Every year my brother, a few of our friends, and I go on a backpacking trip somewhere in the world. Last year we decided to take our adventures to Alaska and saw some of the most stunning wildlife and scenery in the world. Our trip started at the northern trail head of the Resurrection Pass, in Chugach National Forest, where we set out to hike 40 miles and climb 2,600 feet over the span of 4 days.
Day One
After 14 hours of travel time My brother, his dog, our friends, and I finally made it to Anchorage Alaska at 2 am in the morning. Fortunately for me this was last year, before I got sober, so I spent the day before the flight boozing and drugging it up. Just as I planned I passed out right when we lifted off. This ingenious scheme worked well and when we got to Alaska I was ready to go. We rented a mid-size suburban, squeezed ourselves and all our gear into the car and started our Road trip to the Resurrection Pass Trail (RPT) Head. I drove down the Seward Expressway, which is along the Turnagain Arm in Alaska, which has the most beautiful natural views you will ever see along an express way.
It took us about 3 hours of driving to finally get to the start of the trail in Hope, Alaska, a small heavily wooded town on a singular dirt road with nothing around it. After getting lost for a while we found the trail head next to what I believe was the only diner in the area for miles. We unloaded our gear threw on our packs and started the first leg of our journey.
The first day we hiked up over 1,000 feet and 10 miles through some of the most beautiful and scenic views imaginable. The trail was covered in blueberry bushes and bear poop. Good thing we had a guard dog Benji there to scare away any bears that might be in the area.
With each of us carrying over 50 pounds of gear we found a great camp site after 7 hours of hiking. Even though we only had backpackers pantry for dinner, freeze dried food, I do not think I have eaten anything so delicious. It still blows my mind that you can have a three star Michelin rated meal, but if you did not put in a hard days work to deserve it a packet of Ramen will taste better.
Since this was the end of summer time in Alaska we got to bed before the sun even went down. The sunset while we were on this trip would occur around 11pm and it sunrise was around 3 am.
Day 2
We all woke up around 6 am to a violent temperature shift. As we went to bed it must have been pushing 60 degrees Fahrenheit. When we all woke up it was cold enough to see our breath in the air. We all immediately got our sweatshirts out of our packs and boiled some water to make some tea and coffee, I need to give a big shout out to every created instant coffee you've changed the world for the better. We put our packs back on and continued on our journey up the trail.
This was the day we broke above the tree line and all you could see for miles was mountain tops, grass, lakes, and the occasional prairie dog.
At this point we hit a point of total seclusion from the outside world. Our cell phones could not get signal and there was not another person to be seen for miles. It was a welcome change from the normal chaos of NYC.
Day 3
The morning was the same as day two, except this time it was expected, so it didn't phase us East Coasters as much as it did the first morning. On this leg of the journey we started trekking down the southern face of the trail. It took us about two hours before we got to tree line, but this was easily one of the most scenic areas. It could have been because when we were hiking up hill we had no time to look back, but as we saw the trees coming closer to us and where just above them the views were breath taking.
After two days of 10-12 mile hikes we decided we would cut the third day short and get some rest. We found a perfect camp site on a massive lake that was about 7.5 miles away from the campsite we stayed at after night 2. We brought a fishing pole in case we came across a lake like this and tried to catch our own dinner, like real men. After about two hours we realized maybe we were still just boys and ended up eating more freeze dried food.
Day 4
Day 4 was the last leg of our journey and for me one of the worst experiences of my life. The evening prior I stepped on a wasps nest and was stung multiple times by those vicious mother fuckers. I was in incredible pain, we had 13 miles left in our journey, and a time line to keep. I manned up took more Benedryl than one man should and started hiking down the trail in a comatose state. I do not remember much from this day but here are some photos we took. I would get stung by ten more wasps to redo this trip.
After we finished our camp we headed to Seward, Alaska. One of the most incredible places in the world.
That adventure and those pictures are for another post though. Thanks for letting me go back down memory lane!
Photo Cred: Kyle Blaker, LLP (not sure if this is true but he's annoying me)