The Final "That Was Then"

We left Chicken via the Taylor Highway and back down the Alcan this year, headed for Hyder and the real deal Bearville. But two years ago we ventured off across the Top of the World Highway and crossed the mighty Yukon at Dawson City after wrapping up a marvelous and very thorough tour of Alaska- the part you can see "On Wheels." Here then are the posts that wrapped up the journey in 07....That Was Then:

Behind The Blog: Circumstances are different to some degree but it struck me head on how the last in the season feelings of leaving Alaska came around one more time...

I'm tempted to say we were a one trick pony this year in Alaska, staying only in Chicken, prospecting only in Chicken, sightseeing only around Chicken. But in actuality, we spent the entire summer revisiting our past trip to Alaska...around the campfires, at the panning troughs, over dinner or a beer on the deck at the Outpost. We could compare notes with guests, make suggestions to hesitant travelers, assure those who feared to venture where they needed not to fear. We had been there, had done that, and hopefully helped a lot more people to be able to say the same after their trip this year. Alaska In Review

Gold That Tastes Like Chicken: If you never read another one of my posts from Alaska and Chicken in particular, please read this one. Things were very well in focus when i put those words to press...and nothing has changed.

Travel By Top of the World: There's a reason they call it the Top of the World. The view seems to go on and on for ever. Why they call it a highway? That might be a different story. The Jack Wade historic Dredge pictured has not regrettably been dismantled, but here's one last look at the the way things were on Top of the World.

Down At Dawson: A look at the end of the top of the World and the high kicking Diamond Tooth Gertie

Cruising The Cassiar: A look at what's just a head for this year's trip

West To Alaska? Just grin and "bear" it...

Well, that's about it for this final install on the series from two years ago. Thanks for riding down memory lane with us. Nice to have you along!

August Roundup Part 2- TWT

Here's a few from two- years ago that is....

Ninilchik Hub: a look back at our visit to this part of the Kenai Peninsula

Red At Night: something a bit different in the way of an eagle photo...

Barn To Be Wild: a look at state fairs and high stakes piglet racing

It's Always Something: yet another dose of reality as mother nature finds you no matter where you try and hide...

OK This time I mean it. Now I really am finished for today!

August Roundup

Busy, busy, busy! Time is flying with camp projects, mining activities, sight seeing - leaving no time for the weary. But here's a roundup of things going on the first part of August. A bee-keeper rolled into camp a short while back. He was shutting down his 11 hive operation for the season and taking the last hive and the remaining bees out for a ride in the back of his pickup truck. It gave us all a chance to grab a plastic spoon and take a taste of the fireweed only honey product he produces directly off the honeycombs. Pretty neat- for us that is. But for the bees it's a swan song as they do not winter well here. Actually they really don't winter AT ALL here. Alaska has few if any honey bees as you know them in the lower 48. What hives operate here do so by importing bee colonies annually, shipping them via plane (they cannot cross Canadian borders via vehicle transportation) and dealing both with high cost and high rate of loss owing to cold and altitude during transit. For the bees, this is the "final flight" of the season. When the honey truck (as opposed to the honey wagon which is not the same thing- trust me!) has finished its rounds, most of the bees will have blown out the back and will fall to the mercy of the weather as Fall, then Winter approaches fast here. Already nighttime temps have dipped below 30 and soon they will plummet beyond the bees' ability to survive. The Flight of the Bumblebee will become the Plight of the Bumblebee and only a season's worth of honey in a jar will remain to attest to their ever having been here at all. That- and these photos...



While bee season was drawing to a close, caribou hunting season was just opening. The fast and furious three day season brought many many hunters to our camp which they then used as a launching point for hunting the entire area. Caribou hunted in this area are those of the "Fortymile" herd, so called from the name of the river system and the mining district of the same name and historically very significant to many aspects of life in Alaska. Hunters brought all size and manner of ATV with which to carry themselves and their gear into the deep woods for the hunt. And for that matter, the hunters themselves arrived in all sizes and manner. One in particular caught my attention and while it would have been easy to plaster the post with pictures of hunters, their gear and the game they took out with them, I decided to go with HER to tell the story. Seven (and a half, to be exact) year old Dawson rolled into camp at the close of the season with her dad. One of the largest caribou racks I saw this season was strapped to the bike and the back of the truck they arrived in.

Half jokingly, OK all jokingly, I asked the pint sized hunter, "Did you shoot that big caribou?"
"Yes, sir."
"For real?"
"Uh huh."
"All by your self? With a rifle almost as big as you?"
"Well, daddy knocked it down with his shot, but my shot hit it in the lungs and made the kill..."

"Dad, can I please take her picture with the antlers for the blog I write? Maybe we'll just make her famous?"

"Oh, she's already famous, they named a city in the Yukon after her- Dawson City."

Some hunters are successful in the hunt but some are not. Maybe because they were in the wrong place at the wrong time, or more aptly the caribou were in the right place at the right time. Who knows? But there is always some poor frustrated hunter out there who can only answer the challenge of a non moving target and takes out a road sign or two in frustration. I thought this 40 mph sign taking a hit in the Fortymile herd range was the perfect way to make the point. What a trophy, Mighty Hunter!

Now about the time all this was happening, another season was coming right up. Lou and her sister Debra were getting ready to celebrate Papa Gene's birthday, and while there was only one candle on the cake after that delicious salmon and halibut meal, I'm thinking it was celebration number 88. Always upbeat, full of vim and vigor, Gene helps out all around camp and his time here with us was real blast! Here's a little slide show from the celebration dinner...



But while day time temps remained pleasant enough for an occasional outdoor dinner or get-to-gether, the nighttime temps started to indicate a change of season in the air. Same thing happened back in Maine but not this ealry and not this extreme. Temperatures at 27 degrees the beginning of August - brrrrrrr. That called for emergency (however temporary) plastic covering of the cold frame part of the greenhouse complex (make it sound big, don't I???) Think of it as "hurry up cold frame emergency procedures..." Hardly air tight, certainly not pretty, but adequate none the less and as of this writing, everything is still producing the way we intended.


So yes it's been pretty busy around here. Always the day to day stuff to keep up with and of course there's always a pocket of gold up in them thar hills that needs finding, but there are long range projects in the works as well. Pedro Dredge is slowly being readied to float to its new position perched overlooking the panning troughs, and we've started building a new log cabin as part of another project to be reported on at another time, but Mike, a consummate collector of all things mining related and Chicken mining in particular, has begun to realize the dream of creating a museum on property. It's fun to be even a minute part of that realization. Old Chicken may yet live again through the display of his collections of machinery, buildings, equipment, articles, antiques and just plain cool junk - as one less than proper antique dealer once displayed on his signage. To that end, he recently acquired and moved an old miners shed from the nearby Bygland Claim. I have been fascinated by that building for two years as I drove past it on daily trips to and from Myers Fork Claim of Chicken Gold Camp. Old. Dilapidated to some degree. Fascinating in every regard. Now it's here..and already it is breathing new life with the TLC it has already received. From the ingenious use of a bucket loader turned fork lift, to its delicate moving proposition, its site preparation and resettling, this has been yet another addition to the now in-full-progress development of the museum to be. Here's a look at the transition of the old shed:












I suppose I could keep going with news from August, but here's the deal: I started all this today at 11:00. Photo management, slide show production, uploads, writing, organizing, what have you...and here it is after 7:00 already- non-stop blog production from Chicken, Alaska. There are places in the world where this could certainly have been done faster. But I'm not there, am I? So that's it for now from Chicken. The cluck stops here!

Splish! Splash!

It sounds more like a bath on a Saturday night than a mining term, I know, but "Splashing" is just that. Splashing refers to "running and gunning" your operation to make use of extremely limited supplies of water when highbanking or dredging. You dig a hole to give yourself as much of a body of water as you can- then you run your equipment until the water supply is nearly spent. Then shut down and wait for the supply to replenish itself- however long that may be. At one point we were running ten minutes and then shutting down nearly an hour for the uptake hole to fill back up- and that was after a day of digging out the hole in the first place. And of late, that's exactly what we have been doing here in Chicken. Streams went nearly dry there for a bit. Now of course, Rainmaker Choan has sent us rain, ice, sleet, hail and has things running fairly well again for the time being. Thanks. I think! Although this 27 degree business in the beginning of August has GOT to stop, Rainmaker!

Below is a look at one of the creek crossings on Myers Fork. The rocks are usually under water. But only a trickle was barely running a couple days ago. Fortunately it is a bit better now and we hope the drought is ending, or at the very least easing up a bit. As of the day this picture was taken, you could cross the usually ice cold stream in your sneakers. No boots necessary! That is for sure not always the case.



But splashing is not JUST a mining term either. With temps high (not now, but a few days ago) the moose were gathering in the ponds that still held water and drinking and bathing to keep cool. This cow and her twin calves were at a roadside stop (moose style) on the Taylor Highway just outside of camp a couple days ago. Moose lovers: here's your slide show!



But splashing was definitely NOT happening in this odd looking RV that came by camp the other day. The Condo RV, looks like half bus and half hen house, so I suppose its showing up in Chicken was not all that out of character. Mike and I gave panning lessons to all 18 "inhabitants" who each have their own berth in the back of the big rig and a bus seat in the front. Is there a shower in there? Nope. Is there a bathroom in there? Nope. Just lots of stops as needed along the way. I asked one of the tourists on board (all German visitors) what it was like to sleep in those tight quarters. She answered that it felt a bit like sleeping in a coffin. Oh, yuk! Not for me! Mike asked if she could hear everyone else snoring at night. That was an affirmative. Way too up close and personal for me. I'll catch the Greyhound thank you very much...

For those wondering, those are dredge line buckets on a sled in the foreground.

Poking Around Tok

We're seeing what's in Tok, talking up the Outpost, meeting folks we'll need to do business with, and taking care of a few remaining items of our own that need dispensing sooner or later, where sooner would be better but later would be easier.

Meanwhile, here's a few look-backs at the 2007 trip up the Alcan Highway:

The Great Alaskan Highway Begins

Mile Marker 300

"Yu-Kon" If You Try Hard Enough

When The Waterfall Is Closed