Laura Cavagnaro
-Aldo Leopold
"What the hell is that on the roof?" Paul exclaimed as he pointed to the upper logs of the small cabin.
"What? You've never seen grass before?" said Mary stepping out from behind her heavy wood door. I couldn't help smiling as Paul looked away embarrassed. "The grass helps insulate the house and keep it warm in the winter and cool in the summer. Welcome to my home, wanna go see the dogs?" she said all in one hurried breath. Her pale face was shining with excitement. The wrinkles around her face smashed together as she smiled, almost hiding her pale blue eyes behind the folds. Her long, untidy silver hair waved and spilled around her face. You could tell she was happy to have visitors.
We could hear the dogs well before we could see them. They howled and yelped and barked in a well-rehearsed chorus. Mary abruptly stopped on the trail and I had to tip sideways to avoid crashing into the back of her. She threw her head back and howled in a loud, low voice. I almost jumped out of my skin. Now the dogs were really going crazy. I had the feeling we were about to walk into a hungry wolf den. I shot a puzzled look over to Erin, who raised her eyebrow and shrugged.
Our group had woken up extra early to drive out to visit Mary Shields, in her home in Fairbanks, Alaska. Throughout the summer she hosts small groups of tourists. In the 1970s she was the first woman to complete the 1,049 mile Iditarod Sled Dog Race. After hearing she was in her sixties and had published multiple novels, including some children's books, I pictured her as the frail, librarian type. I was surprised instead to find this hearty, wild, half crazy dog woman.
We came to a large pen containing fourteen miniature replicas of Mary's house. Each dog was chained to its own log cabin, with grass growing on top and a nameplate tacked to the side. Clifford, Stevie, Kianna, Crockett, Little Girl, Scout and the rest ran circles on their chains, no longer howling but making whining sounds that came from deep in their throats.
After an hour of playing with the dogs, we hiked back up to the cabin, wet and cold. "Sit, get comfortable," Mary commanded. I wondered if she always did that, talked to people like she talked to her dogs or maybe fluffy words just weren't that important out here. The cabin was only one room. A thin blue curtain separated the bedroom from the rest of the house. Potted plants and ferns were everywhere and lining one entire wall of the living room were books from floor to ceiling. I guess when it's fifty below and you have no TV there's nothing else to do. The small cabin was cluttered with exotic knick-knacks, like a beautiful white husky dog carved from whalebone and a tiny Eskimo doll made from cloth and fur. Black and white photos lined the walls; most were of sled dogs and mountains.
There were no seats besides the kitchen table and one leather easy chair, but I found a comfy spot on a bearskin rug in front of the crackling stone fireplace. She handed out tea and ginger spice cookies, reminding me of my grandparents at home. At sixty-one I wondered how much longer she would be able to live out here alone.
I could feel the group collectively relax as the fire and tea did their jobs, we all fell into a silent, contented trance.
Taking advantage of the quiet, Mary began telling about her life in Alaska. She first came to the state in the summer of 1965 to work for the Camp Fire Girls of Anchorage, running an all-girls day camp. "You all better be careful," she said. "I came here for one summer and ended up staying forty years." She left Wisconsin because she was looking for something. "I took some ecology classes, a new subject in the 60's, or at least new to me. I was not a beatnik or hippie, but I loved poetry and since early childhood I loved being in nature. With a better understanding of earth processes, my connection with the natural world gave me stability in a time when things were changing very quickly. When I came to Alaska, the land, the feeling of being a small living creature in this big place, made me feel at home. The more time I spent out in the wilderness, the more clarity I felt."
She told fantastic stories of her annual month long camping trips in Denali National Park. It was a tradition she started with her husband, but now it is just her and her dogs. Through the back window she pointed to her bright yellow canvas tent complete with wood burning stove. For weeks at a time Mary camps in the tundra, where temperatures are below zero and there are very few hours of sunlight. Each day she mushes her dogs anywhere between thirty and fifty miles before finding a safe place to camp for the night, alone. On her sled she carries limited supplies and the bare minimum food necessary to sustain herself and the dogs. She also carries an axe to cut wood for the stove, which she must keep burning all night long.
"Why do you go on these trips?" Erin asked.
"I miss the peace. I go to gather my thoughts and clear my head. I don't know what I would do if I didn't live in a place where I could be alone with the land," Mary responded. "In wilderness you can't help but feel the connection of all things. I love that."
She sat straighter in her chair, her eyes narrowed as she said, "though there's a lot less peace around here than there use to be. Development in Alaska seems to be following the same greedy patterns as the westward expansion in the lower forty-eight. Some people come to Alaska because they appreciate the opportunity to live in a space that has not yet been completely spoiled by people. Some, most, come here because they want to take advantage of the opportunity to exploit Alaska. Industrial sized tourism, cruise tours; I would put in this second category. They sell Alaska and they destroy it at the same time. They do not understand that there is a carrying capacity; there are limits to which the land can welcome more visitors."
This was the real reason Mary invited visitors to her home. The dogs and the wilderness stories are her hook, but her real message is that Alaska is under attack.
As we got up to leave, Mary continued almost desperately, "Tourism needs a lighter footprint in order to be sustainable at a quality of experience that is respectful to this great land. Wilderness is the salvation of mankind, or something like that," she muttered. "Alaska's wild lands are our most valuable resource for the future so that the next generations can experience what we have had the privilege to know."
As we left the house and waved our goodbyes Mary stood at the door, shoulders hunched, looking a little older than she did when we first arrived. As we pulled out of her long dirt drive Paul exclaimed, "is that a hot tub?" We all careened our necks around to get a passing glance of a large state-of-the-art plastic hot tub resting on a cement slab next to the log house. I smiled.
-Goldbelt Alaskan Tours
This was the trip of a lifetime, three weeks of hiking and camping in the Alaskan wilderness. Even better was that I was going to see the state not as a tourist but as an explorer and a student. There were other options, I could have gone on a train ride through Canada, visited Beijing and Shang High, or helped teach South African children English, but the second I read that we would be camping and hiking around Alaska, I was hooked. When I told my mom she couldn't believe it, "You camping? Like in a tent on the ground?"
"Yes," I said, "that's the best part."
"For three weeks in a tent? You know it's going to be cold right? You've never slept outside for more than one night in your life, and even then it was just in the backyard," my mother teased.
"Yea, so what?" I countered, "I've always wanted to be more outdoorsy, but with you and Dad as parents I never had the chance. I can't think of anything better than sleeping in the middle of the Alaskan wilderness listening to moose eatingÉwell whatever they eat and wolves howling at the moon."
Alaska is known as America's "Last Frontier." After decades of pushing westward to settle new and unexplored wilderness, American's found themselves running out of territory. In 1890, the Census Bureau announced that a "frontier line" no longer existed. Before European settlers arrived, the United States consisted of one billion acres of lands, most of which was pristine forests, grasslands, deserts and wetlands. Today over ninety-eight million acres are developedÑlands considered permanently altered by human activity.
To American's Alaska represents the last truly wild place left in the country. Tourism companies have capitalized on this perception. "The Last Frontier" slogan is used to draw upper class Americans to the state. It promises the experience of being a pioneer, of discovery, of living out an American tradition. My grandfather, a New York City mortgage banker, saved up for years for a trip to Alaska. Each day he sat in his windowless ten by ten office and dreamed of the pioneer life. His grandfather, William, had told him many stories of his dangerous trek from Missouri to Oregon as a boy. My grandfather, loved to retell us these stores, especially the accounts of crossing the Rocky Mountains.
Some of my favorites were how my great-great grandfather walked the entire two thousand miles barefoot or how William's best friend had been struck by lightning on the prairie and was never "quite right" after. Best of all was the story of hail the size of apples. "There was no shelter on the open plains," my grandpa would say. " They were always worried about weather. When it hailed like that, they would get under their big wagons and wait for it to stop." I always imagined William with long, shaggy hair, lying under the wagon with his parents singing songs, and licking ice apples. Though probably exaggerated over time, my grandfather loved retelling these stories.
He once read me a brochure he had found, "Looking to get off the beaten path? Then we have the perfect adventure for you. Alaska, home of northern lights and magical ice-capped splendor. Sail along the massive ice face of Tracy Arm Fjord, then walk on an Ice Age glacier and watch the sunlight form prisms at your feet. Don't forget to listen closely--you might just hear the primordial "singing of the ice."
"That's what I want to do," he said, "listen to ice sing!"
When he was sixty-four he finally got to go to Alaska. To him it represented an area still wild enough to be explored. My grandparents boarded the Northern Princess cruise ship in Seattle and spent a week sailing along the coast.
Five years latter, I got my own turn to visit Alaska. On May 15th I drove up to School to meet the group of sixteen other students who would be making the journey with me. I also met the two professors, Frank and Scott, who would be leading the expedition. Frank had spent ten summers doing geological research in the Alaskan mountains and was an experienced outdoorsman. Scott, a philosophy professor, was not so experienced, but he was eager to learn the ins and outs of camping and experience Alaska for the first time.
When I met the other students I began to feel a little unsure of my decision. Most of them were geology students and had been camping all their lives.
"I've camped in Yellowstone, Zion, Yosemite, Acadia, the Grand Canyon, pretty much every state except Alaska," said Nick the first time I met him.
"Oh' you think your special?" I quipped, "I've been camping in my backyard." He didn't find the joke as funny as I did and left to talk to Samantha who had just gotten back from a weeklong backpacking trip in the Allegheny Forest.
Next I met Erin, an Economics major, the only student beside myself that was not a science major. "Don't worry," she said, "I haven't ever been camping, not even in my backyard. I'm just so excited, Alaska is a place I've always wanted to visit, and I feel like we will have amore meaningful experience as opposed to just going on vacation with a tourist group or something."
Before the trip we had received a list of supplies; sleeping bag, sleeping pad, heavy waterproof boots, a mess kit, a waterproof suite (pants and a jacket), blank notebooks, and enough warm clothes to last us for three weeks. Tacked on at the end of the list in small italic letters it stated, "students are only allowed to bring one bag and it must way less than fifty pounds."
As we packed the school bus that would take us to the airport, I tried to hide my large three-foot tall suitcase complete with wheels and a handle for dragging it around the airport. It wasn't quite square anymore and more resembled a stuffed laundry bag, as it was bulging in all directions. Why did I bring so much stuff! I screamed at myself. How come no one told me to buy a fancy backpack like everyone else had? How did they fit all there stuff in there?
"I got a great deal on this North Face pack, only three hundred bucks. It's the Catalyst 75, its award-winning Pivotal Suspension system works with your body as you walk to evenly disperse the load to your hips. It also comes with a removable lid that converts to a waist pack, multiple access zippers so you can easily reach your gear and Hypalon daisy chains to keep the gear you use a lot right within reaching distance," cooed Nick. He sounded like a walking commercial. I wanted to vomit.
Luckily the attention switched to Erin as she dragged her black hockey bag over to the back of the bus. The thing was almost as big as me. I was secretly glad to see her coming; I didn't feel quite so out of place.
Aldo Leopold (1925)
My calf's burn and my lungs scream for me to stop. I ignore them and pushed on. Soaked from sweat and snow, fat, salty droplets slide down my neck and back. It's thirty degrees, but I am burning up. Pulling my sleeves up for the fifteenth time, I wipe the sweat from my eyes and continue on.
The rush of wind in our ears is so loud that my companions and I had given up trying to talk about four miles back. With each punishing step I thought about the sign at the bottom of the mountain. "This trail is strenuous! Hikers gain approximately 1000 feet of elevation with every mile and there are several rocky sections that may require a bit of scrambling. Allow at least 10-15 hours for the hike."
When I first saw the carved wooden sign, I didn't give it more than a glance. All week the boys in the group had been giving the girls a hard time about making the climb. "You know, I hear the view from half way up the mountain is pretty good, I mean its not the top, but at least you'll get to see something," Paul had teased.
The Alaskan summer morning is beautiful and warm. Great pine Cedar Citca and Black Spruce trees tower overhead, creating a dense canopy. The sun streams down in spots that scatter the dark floor and skip across the deep green ferns. Within the forest is an almost eerie silence; so much different than the noises of Anchorage we had woken up to just yesterday morning. In the port city I had heard natives grumbling about crowded streets, beaches, trails or the noise from flight-seeing tours that run continuously all day.
Alaska is now the third most popular cruise destination in the world, right behind the Caribbean and the Mediterranean. Unlike these tropical locations, Alaska doesn't promise a suntan, it caters to another type of desire. Tourists come to Alaska to see wilderness, Grizzly Bears, Bull Moose, and Eskimos smoking salmon in their igloos. They come to Alaska looking for adventure. More than five hundred cruise lines decked out with tuxedoed waiters, movie theaters and Swedish masseuse bring two thousand mid-western doctors, CEO's, lawyers and their wives per week to some communities with only eight hundred residents. In fact each season, tourists outnumber residents by over one hundred thousand.
I am so relieved to be in this breathtaking quite, transported back in time. I feel as if a dinosaur should be rounding the corner any moment. The soil below my feet is moist and sinks when I walk, releasing an earthy smell of soil and decay. Down wood in the forest directly contributes carbon-rich organic material to the soil, providing a substrate for mosses, fungi and seedlings. Most Americans don't realize that Alaska contains a dense, complex rainforest. The more common tropical rainforests cover about ten percent of the Earth, the less common temperate rainforests of Alaska cover just 0.2 percent.
Ecologists understand rainforests as consisting largely of vegetation that thrives in wet conditions, which, on the West Coast, is about eighty inches of precipitation per year. Here, moist temperate air gets trapped by the coastal mountains and creates the rain that nourishes this forest. The poor soils and cold weather is what makes this area distinguished for its coniferous evergreen, softwood species such as the western red cedar, western hemlock, Douglas fir, and Sitka spruce that grow year-round. Most remarkably this forest features the last stands of ancient old growth, trees at least 250 years old, but capable of living well beyond 1,000 years.
Old-growth forests are special for the diversity of life forms they support, including many so-called "lesser species," of which we know very little. Millions of insects live in tree bark or the soil decomposing dead plant matter, this is critical for life on earth. Currently, 121 prescription drugs come from rainforests. Insects and plants provide some of the ingredients necessary to make birth control, stimulates and tranquilizing drugs. Who knows what we will be able to discover in the future? At least 380 vertebrate wildlife species live in the rainforest; 262 of them are birds, almost all of which use the trees for nesting and feeding. Many of these vertebrates can be found on the threatened or endangered species lists. Salmon are born in the streams and rivers of the forest. The last intact populations of the Alaskan cougar hunt among the trees and the threatened North American Golden Eagle soars above the tree line. These and other animals are especially vulnerable because clear-cutting continually shrinks their habitat.
The Portland-based environmental group Ecotrust estimates that almost half the twenty-five million hectares of coastal temperate rainforests that once covered North America has already been lost to logging, agriculture and development. Cattle raising and dairy farming are the largest agricultural industries in Alaska. Farmers cut forests in order to create pastures for their cattle to graze. Just like the rest of the country, Wal-Mart has made its way into Alaska. Over the last ten years forests have been cleared to make way for subdivisions, shopping centers and movie theaters. The policy group World Resources Institute reports the total area of old-growth forest now amounts to just thirteen percent of the original amount, of which only half is protected in national parks and wilderness areas. Half the world's temperate rainforests have been destroyed, a crisis far more urgent than the disappearance of the tropical rainforests, yet no one knows about it.
The vegetation along the trails is dense and passes through thickets of salmonberry, a favorite food of black bears. I had always thought Grizzly Bears were more ferocious and dangerous than the cuter, smaller Black Bear. Grizzly bears are more than six feet tall and can weigh up to 1,400 pounds. The average black bear is a mere three feet tall and averages only 200 pounds. Yet it is Black Bears who are more prone to attack. Grizzlies, who live further north in the interior of Alaska, keep to themselves and almost never initiate attacks unless provoked.
Before the trip our group went through several hours of extensive bear safety training. It had me so nervous that I was constantly on the look out for signs of bears. Black bear tracks are distinctive; the hind footprint resembles that of a human. All bears have five toes, with the front foot short and about five inches wide. The hind foot is long and narrow, measuring about seven inches. It is also easy to recognize black bear's sizable droppings of plant leaves, partly digested berries, seeds, or animal hair. I also kept an eye out for claw marks on trees, ripped apart rotting logs and clumps of hair stuck to tree bark from bears scratching on the logs.
As we hiked we were careful to make noise, talking loudly or singing. Some hikers even wear bells on their boots to alert bears of their presences, but we preferred to sing. We covered everything from the Lion King to the Beatles and even some Aretha Franklin. When we lost the energy to think of new songs, we would use the "call of the explorer," and yell in low bellowing voices, "heeeey bear." Rule number one of bear safety, never surprise a bear. Bears will usually move away if given the opportunity, but if startled they can attack, especially if there are cubs around.
At school in Pennsylvania we covered everything from bear behavior, to how to react if you are attacked. Behaviorally, it can be difficult to distinguish a bear in a predatory mode from a curious or food-conditioned bear. Predatory bears don't threaten or make noise. They are intensely interested in their victim. Bears can stalk their pray for miles, without them ever knowing. During training we received an extensive, fifty page manual that we nicknamed "the bear bible." One section said, "if a black bear seems to be stalking you, keep an eye on it and don't let it circle behind you." Right, I thought, I just wont let the two hundred pound bear get behind me, that is if I even see it at all.
Rule number two, three and four listed in the bible were, don't run, don't retreat, and don't climb trees. "You should face the bear and stand your ground to see what happens. If it keeps advancing and you lose your nerve, slowly back way. If it follows you, stand your ground and prepare to defend yourself." Sure, I'll just stand still while a bear charges straight for me. I could easily picture myself "loose my never" running and screaming in the other direction.
Tom, a bear expert who came to talk to the class, didn't help my confidence much. He told us, "don't even think about climbing, bears usually get to the tree and drag you out of by your foot, a lot of people have died that way." Tom was tall, thin and wore an outback hat that you would expect to see in Australia. He had been studying bears on the west coast for a number of years and had apparently "seen it all."
He also showed us how to defend ourselves if we needed to fight. We were instructed to "go for the eyes" and dig our fingers deep into the eye sockets or to punch "wildly" at its nose. I've never been in a fight in my life, and I was pretty sure I didn't want my first time to be with a bear. "Bears direct most bites and blows to their opponents head, so at all costs we had to protect your head," Tom explained. How was I going to gouge its eyes out while protecting my head and punching wildly?"
The scenery is too beautiful to worry much about bears, besides I had been in the state for over two weeks and hadn't yet seen a bear. We continue hiking, crossing little creeks of clear water that trickles over rounded dark rocks. These runoff streams are everywhere, the result of snow melting higher up the mountains. My pack is heavy on my back, full of warm clothing, rain gear, an extra pair of socks, sunscreen, plenty of water, some granola bars and trail-mix. We have to be prepared for everything, storms, high winds, rain, snow, intense sunlight and sudden temperature changes. Alaskan weather, even in summer, is extremely unpredictable.
After crossing a large stream, careful to balance on rocks so I didn't soak my feet, I ran right into the back of Scott.
"Shhh! Look!" he whispers as he points to a rock in front of us.
A medium sized brown and white fur ball sits sunbathing on the cool boulder. Its nose is long and pointed. Each eye is set deep into its shaggy fur, it's a wonder it can see through all the fluff. It is about the size of my cat at home except much rounder, some weird mutant cross between a rodent, a beaver and a grizzly bear.
"What is that?" I ask.
"Just a Marmot," he replies. "But it almost looks like a baby bear doesn't it?"
As our group walks past, the marmot does not move. It continues about its business, dozing on the warm rock.
"The stupid thing doesn't even know to be scared of us," Nick said. "Come on, let's pick up the pace or we'll never make it."
The boys rush ahead, while Scott and I stay back looking at the Marmot. "The only reason it's not scared of us is because it just isn't use to seeing people," Scott explained. "This is pristine wilderness."
I had had been hearing the word wilderness relentlessly since I arrived in Alaska, but what exactly constitutes pristine wilderness?
Cheryl Charles wrote, "Wilderness. It affects our consciousness in ways we can neither explain nor understand. Our relationship to the wilderness is a legacy-its value not clearly understood, just as the value of the wilderness itself is not clearly understood." The Wilderness Society describes wilderness as any rare, wild place where one can retreat from civilization, reconnect with the Earth, and find healing, meaning and significance. To the Sierra Club wilderness is a place where the imprint of humans is substantially unnoticed. It is where natural processes are the primary influences and human activity is limited to primitive recreation and minimum tools. Famed conservationist Aldo Leopold, initially defined wilderness as "a continuous stretch preserved in its natural state, open to lawful hunting and fishing, big enough to absorb a two weeks' pack trip, and kept devoid of roads, artificial trails, cottages, or other works of many." Later in life Leopold's definition grew in meaning. He wrote that "the indivisibility of the earth-its soil, mountains, rivers, forests, climate, plants, and animals" meant that we should "respect it collectively not only as a useful servant but as a living being." Roderick Nash, Wilderness Historian, has written, "Wilderness is so heavily weighed with meaning of personal, symbolic, and changing kind that it is difficult to define." Wilderness is a human constructed concept, more a state of mind than a tangible place. It means something different to everyone. I feel, I tend to side with Leopold. Being miles away from a road or car feels so refreshing. The trees, the soil and the animals are all alive. This is there home. I almost feel as if I'm intruding.
In early Norse languages, the root word "will" meant willful or uncontrollable. From "willed" came the adjective "wild" used to convey the idea of being lost, unruly, or disordered. The term was extended to wildlife or wild animals as "being out of control of man." The idea of a habitat of wild beasts implied the absence of men, and wilderness was conceived as a region where a person was likely to get into a "disordered, confused, or wild condition."
The idea of wilderness, as we have come to understand it, emerged during the agricultural transition period around 10,000BC. Prior to this humans had no idea of wilderness because they were too much a part of nature to conceive of it as wilderness apart from themselves. Native Alaskans don't have a world for wilderness nor do they protect land as officially designated wilderness as Americans do. They believe all land should be respected and all land is used only for survival, whether it be physical, spiritual or mental. This belief that people and nature are intimately bound to one another is a belief widely shard among all indigenous peoples, as is the belief that the natural world is alive.
Even in today's dictionaries, wilderness is defined as uncultivated and otherwise undeveloped land. The absence of people is a common perception. Today some define wilderness as a sanctuary in which those in need of solace can find relief from the pressures of civilization. Cheryl Charles explains that the American psyche contains contradictions related to wilderness. On one hand we have historically wanted to chart and map unnavigated areas and to tame the inhospitable, mysterious and threatening. Our narratives reinforce these perceptions; the witch in Hansel and Gretel lived in the wild forest, as did the wolf in Little Red Ridding Hood. Dracula lived in the wild untamed lands of Transylvania and werewolves roamed desolate, unsettled domains. Simultaneously, we yearn to keep wilderness, wishing there were still new frontiers to explore. We have feared the wilderness, seeking to conquer it; we have cherished the wilderness as beautiful and capable of enlightening us, wishing to protect it in its wild state.
The movement to protect wild lands reached its peak with the creation of a National Wilderness Preservation System, passed into law by Congress as the Wilderness Act of 1964. According to this act wilderness is defined, "in contrast with those areas where man and his own works dominate the landscape, is hereby recognized as an area where the Earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain." The act went on to require that a wilderness retain "its primeval character and influence" and that it be protected and managed in such a way that it "appears to have been affected primarily by the force of nature." This ideal of wilderness is embodied in more than six hundred federal wilderness areas in the United States.
This definition of wilderness seems like a good one, yet I question how well we have been able to follow it. Denali National Park in interior Alaska is considered one of the best models we have. Yet, a road over ninety miles long stretches across it, built in order to bus people throughout the park. I'm pretty sure that the road did not appear "by the force of nature." I'm still conflicted on how far parks should go. Roads bring people, pollution and disturbances. Yet, so much pleasure can be derived from the wilderness and I don't believe it should be restricted to only those young and fit enough to hike through it. We will be battling out the definition of wilderness for years to come.
This marmot laying on the rock was certainly wild. Eyes narrowing, it stood on its hind legs and bellowed a high-pitched warning, sounding almost like a chipmunk. We decided to give it some space and moved on.
As we climb higher in elevation we leave the magic of the rainforest for the stark nothingness of the tundra. After the abundance of vegetation in the forest the brown shrubs and weedy pioneer plants poking out from the gray earth feels like a let down.
"Look!" Paul yells. I follow his finger and finally see the Harding Ice Field, the reason for this hike. The 300-square-miles of glacial ice extends out like a frozen river. As far back as I can see is bright blue. This blue seems so unnatural, so unlike any other color in nature. The ice is a more brilliant bluish green than the sky; it reminds me of the Caribbean Sea. It is a common misconception that the blue color exhibited by glaciers is due to the same phenomenon that makes the sky blue, but nature has more than one recipe for producing the color. In frozen water and in the sky the processes are almost the reverse of each other. The blue in the sky results when light bounces off molecules and small dust particles in the atmosphere. Because blue light scatters more than red, the sky looks blue except for the direction of the sun. When light passes through ice, however, the red light is absorbed while the blue is transmitted. It takes an appreciable thickness of pure ice to absorb enough red light so that only the blue is transmitted.
"I'm tired and my legs are starting to hurt," I whine. "This would be a great place to take a break and examine the ice, plus we should wait for Erin and Stacy to catch up." I flop to the ground and take out a granola bar.
"No way! We have to keep moving, we have to get to the top," Paul answers.
The boys agree with him, even Scott, and they don't even wait for me to stand up before racing on. Nick and Samantha hang back. Erin came stumbling around the turn. "I'm done, Stacy and I can't walk anymore, I don't know if I'll ever be able to walk again. We're gonna stay here and eat lunch," she says breathing heavily.
"I'll walk you back down," Nick says in his macho voice. "It's so cloudy its not like we'll see anything good at the top anyways."
"I'll come with you too," Sam says. "Really what's the point of walking all the way up there? Lets go back and take a nap."
I cannot believe it! They are turning back. All their talk and all their gear and they aren't going to finish this once in a lifetime hike.
There is no way I'm turning back down now, and I don't want to be left behind so I stand and hurry to catch the others. Another two miles and we surpass the vegetation line. Not much of a feat considering I still had three hours of hiking, straight up and in the snow, to look forward too. When I first began the hike the temperature had been fifty-eight degrees, now at the snow line it is hovering just above thirty. No matter how hard I try I still manage to fall behind the group. Wet and exhausted, we take breaks frequently, collapsing into the snow to catch our breaths. When I finally reach the group resting I fall to my knees and lay sprawled on my back, in a daze. I hardly lay down for a minute before the boys are standing back up. With each stop it becomes harder and harder to stand. I have to rock my body back and forth, using the momentum to heave myself to my feet. We are on a strict time schedule, if we aren't up to the top by three, we will have to turn around and go back. In Alaska in May the sun doesn't set until 11:30 each night. We aren't worried about sunlight, it's falling evening temperatures that holds us to a clock. Even still, I wish someone would stay back and hike with me.
Rounding a corner I can finally see the top. It looks like it's right in front of me. I raise my hand out to it, as if I can grab a hold of the sharp peek and pull myself to the top. I can see the rest of the group out in front of me, tiny brightly colored dots, they pick up the pace, excited that the top seems so close. Yet, surrounded by all white, we have no way to judge space; every mile looks the same. No matter how fast I go, I am no closer. My lungs are on fire now, I gulp the freezing air and it stings, snot drips from my nose and I can't see straight. My eyes are watering so bad from the wind that the white snow blurs and smears. I follow a rhythm in my head; left left left right left. I say it over and over, willing me feet to continue. My strides are long and awkward as I try to place my feet in the prints the boys have left in the snow. I fall further and further behind, I can't even see anyone anymore, nothing but white. Everywhere. I fall exhausted, no closer than before. With all my strength I pull myself up and continue staggering, hardly in control of my own feet. Taking a wrong step I break through the fine layer of ice covering the snow; my leg sinks all the way up to my waist. I try once to pull it out, but give up and lay down, leaving my leg buried. Wheezing and gulping air, I stare at the now cloudy sky, making peace with the fact that I am not going to finish the hike. I'll just lay here until they come back down, though who knows how long that will be.
The sky is a steal gray; it looks every bit as cold as it is. The wispy clouds float by, pushed by the wind. Then I see it, gliding silently above me. Ordinarily I would have grabbed for my camera, I had been on the look out for a Golden Eagle all week. Instead I lay, unmoving. That high up, it is little more than a graceful black dot. Every few seconds it tumbles and swooshes reveling the brilliant golden brown atop each wing. It swoops lower, circling me; it's impressive claws now visible. Jet-black and long, his hooked talons are like moon shaped razors. It circles above over and over, silently. Everything is silent. It watches me; I watch it.
Where do I come from? How do I fit here? These impossible to answer questions wont leave my head. Thoreau wrote, "What is the relationship between a bird and the ear that appreciates its melody, to whom, perchance, it is more charming and significant than to any else? Certainly they are intimately related, and the one was made for the other. It is a natural fact. If I were to discover that a certain kind of stone by the pond-shore was affected, say partially disintegrated, by a particular natural sound, as of a bird or insect, I see that one could not be completely described without describing the other. I am that rock by the pond-side." Made with feathers instead of skin, wings instead of arms, and a beak instead of lips, I feel connected to the soaring bird. How come I am a woman and he a bird? Who decides such things? Was it just a stroke of natural luck that my DNA formed that of a human, could I just has easily been an eagle, a starfish or a potato bug? Laying here cold, wet and exhausted I don't feel so lucky. I can't do it, I can't get to the top, my clumsy body won't let me. The eagle soars and swoops in this harsh landscape, sailing to the tops of mountains, he is made for this.
I had read that if these birds spot prey while soaring, they could tuck their wings and swoop at speeds up to 200 miles per hour. Feeling a new appreciation for the mouse, I watch the massive bird get closer. Curved dark beak, glowing intense eyes. I am a part of the food chain, a part of this landscape. John Muir writes, "In God's wilderness lies the hope of the world-the great fresh, unblighted, unredeemed wilderness. The galling harness of civilization drops off, and the wounds heal, here we are aware."
"Hey! You alive back there?" Scott calls.
Startled, I sit up taking my eyes of the swooping bird. I look back to the sky, but now it is nothing more than the black dot it started out as. "Yea barely," I yell back. "It's nice to know someone cares." With much effort I pulled my leg from the snow, stand and keep hiking.
At the peak, exhilarated and exhausted I fall to my knees. The others finish a good twenty minutes before me, but I don't care, I made it.
"Bout' time you got here!" Nick teases. Smiling I pick up a handful of perfect white snow, pack it into a tight ball, and nail him right in the face. Giddy and laughing uncontrollably we throw snow and make glistening snow angels. The excitement somehow restores our energy and we roll and laugh and play until we can't breath.
I take out my binoculars and survey the glacier. Deep crevices wrinkle across the ice, like skin left in water for to long. The park rangers were explicit that we were not to go out onto the glacier. Recently, in Northern Canada, unguided tourists fell to their deaths into a sixty-foot deep crevice, which were camouflaged, by fresh spring snows. Some of the crevices on the glacier extended hundreds of feet into the earth. Looking at it, still and silent, it was hard to believe that from early fall until spring, fierce snowstorms rage almost every day. During the winter the snow accumulates to hundreds of feet, compacts, and forms the new ice layers of the glacier. During the summer the snow melts from the ice, and leaves the whole surface one mass of deep crevices, which makes its passage impossible in the summer and fall.
The miles of glacier stretch all the way to the Pacific Ocean. I stare at the ice and water, the clouds can't stop the two from sparkling and glowing blue, each a starkly different shade. My binoculars focused on three large black blobs floating in the ocean. Whales? I could see them from way up here? But, then realization set in, cruise ships! How annoying, in the last eight hours there had been nothing but earth and sky and snow. The ships bring me crashing down after the amazing high of the hike.
With few other economic alternatives, local officials have turned to tourism as a way to create jobs, spur business development, and generate tax revenue. Traditional industries like logging and fishing are in decline. Tourism is listed as the third most important industry to Alaska. It is behind only oil and is closing in fast on fishing. In southeast Alaska, tourism jobs accounted for ten percent of total employment. The industry fuels a boom in everything from whitewater rafting and flight-seeing tours to hotels and dinning.
By far, the cruise ship industry is Alaska's biggest tourism contributor, but cruise ships also contribute to environmental degradation. One cruise ship discharges about 1.3 million liters of wastewater per day, much more than the port cities they are sailing to. These port cities can expect several ships per day, creating what one resident has described as a "floating mega-city in the harbor." Cruise ships burn fuel that has a ninety percent higher sulfur content than that used by cars. About two billion pounds of trash is dumped into the world's oceans each year and twenty-four percent of that comes from cruise ships. Fourteen million kilograms of waste is produced each year on the Alaska-Canada route.
Three of the four major cruise companies are convicted environmental felons. Cruise ships have accrued over 60 million dollars in environmental fines over the last five years in the United States. Royal Caribbean Cruises and Norwegian Cruise Lines were caught having installed lines to bypass the oil/water separator, a mechanism used to clean water of oil before being discharged into the ocean. Both of these companies were also found guilty of dumping hazardous waste into their wastewater and dumping it into the ocean. Ironically, Royal Caribbean Cruises was promoting its "Save the Waves" campaign while purposely and illegally polluting the oceans. Carnival Cruises has also had to pay for dumping oily waste from ships, and making false entries into their logbooks.
Many people come to Alaska because they are missing something; I know that's why I came. I grew up in a densely populated suburb right outside of Buffalo. City life is the only life I have ever known. Yet, as a child I ignored my pogo stick, jungle gym and bored games, always playing in the mud or in the sparse woods behind my house. There is something inherent in us that calls us to the wild. Bob Marshal writes, "the most important passion of life is the overpowering desire to escape periodically from the cluthes of a mechanistic civilization. To us the enjoyment of solitude, complete independence, and the beauty of undefiled panoramas is absolutely essential to happiness." When looking at a sidewalk I feel no connection, no sense of wonder. Standing atop this mountain, surrounded by things not created by humans, I feel complete, I feel connected.
Sigurd Olson, a conservationist, author and leader in wilderness preservation wrote, "In wilderness we find silence, oneness, wholeness Éspiritual release." Jay Hair has said, "In the wild we find ourselves. In wilderness, we find our links to yesterday and to eternity." In the city when the thoughts, where do we come from, why am I here? cross my mind, I quickly shove them away and think about something else. The questions are frightening and I don't like to dwell. In the wilderness these thoughts come much more frequently and are harder to push away. Author Ellen Meloy wrote, "The desert gives an unsettling sense of the largeness of the universe in relation to the self. The desert is a scary place for a human being if you do not want to feel puny and humbledÑthat is, like a human being in the desert." The same can be true about a forest or a mountain. Here I feel nonexistent, the wind blows, the snow falls, and the eagle soars, whether I am here or not. I am unimportant.
Thoreau writes, "a man must live according to his true nature or he will die." Each of us is slowly dying in our urban landscapes, living among concrete and pollution instead of rock and fresh air. Melody wonders, "Why a country like ours spends billions of dollars to build roads anywhere and everywhere only to want to drive off them." Three and a half million Americans visit Yosemite National Park each year, and twenty four million visit the Blue Ridge Mountains. American's are obviously yearning for something natural.
The problem is that the tourism industry has run with this longing. They have commercialized wilderness and made it into just another form of entertainment. My most meaningful experiences in Alaska didn't occur at a hotel or a fancy restaurant. All that is needed is two legs, a good pack and an open mind. In A distant perspective on the future of Americans outdoors David Mech writes, "Certainly some people occasionally, or even regularly, slip their bonds to artificiality and actually experience the natural world. However, as a proportion of the total population, they represent a small fraction. Even when they do rough it, most do so from their auto, recreational vehicle, or camper. Others commune with nature from powerboats, snowmobiles, or all-terrain vehicles."
The day after my grandparents got home from their trip to Alaska, I went over for dinner to hear about the adventure.
The first words out of my grandpas mouth was, "The trip was great. The cruise ship was beautiful; can you believe they had a casino right on board? I made over two hundred dollars at black jack!"
"Yea grandpa, but how was the trip?" I asked.
"We met a few other couples and got some great bridge games going. There was also a play or concert every night."
"Yea, but what about Alaska!" I almost yelled at him.
"Beautiful, we sailed right next to a glacier. From this great viewing room on top of the ship we saw everything."
"Did you hear the ice singing?" I asked.
"No, that's silly, ice doesn't sing," he answered.
Of course it doesn't sing, I thought. Not when you're inside a big Plexiglas bubble.
Even my grandfather who openly longed for exploration, freedom and the experience of wilderness was sucked into the tourism ploy.
Chief Seattle Duwamish
Leaving the group and the ships, I crawl to the very uppermost point of the mountain and hoist my self up. The swirling, rushing winds pound hard against my body, I can feel the Earth spinning at my feet. All around even taller peaks extend for miles above me, black rock covered in snow. I hear nothing but the wind. What's out there? What is my body? How am I so fragile against the unbreakable rock? How do I fit in this glorious, uncaring picture?
"When we try to pick out anything by itself we find it hitched to everything else in the universe, " wrote John Muir, referring to the law of conservation of matter. Matter is neither created nor destroyed, rather it is cycled through the system, in a never-ending process. The water that formed the snow I stand on was a part of the earth when if first formed over four billion years ago. The rock under the snow is slowly recycled into the center of the earth where it is melted and forced out to create rock somewhere else. All rock is composed of the original elements of the Earth, the same components of our being, oxygen, carbon, nitrogen, hydrogen. Molecularly there is little difference between what makes up our bodies and what makes up Mars or the Moon.
We hiked down the mountain in near silence; we all could feel that somehow we were changed. The way down was brutal; the steep incline put extra pressure on my shins and each step shot painful tingling up to my core. It took three hours to get down and by the end I was seriously questioning if my legs would ever be the same. My throat was hoarse after ten hours of yelling "heeey bear" and my back ached from my heavy pack. But I was thoroughly happy to have made it.
We met up at the big van in the gravel parking lot. The others who had not finished the climb were laying on the seats listening to music.
"Thank God your back!" Samantha exclaimed. "We have been so bored, lets go."
"How was it?" Nick asked. "I'm glad I didn't go, it looks like it got even cloudier."
"Oh, it was nothing special," I answered.
"See, I was right!" he said.
As we drove back to the campsite, I was quite. I sat with my forehead pressed against the cool window and watched the snowy mountains flash by in a blur. On the mountain, I had the time to watch and listen. I head the whisperings of my own soulÑthe thrill, the fears, the questions, the unanswereables. Tomorrow we will be leaving for the city.
"Cruise Industry Environmental Policies, Practices and Initiatives." International Council of
Cruise Lines. 1 Nov. 2005
"Glaciers and Glaciation." 25 Nov. 1997. USGS. 16 Oct. 2005
Herbert, Yuill, and Karen Gorecki. "Cruise Control." 20 Jan. 2004. The Dominion: Canada's
Grassroots Newspaper. 16 Oct. 2005
Haycox, Stephen. Frigid Embrace: Politics Economics and Environment in Alaska. Corvallis: Oregon State UP, 2000.
Kollin, Susan. Nature's State: Imagining Alaska As The Last Frontier. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina P, 2001.
Payne, Daniel. Voices in the Wilderness: American Nature Writing and Environmental Politics. Hanover: New England UP, 1996.
Pynn, Larry. Last Stands: A Journey Through North America's Vanishing Ancient Rainforests. Corvallis: Oregon State UP, 2000.
Scott, Doug. The Enduring Wilderness. Golden: Fulcrum, 2004.
Rozell, Ned. "Bear Evolution, Behavior, and Biology." (2000).
Zeveloff, Samuel, Mikel Vause, and William McVaugh. Wilderness Tapestry: An Eclectic Approach to Preservation. Reno: University of Nevada P, 1992.
Interviews
Mary Shields
mshields@mosquitonet.com
Ron Cole (EL Professor)
rcole@allegheny.edu
Eileen Galeger (EL student)
galegee@allegheny.edu
Jack Cavagnaro (Grandfather)
(716) 688-6495
Laura Cavagnaro is a senior at Allegheny College.