For better or worse....

My amazing wife in the Alaskan jungle before the rain at mile 6 of 12. (Holly is 5'2" in hiking boots)

NYX is my 86lb mutt and camp guard, trust me you don't walk  in unannounced.

Erebus briefly claimed the soft spot on the cabin floor.

For some reason I thought trail runners would be the way to go, mother nature thought otherwise.

.454 Casull my ever present trail companion

Holly and I took the summer off from Wedding Photography and turned our attention to our much neglected camping supplies this summer. Forest Service cabins are located throughout Alaska and are a great back country deal at $35 a night. But, they are hard to book and you need to make reservations 6 months in advance due to their popularity, and are therefore committed to using them long before a weather report is issued. I had rented the Aspen Flats cabin on the upper portion of the Russian River for the only still weekend available back in February. It sits roughly midway between Cooper Lake and the Russian River campground which is a 21.5 mile one way trip. This is some of the densest bear country in the world and we would hike it at the beginning of the sockeye run when the foliage is the highest and thickest. We had hiked the first four miles before from the Russian Campground and the trail is 4 feel wide and gravel, how bad could this be? We voted to start at the Cooper side and the first 4 miles were decent trail with only thick clouds of bugs to really worry about, then the trail started to deteriorate rapidly and fill up with bear scat. At first it was waist high brush and the occasional pile of bear turds, then we were seeing them every hundred feet or less. (To anyone in the area that day, it was me yelling "Sasquatch" every minute or so, I don't say "Bear" unless there is one.) By this point the foliage is 8 feet tall and completely obscured the trail to the point we couldn't tell if we were on it or not, except for the occasional marker in the trees. Still not bad, at least it wasn't raining.....I actually said that about 10 minutes before it started to rain. At least we only had 4 of 12 miles left in the poring rain in the dense undergrowth stepping over piles of bear scat constantly. Holly got to practice her clapping and I my yodeling, which confused my dogs a might bit. We reached the cabin after 5 hours of hard hiking and quickly set about warming up and getting our gear hung up to dry.

If you ever wonder if you married the right person this is the exact moment you find out. You are soaked, cold, tired, hungry and surrounded by unseen bears next to a salmon stream and only halfway down the trail and not one complaint from my much better half. In fact I think she had more fun than I did to be honest. Some mint tea, chicken fajitas and a warm fire were our evening while it kept raining blew a gale outside, that cabin was our Ritz Carlton. The next morning brought a low fog and constant mist that would turn to rain at mile 2 of 9.5. The trail had great views on the way out, at least that is what the guide book says, I'm sure if you could see over the flora they are great. We didn't see a bear the whole weekend as a result of our noise making, hounds and pure luck. I can't say we had alot of fun, but covered a good bit of ground and can say that we prefer other trails.

Me at the end of 22 wet miles, my .454 Casull in its holster on my chest as always. 

NOTE: If you carry a gun in Alaska, carry the largest caliber you can shoot accurately. Practice often with the loads you carry. If you commit to shooting a bear, follow through and kill it. If you don't others are instantly in danger. DO NOT CARRY A SMALL CALIBER and think it is better than nothing. My wife and I carry both spray and my Casull in addition to our two dogs on leash in bear country. Stay safe, all of Alaska is bear country.