Alaska - Gates of the Arctic
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Mick crossing the creek. It was cold and wide.
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Absolutely shitty vegetation. Mick pumping water.
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Tussock's. Pretty to look at, horrible to walk in.
This was the hardest walking we did. We were on day 4 by now, and certainly weren't as fresh and nimble as we once were. (I think we were probably at steady state though, I could actually have kept walking like this for days if we had had more food, you just sort of get into a rythm) This was Taiga at it's best. We tried walking down by the river, but it was thick vegetation, constant re-routing to avoid the interminable braidings of the creek (Hot Springs Creeek apparently, though very very very few people take the time to even try and look for the springs by the time they are in this area) and uneven ground.

The hill side wasn't much better. Don't pay any attention to the "green" shading on the map, it's pretty meaningless, just about the entire south side of the valley is vegetated, with small patches of open ground. It was mostly sodden, trackless, tussocky, and generally hard work. The spruce is a hard tree that doesn't give when you run into it, it just pokes. The other tree, The willow like shrub shown surrounding mick pumping water above is rubber and twiny and awkward to push through. Lovely stuff :) Don't let anything I say stop you from going here.

Had some hard time determining exactly how far down the valley we were around here, massive contour intervals got us repeatedly. We didn't want to be to high and have to deal with all the cliffs we'd seen on Mt Takahula on the flight up. (Unmarked on this map, marked on our USGS map, just N of Lake Takahula) Eventually got down and around to the river again, (after having to skirt numerous steep sections on Mt Takahula's northern flanks anyway) and immediately stopped for lunch. It was glorious to be out of the vegetation and back onto sand and rocks by the river.

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Scott pleased to be off the hill. Mick approaches, near (018Lunch)
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Down the creek from our lunch spot
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Not all easy going by the river, but this was actually quite pleasant. Long grass, firm sand.
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Walking SE in a seasonal riverbed of the Alatna. Unknown, yet beautiful mountains in background (near (018)
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Cracks in the sand/mud with green shoots. By camp4.
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Scott collecting firewood from the banks of the Alatna.
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Alatna River Scenes from near Camp4. (1)
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(2)
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and (3)

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