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4 July 2003 - Independence Day, Day-27, Total-28; Miles-40, Total-1023 - Chuck

A great day for our Birthday! We used some time this morning to cook, organize and chat while we waited until we felt Stevens Village might be alive. We were at their landing at 8:30 and up the bank we went with our water jugs, dirty clothes and soap & towel for showers. As we looked down the gravel streets, nothing was stirring. Then we heard someone crying out in pain, around a corner a young Indian guy was holding his arm while another guy tried to help him. We walked to them and asked about the problem. They said the guy had just fallen and dislocated his elbow. They wanted to know if we could relocate it. BOY, WHAT AN OPPORTUNITY! Having just completed a comprehensive Wilderness First Aid Course this past May, this is my first chance to practice. As I got close to see the injury, my observation was that the guy reeked of alcohol. I told the friend how he could try to relocate the elbow and Bill & I quickly moved on. At the laundromat, we filled our water containers. While there we talked with Mark, a heavy equipment operator who has been working on the new airfield since February. His family continues to live at their home near Tok, AK, several hundred miles away. He told us that the town no longer has a payphone. We decided we would do laundry at the next stop when we could use a phone and get a meal at a restaurant. We also learned that the "injured" guy and his friend have been on a three day binge.

As we floated by a half dozen little cabins on the way out of town, we could hear our injured friend cussing up a storm. When he saw us float by, he came outside cussing at us. His parting words were something about us being on Tribal land without permission and that we could get shot. All this at the top of his lungs and spiced with four letter words. Then I saw him and some of his buddies dropped a rocket flare (fireworks) in a pipe and fired it over our heads. We kept moving.

Soon the terrain started changing, we were entering an area with low mountains and we were about to flow through a canyon. It was a great feeling to have the Yukon Flats behind us and to have the mountainous walls overlooking the river.

This area has more river traffic; there was almost none before. We met an interesting couple Dave Dirk & Sabine Kocks, both from Germany. They were in a Dory like boat, similar to an old wooden lifeboat. It is rigged with a mast for sailing. Dave made it himself at Lake Bennett just like those following the Gold Rush. He started making it about five years ago and has spent the past three summers coming down the Yukon in it. Ten years ago he built a raft and floated down the Yukon on it.

Our destination for the day was the Dalton Highway, which parallels the Alaska Pipeline all the way to Prudhoe Bay. It is the only road that crosses the Yukon from Carmacks to the Bering Sea. Bill drove this road to Prudhoe about three years ago I drove it about 11 years ago.

We stopped at a place Dave suggested about a quarter mile upstream of the pipeline. As we finished setting up camp, Dave & Sabine drifted up. We had a great time talking with them about their adventures on the Yukon. While walking on the shore we saw some large bear tracks. Our contribution to our Nation's birthday party was to share my last two beers and fire a red flare cluster from my emergency flare-gun.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY AMERICA!

Tomorrow morning it will be breakfast at the restaurant by the bridge.