Kobuk Valley

From Wikipedia – Kobuk Valley protects 61 miles of the Kobuk River and three regions of sand dunes. Created by glaciers, the Great Kobuk, Little Kobuk, and Hunt River Sand Dunes can reach 100 feet high and 100 °F , and they are the largest dunes in the Arctic. Twice a year, half a million caribou migrate through the dunes and across river bluffs that expose well-preserved ice age fossils.

• Established: 12/2/1980
• Annual Visitors: 14,937
• Size: 1,750,716 acres

Kobuk Valley National Park, July

“Adopt the pace of nature: her secret is patience” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

Anchorage, Alaska  July 22, 2024

Elizabeth:

Our national park adventures have begun again! After our relatively inexpensive Spain travels walking the Camino in May and June, we are certainly aware of how high prices are here in Alaska during prime season. Since their tourist season is so short, the prices for tours, food and lodging is very high but it’s worth it to us. A hotel in Spain, on the Camino, ran us under $100/night, most of the time. Our outdated Holiday Inn, at the Anchorage airport, is $400 night.

It was 110 in Phoenix (through July 18^th, 28 days over 110 so far this summer!). A 5+ hour flight later it was 60 degrees and still light out at 11:30pm. 

We scheduled our first day with no plans. After looking up many outdoor options, we chose to go to Earthquake Park. In 1964 a devastating occurrence happened to this southwest section of Anchorage with an over 9.0 quake, one of the worst quakes in North American history. The area was honored by making it a lovely park with bike and walking paths, geocaches secretly blending into the beautiful forests with gorgeous views of huge mountains and the city’s skyline flanking the Pacific Ocean’s Cook Inlet.

We walked from the park into Anchorage (about 5 miles) for an oceanside seafood mid day meal and went back to the hotel to confirm our exciting plans for tomorrow, to fly to Kotzebue, 26 miles north of the Arctic Circle, to then fly to Kobuk and Gates of the Arctic National Parks. 

To Kotzebue July 23

Elizabeth: Flying in and out of Anchorage is an adventure in itself.  Where can you hear conversations comparing the latest hunted game and preferred styles of guns, in the airport, by TSA Agents, while working!!?

I love the practical, casual look of most of the travelers. Almost everyone wore a large backpack vs pulling a roller bag. The standard attire was Carhart style work pants or hiking attire, ball caps and some form of boots, whether that be hiking, work style or rubber, and the line at McDonald’s was longer than at Starbucks! The people who checked in ahead of us had 5 full size coolers packed with their fishing adventure success stories! The ice packed coolers were duct taped shut. So full that the tops didn’t stay latched on their own.

Weather report? Basically, I’m not concerned – there’s nothing that can be done about it!  An Alaskan proverb: There is no such thing as cold weather, just cold clothing. Same goes for rain gear. Rule of thumb…be prepared. We’ve brought rain jackets & pants as well as layers, from head to toe. After 35 years living in New England we love the Vermont moto: If you don’t like the weather…just wait a minute!

Kotzebue’s baggage claim has a half-sized carousel and it was abundant with cargo. Large Rubbermaid containers full of necessary items to survive on what they call “almost an island”. Anchorage is the hub for a lot of remote towns down south, but Kotzebue is the hub for all the remote villages in northwestern AK. One man hand carried a 24 pack of eggs on the plane. 

Kotzebue has a hotel, a couple of places to food shop, a few restaurants and a couple of coffee shops but, honestly, I am unsure of how these wonderfully pleasant locals survive financially! The grocery store prices were even higher than I would have guessed. See pics. Gas is over $9/gallon hence, in the summer, the main mode of travel for residents are ATVs and dirt bikes. One mom had three young children on a two seater 4 wheeler driving down the main road 🤦🏼‍♀️. Almost every home we saw had a snow machine, or three, in their yard, hibernating until it was to be their turn at first snow fall (I am guessing in October at the latest!). Most roads are dirt, houses are small and yards are occupied by household items, trucks and snow machines no longer in use. There is nowhere to place them or too expensive to ship or fly them out, off the “island”. The entire town of 3,000 residents is about a mile by ½ mile. The only access is by plane or boat.

An alcohol license/membership is needed to drink in town. Where have you ever seen a sign in a hotel that forbids tabaco and alcohol on the premises?!

The sun sets about 1:30AM and raise again at 4:15AM. We stayed at Sue’s B & B…but no breakfast for guests anymore. Sue says it was unfair to guests how much she had to charge to continue to serve it! We were grateful for the blackout bedroom curtains and appreciation goes out to my daughter-in-law, Chelsea, for letting me borrow her fabulous nighttime eye covering to block out that midnight sun!

Inuit is preferred over the term Eskimo but the terms Inupiat or Inupiaq refers to those people who live in or around Kotzebue, those indigenous to the northwestern areas of Alaska specifically. The street signs and businesses are written in both English and their native language, Inupiaq, and is close to the Canadian or Greenland Inuit language.

Backing up to our real reason for flying up to Kotzebue in the first place…Golden Eagle Outfitters (GEO) was our first stop after Alaska Airlines “dropped us off” in town at 10:30AM.  Golden Eagle is a short walk from the main terminal. We were supposed to go up in a bush plane for 4 hours, to sight see and land at Kobuk and Gates of the Arctic National Parks, but since the flights were socked in (fog) the day before, and earlier in the morning of the day we landed, they were way behind. Our group’s flight was canceled for today. We will contact them in the morning, fingers crossed, for a flight tomorrow. 

Like minded adventurers, that were going up to the national parks today, were in the small bush plane’s office. A 70+ year old couple who are off to see number 60 and 61 of the 63 US national parks; a young couple who are going to their 51st park; a single guy seeing parks number 61 and 62 and a retired woman experiencing all 63 after this week! They are all tenting for a few nights at both Kobuk and Gates. We are not alone in seeking all 63 parks. We are at number 58, so far, and trying to get to 3 new ones on this trip.

Besides being bummed we were not going up today, we experienced difficulties with obtaining WIFI in Kotzebue. Our phones work for calls and texts only. No data at all (we have Verizon). We asked stores and restaurants and no one said they had public WIFI. Finally, we were able to use the WIFI at the Northwest Arctic Heritage Center by the airport. 

Gary ventured out to Kotzebue’s library to get a geocache…his most northern cache in the world, so far. The young librarian said she was really hot today…it’s 58 degrees. We were telling locals we are so glad to be in cooler weather…same 58 degrees…since we’ve come from 110-degree days in Phoenix! All relative, a matter of perspective!

We had dinner at a diner, walked around and thru town and along the ocean, watched local adults play softball at 9PM, saw kids swimming with mom looking on (I bet the ocean was cold for our standards!). We are off tomorrow, back to Anchorage, rent a car and drive one hour north to Wasilla for the night on our way to Talkeetna.

7/24 Kobuk and Gates

Elizabeth

Breakfast at the Medical Ctr, serves over 6 villages

We were able to go up on a flight at 9AM in a 1952 De Haviland DCH 3 Otter with 8 of us and the owner of GEO Jared as our pilot.

Flew over Kobuk to Gates, got off, another couple brought signs and an American flag, G waded in the cold water and filled his water bottle up with the crystal clear water, I should have done the same, the water was awesome!

“When we walk into a grove of trees or under an open sky the magic of nature take over and the heaviness of life lifts a little.” – Natassia Cassinero

Locals pick berries at Sand dunes, too early for us

Kobuk was fun, very warm (70’s), full sun and mostly blue skies. There were two other tour planes that joined us. Kobuk is the 59th Park we have visited. We were in Gates in March 2022, so it was fun to return in the summer. Only 4 remain on our list of unvisited Parks.

GEO flies supplies to miners, scientists and several outlying villages in addition to doing tours.