One man’s wilderness (47 page)

In some shallow water off a point, he hit bottom, lunged ahead in a shower, and made deep water again. I followed right after him. He was tiring and I could easily keep up with him now. He was breathing hard, snorting, and I was afraid he might drown. I pulled in front and turned him toward the beach, then dropped back to watch. Surely he would stand and rest when he struck the shallows.

Nothing doing. As soon as he had footing, he made the water fly. Up and on the beach and off through the brush as if he was not tired at all. Maybe he figured he couldn’t get rid of me on land so he had done what he would have done with a wolf in pursuit—take to the lake. Swim and lose the enemy.

Ahead of me a loon was riding low in the water, a study in streamlining, diving, and bobbing up again an unbelievable distance from where he had disappeared. His laugh floated to me. “I’m over here!” he seemed to say. “Who are you in the canoe?”

In one of the bays I could see the bottom at least twenty feet down, and
schools of trout. Not big trout, mostly char and lake trout about a foot long. Now and then a few bigger fish appeared, eighteen to twenty inches long, lying still on the bottom as I slid over them. Then in the area where the river began, hundreds of trout were clustered.

I headed for the beach before the current gripped me. I would have my hands full if I got caught in that funnel. Huge boulders reared out of white water, and I could hear the sound of its seething as it rushed out of the country.

I beached the canoe, strung up the fly rod, and picked my way along the bank. I tied on a small black fly, tested the knot, and stripped out some line. In the first two places I tried, the water was just too swift. The fly shot the line out straight in the blinking of an eye and dragged and bounced on the flow. A man couldn’t wade out into that torrent; he’d get swept right off his feet.

Near a large boulder that jutted out into the river, the current slowed on the downstream side and made curlicues on the surface past overhanging willow brush. I cast just to the edge of the fast water and let the fly swing in an arc.

The grayling were there. They slashed viciously. A flick of the wrist and the rod tip quivered into a bow. The current exaggerated the fish’s power, but it was graceful. It arced, high dorsal spread like a fan, and knifed back into the river again. Several times the line sawed back and forth as the grayling cut erratically to rid itself of the tiny fly. Finally exhausted, it slid into the fireweed that grew in the gravel.

It was a beautiful fish at least eighteen inches long, gill covers and tail a gleaming green and turquoise, body cylindrical with salmon-colored stripes on the fins. I released it. I caught several more, smaller that the first, then forced myself to keep the fly away from the feeding fish that swarmed beneath the willow branches.

I followed down along the bank until I came to a cabin. It belonged to a trapper named Frank Bell. The logs of the cabin walls were upended instead of laid parallel to the ground. It had been deserted for several years now. I creaked open the door.

“Helloooooo, Frank,” I called, almost expecting an answer from the gloomy emptiness. Some animals had raised havoc inside. There was a caribou robe on a sagging cot, some large traps hanging from pegs, and snares dangling from the walls. In a large iron pot were many dead mice. Once inside they had been unable to get back out.

Outside was a prominent meat pole high on the riverbank. Gas-can tins were wrapped around the uprights so animals could not climb to the crossbar.

I sat down with my back against a stump, my jaws working on a sourdough-pancake sandwich of peanut butter and honey, and listened to the wild rushing noises the river made over the great boulders. The Chilikadrotna? What did its name mean? Did Frank Bell know? I thought about him. I tried to imagine him coming out of his cabin, and suddenly felt a strange kinship with the man.

He and his Indian friend had told me stories back at Port Alsworth, and now the stories held more meaning. I could almost see the ghostly figures of the Indian packers with their 100-pound loads—no packboards, just ropes—backs bent as they trekked through the brush of the riverbank. They built rafts using only axes and no nails. They chopped upside-down notches in the logs, the cuts narrow at the top and flaring out at the bottom. Then they hewed out two three-sided poles, lined up the logs, and drove the poles into the triangle-shaped notches. Ends of the poles were split and wedges driven in to keep the poles snug in the logs. A finished raft was only four feet wide, yet they crossed the hissing water on them. Come winter, they took them apart and piled the sections on the bank to assemble again in the late spring. Those times bred tough men to supply the prospectors who made scars on the slopes of the Bonanza Hills.

My attention was drawn to magpies making their harsh calls from the willow brush. Now and then I saw the black and white splashes of their wings against the foliage. That kind of activity needed to be checked out, so I strolled over there.

The magpies scattered and perched in the spruces. On the moss was what was left of a caribou. A hunter had made a kill here a few days ago. All that
remained was a badly torn stomach, some legs, and part of the head. Something besides the magpies had been feasting here.

I examined the area for signs. There was a movement along the slope. I trained the glasses and saw an animal about the size of a fox but darker and chunkier. A wolverine, then another, and finally a third. They loped across a clearing, headed my way, and into a thick brush patch.

Suddenly a flock of ptarmigan cackled and flurried into the air, their white wings quickly setting in downward curves as they sailed along the slope and tipped to a landing. Two wolverines reared from the brush the way bird dogs do to get a better look over heavy cover. They cut back and forth, working like beagles. One stood up and looked at me, ducked, then returned to stare again. The others were on his flanks. They were small wolverines, perhaps a little more than half grown. I wondered where the mother was. They shrank into the brush and I didn’t see them again.

It was time to head for home. I would remember the sounds of the Chilikadrotna, savage, awesome, terrifyingly beautiful as it smashed white against the boulders and seethed angrily toward the sea.

A stroke of good luck came on the return trip. The wind was at my back as I kneeled on the canoe bottom and rode the big swells.

The current in the connecting stream was too strong to paddle against. I unwound a nylon line and hitched one end to the stern ring and the other end to the thwart just behind the bow seat. I picked up the middle of the line, let the canoe ride back with the current and walked along the bank. The canoe rode high against the flow and was easy to control as I towed it to the upper lake.

After the long paddle the cabin’s gleam on the beach was a comfort. The more I see it the more I love it. Surely there is no stretch on the lakeshore as sheltered as mine.

After a supper of navy beans, I sat on my threshold and gazed off toward the volcanic mountains. I had been close to them today. The Chilikadrotna River showed me the beautiful fish and I returned them to her. I thought of the sights I had seen. The price was physical toll. Money does little good back here. It
could not buy the fit feeling that surged through my arms and shoulders. It could not buy the feeling of accomplishment. I had been my own tour guide, and my own power had been my transportation. This great big country was my playground, and I could afford the price it demanded.

Reflections

I sat on the spruce chunk listening to Hope Creek rushing down the cut just beyond the willows. This was one of the good places to sit and watch the action along the Cowgill Benches.

I was proud of my cabin, my woodshed, and my cache. The actual cash layout had been just a shade over forty dollars, and that figure included the glass window Babe had flown in but which was still in storage. The Mylar thermopane had been better for my needs.

Needs? I guess that is what bothers so many folks. They keep expanding their needs until they are dependent on too many things and too many other people. I don’t understand economics, and I suppose the country would be in a real mess if people suddenly cut out a lot of things they don’t need. I wonder how many things in the average American home could be eliminated if the question were asked, “Must I really have this?” I guess most of the extras are chalked up to comfort or saving time.

Funny thing about comfort—one man’s comfort is another man’s misery. Most people don’t work hard enough physically anymore, and comfort is not easy to find. It is surprising how comfortable a hard bunk can be after you come down off a mountain.

I’ve seen grown men pick at food. They can’t be hungry in the first place.
Or maybe their food has been too fancy and with all the choices they’ve had, they don’t really know what they enjoy anymore.

What a man never has, he never misses. I learned something from the big game animals. Their food is pretty much the same from day to day. I don’t vary my fare too much either, and I’ve never felt better in my life. I don’t confuse my digestive system, I just season simple food with hunger. Food is fuel, and the best fuel I have found is oatmeal and all the stuff you can mix with it, like raisins and honey and brown sugar; meat and gravy and sourdough biscuits to sop up the juices with; a kettle of beans you can dip into every day; rice or spuds with fish, and some fresh greens now and then.

I enjoy working for my heat. I don’t just press a button or twist a thermostat dial. I use the big crosscut saw and the axe, and while I’m getting my heat supply I’m working up an appetite that makes simple food just as appealing as anything a French chef could create. I’ve never found anything I like better to drink than Hope Creek water. The good feeling I get out of lungfuls of mountain air and draughts of sweet water from the snows is probably as good as any “high” I would get out of a bottle or a pill. But of course not many have a chance to live in unspoiled country.

I have learned patience, learned to take my time and try to do a job right by first figuring it out. No sense to rushing and going off half cocked; there’s plenty of time out here. No sense complaining if the weather turns sour—make your job fit the day. Grandmother Nature is in control, and you better just wait until she sees fit to give you the weather that is right for another job you have to do.

Distance is relative. You learn that in time. A trip for me down to the lower end of the lower lake takes three hours by canoe if I don’t have the wind to fight. That’s a distance of about eight and a half miles. With a motor on the canoe I could make the trip in under an hour, but a motor’s noise stills the sounds of the wilderness.