambles right back up. Most of us follow across the cottonwood. Sue Kruse is the last across. She has severe blisters on the bottom of her feet. Although in considerable pain there is never one word of complaint. We decide to divide up her gear so she only has an empty pack and can walk using ski poles. We cross the Killey five times headed east up river. We have gone only 10 miles in ten long hours. "There was a bear trail here in '84. You folks take a rest I'll go find it," Dick says.

Lying in the sun I talk to Barney and John about paragliding. They both have more than 1000 flights in paragliders. I also see that John is treating his water. At the first stream crossing near Hope I noticed that most racers just drank from the stream. Since then I had drunk from virtually every tributary in the last 100 miles without treating it. Now that it appears I have a reasonable chance of finishing I start treating it also.

Dick returns, "There is no bear trail. I don't see much sign of bear, there must be a lot fewer now. In 1984 there were bear everywhere, we would see them all the time. We have seen none in this entire section. I guess we'll call today a rest day and start tomorrow early."

Mike Martin and Jeff want to go on so Dick points out the ridge they need to climb to head toward Tustumena Lake. Mike has finished several Classics once even hiking back out 40 miles from the Brooks Range with a broken leg using his kayak shaft as a crutch and wearing 1/2 inch off the bottom.

Soon after 06:00 we cross a tributary of the Killey River and head straight up to a small plateau that contains the Killey Lakes. Then we go east until the Killey River is in view again and straight up a green tongue of tundra that is as steep as a cow's face.

Climbing out of Killey canyon we cross snow chutes in the alpine zone reading the tracks of those who are ahead. A herd of 50 caribou are feeding just across the valley. Like the upper Twin Lakes area, it is a spectacular vista that causes one to appreciate this truly wild country we are traversing. We look back on Killey Mountain which is draped in a verdant green of alder jungle and rimmed by cliffs. "One year my partner fell off a cliff over there," Dick muses, "He broke his glasses in the fall and for the next sixty miles he had to stay just a few behind me because he could not see without them."

We traverse to where we can see Tustumena Lake and then head east back toward the Harding Ice. Sue continues to fall further behind. Even with a lightened load she is now getting blisters on her hands as well as her feet. Ever the optimist she pushes on always answering in a cheerful refrain.

Dick finds a faded horse trail that leads a few miles to Emma Lake. There on the door of a public use cabin is a faded yellow sheet with six names: Jacques Boutet, Dave Kelly, Claire Holland, Angelika Castaneda, Gordy Vernon and Thai Verzone. The family renting the cabin tells us that Jacques and Dave were limping. Just about that time Gordy and Thai were hallucinating from lack of sleep as they closed in on the Homer Spit. When they heard about Jacques and Dave at the cabin their reported response was, "Let's go get them."

Jeff and Mike are at the Emma Cabin having spent much of the day lost a the tangle of brush. They decide to fly out. Sue will also drop here and fly out. Mike, who is eating a hamburger offered by the family, tells me, "I have nothing to prove. I have already finished Classics in the Brooks and Alaska Ranges. Besides I don't look forward to the Fox River traverse, I've done enough bushwhacking for a while."

The seven of us remaining head to Tustumena Lake and then follow the shore to camp on the beach. The sky is lit the next morning as we hike toward the Tustumena River. After fording it and paddling around the end of Tustumena Lake we are ready to traverse to the Fox River.

Like the Confusion Hills the reputation of the Fox River portage precedes it. There is 70% spruce beetle kill of the trees in this area. The entire area is gray from dead and dying trees. Dick is a tracker in his ability to ferret out trails where no one else can find them. Here is one of the only two places I have seen him use a map, most of the time he just moves through the country, kayak shaft under his arm, with what seems like a CD ROM of information playing in his head. Now he is holding a compass on a 171 degree azimuth , "Jerry, go out there and find me a bear trail."

We are picking up different trails as we cut across the portage. Late in the afternoon of the six day we reach a tributary of the Fox River and inflate our boats for the 20 mile float to Kachemak Bay. This is where I am glad for my 25 years of running white-water rivers. Barney Griffith, a strong and quiet man, is more at home than I. In Idaho, where I started boating, kayakers told stories around the campfire about Barney. When American Sportsman came to Alaska in 1976 to do a film about Walt Blackadar kayaking Devil's Gorge of the Susitna, Barney who was only 18, trained with the team on the Six Mile River near Hope. He missed one roll because his boat was pinned up against a rock and was not asked to join the team going to the Susitna.

But as Watters said in Walt's biography Never Turn Back, "Blackadar, however, wasn't dealing with an ordinary 18-year-old. He was dealing with the son of Dick Griffith."

John Spenser flew Barney into the Susitna near where the Blackadar team was preparing to run Devil's Gorge and Barney sent them a note via a helicopter that was doing the filming, "Walt, I am up at High Lake with the rest of the people. I have my kayak and am going to run the river. I need to know if I can run it with you guys..."

Barney had played high stakes poker with the best in the world and won, Walt asked him to join the team. What followed was even more amazing. Essentially Walt, then arguable one of the world's premier boaters, took a nasty swim in a place where very good boaters have conversations with God and Barney made it through, "With motorcycle helmet and unfeathered paddle."

We are floating the Fox now, seven rubber duckies in a row. It is raining, we are soaked, and have been on the trail for over 12 hours. Already Mike has twice hung up on a log jam and only his much stronger custom pack raft has saved him from a swim. Tim is close to hypothermic and wanted to stop. Like the rest of us he is all but out of food and soaking wet but we got him to drink liquids and stay with us. The river is full of sweepers, logs that completely occlude the river. I am sitting on my life vest, with log jams and sweepers around the blind corners it might be easier to dive under as go over if one were trapped on a log. It doesn't escape me that Walt Blackadar died in Idaho in 1978 when he was pinned on a log.

My moment of truth comes shortly after 22:00 when I look up and see Dick on the bank motioning for everyone to get out of the river. We have already portaged a half dozen times but several logs are around blind corners. At this sharp right turn there is a cottonwood completely across the river with about three inches of water flowing over it. Brian goes right, is caught on a limb, but manages to pull himself over the tree. I make a split second decision to run center over the tree. Approaching the cottonwood I lift my feet and pack up onto the two foot diameter tree. Just as the current starts to pull down my raft I push forward and am sitting on the tree. If it were a spruce I would have shredded my raft. Dick, who was guiding in Glen's Canyon in the 40's, one of the first in a rubber raft down the Grand Canyon in the '51 and floated the Zanskar River in India with the same Sherpa raft he is using here in the 80's, yells out, "Now its getting fun."

The fun continues with sweepers and logjams sometimes completely blocking the Fox river. Finally one of the racers almost doesn't get out before being swept into log across the stream and we decide to stop for the night.

On the morning of the 14th we are off early again. The racer who was almost into the log the night before told me, "I don't mind admitting I'm scared."

"A little fear is a good thing," I remark.

This day we see both brown and black bears near the river. It is the first brown bear I have seen on the Kenai. The first few nights on the Classic I tied my food up in a tree like I have for 30 years in bear country. Then it moved closer to my tent until the last few nights I have been sleeping on it. What little food my companions have left they have also been sleeping on. We're talking seven guys with an attitude, at this point having food is critical to finishing the race and we are all intent on doing that.

Actually Dick is ready to burn his last few packages of Top Ramen even though we have perhaps 50 miles left to go today. I stash them in my pack and we float. Power lines cross the river from Bradley Lake which is new since the last race here in 1984. To the right of the lines high on the bluff I point out my limited entry parcel on the bluff high above the river. We bob along the Fox until it empties into Kachemak Bay. Dick remembers exactly where to get out to find the trail that leads to Kachemak Selo and then to the bluffs we follow all the way to Homer.

It was at this point that the winners, Gordy and Thai, were hallucinating from lack of sleep. Gordy imagined an old woman bowing to him and Thai thought that raindrops hitting his jacket was the sound of helicopter blades. Marathoners like Brian Hall and John Lapkus are out in front. Mike and Dick are close behind. Barney has severe blisters and considers dropping at Kachemak Selo, "I want to race next week in the Bird Ridge hill climb, I know I could finish but why should I tear my feet up?"

I catch up to Dick and he asks me how Barney's feet are. I reply, "He is draining the blisters now and says he'll make a decision on if he will finish."

"He loves mountain races, he'll just have to decide." With that Dick walks along the beach with long strides. I have come to admire this strong father-son relationship. They seem to sense what the other is thinking. They have such confidence in each other's abilities. A short time later Barney passes me running and remarks, "Running seems to be easier on my feet than walking." He not only does the Bird Ridge race the following week, he wins his class.

Among the myriad photos on Dick's wall at home that document a life of adventure there is one that caught my eye. It shows a sled full of gear that has been pulled across the frozen sea. As one follows the tracks into the vanishing point there is a place where they cross a hole in the ice. That hole represents where Dick, who was solo, fell through the ice into the Arctic Ocean miles from shore. When I asked him how he managed to get out he answered, "Quickly."

This winter Dick will return to finish the Northwest Passage from Kotzebue across the top of North America to Hudson Bay. He has done it alone, in stages during the winter using wooden skis. He intends to finish it in '98. I can only hope that at 70 I could have the will and physical stamina to be completing my own NW passage.

The health of an ecosystem can be determined by its indicator species. If a river has a strong salmon run it is in good shape. If a country has wolves and bears it has a food base to support them. Any place that can host a Wilderness Classic is a "Wild and Perfect Land." I hope that 30 years hence a Hope to Homer will still be possible here.

Just before midnight on the sixth day I hit the wall. About 12 miles from the finish at the Homer Spit my feet just wouldn't move anymore. I had pushed past the blisters and had drained them to the point I could walk. The pain in my knee is an old smokejumper injury that hasn't bothered my for almost 20 years. The continuous hiking and fording rivers had caused an overuse injury and it just locked up.

At 03:00 I am walking again, more slowly now but walking. Yesterday I pushed past the point of overuse and my knee just wouldn't function. I find out that I am not alone as some racers will spend time after the race on their hands and knees with superating wounds on the bottom of their feet and others will be on crutches. With 166 miles behind me and only four miles of easy walking on the Homer Spit ahead I still do not know if I can make it. If my knee won't work I resolve to get out my backpack raft and paddle and if the waves get to high then to crawl. Walking down the spit I wear a half inch off my kayak paddles leaning on them, yet there is not one person here who even knows I am in a race. I look like another spit rat washed up on the beach searching for a camping spot albeit with a fancy set of paddles. The music in my head tells a different story, for all the world it feels as though I am flying. I have flown enough parachutes and airplanes throughout Alaska to know the feeling.

Jerry S. Dixon Seward, Alaska December 16, 1997

 

 

 

 

 

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