Our flight was supposed to be from Gates of the Arctic to Kobuk Valley National Park. But we had a problem. Not long after we departed from Gates, Emilie realized that she had forgotten to retrieve our water filter. It was hanging in a tree by the river and she just hadn’t packed it. She said that we needed to go back for it but that our pilot did not want to land there again, especially with all the added weight. I asked what that meant. She said that the pilot suggested dropping us off in the Noatak National Preserve because he knew of a much better landing place there.

The Noatak National Preserve is perhaps the United States last remaining complete river system that has not been altered by human activity. It is 6.5 million acres or 10,265 square miles. It borders both Gates of the Arctic NP and Kobuk Valley NP, which is why we were flying over it. It has Grizzly bears, black bears, wolf packs, moose, caribou, and a fabulous river system. Noatak has no roads or buildings or anything else. It’s another huge wilderness area.

I told Emilie to go ahead and drop us off. She said that it would probably only take about twenty minutes or so for them to go back to Gates and retrieve the water filter and come back and pick us up. I told her that we would be fine. Of course, I said in an earlier blog that we made ten flights on this trip, but with this one, Vicky and I actually made eleven flights.

Upon learning that we were to be dropped off, I began looking for our landing site. You can see in the first photo that it didn’t look much different from looking for our previous landing spot.

Vicky and I are in Noatak in the second photo and watching our plane take off without us.

We walked around and found some interesting things, such as a probable bear print in the sand which you can see in the third photo. It looked pretty big to me.

When we got dropped off, the bear spray had already been packed for our flight. The shotgun however was readily accessible. Emilie asked me if I would feel comfortable taking the shotgun, just in case we needed it for protection. I said sure and she handed it to me. I planned to keep the shotgun in its case but after seeing the bear print, I decided that I would rather inspect the shotgun for functionality at my leisure rather than with a grizzly bearing down on me. I was ready for anything.

You can see our plane coming back to pick us up in the last photo. We enjoyed our short visit to the Noatak wilderness area. Then it was on to Kobuk Valley National Park.

On an aside, we at least knew what was happening and had some protection. Andrew and April got dropped off in Kobuk Valley and their pilot took off. They expected us to land within a couple of minutes. So they had the same alone time as we did, only they had no idea what had happened to us. Plus, they didn’t even have any food or protection. I think I prefer what happened to Vicky and me.