Around this time last year I found myself boarding a plane with 10 other Houghton College students bound for the state of Alaska for a 15 day trip. Previous to getting on the plane, we had spent an intensive four days in class learning about the unique ecosystems, like none of our own here in New York, we would soon see. We left New York from Rochester, and a layover and seven hours of flying later we arrived around midnight in Anchorage. It was dark when we landed, but while we were waiting to be shuttled to our hotel we were able to peer over the buildings and see the peaks of several snow covered mountains surrounding the city. The next morning, we awoke to a sunny day allowing us to take our first good look at the mountainous terrain that went on for miles. Its difficult to properly describe just how big the mountains are in Alaska, but they are nothing short of awe inspiring. After snapping a few dozen photographs of the snowy mountainous backdrop, we all loaded up into a van and RV eager to begin our 2,000 mile round trip through the coastal marine, boreal forest and tundra ecosystems.
The view from our hotel in Anchorage Alaska
Amongst our first stops were Kenai lake, the Wrangell St. Elias National Park and the Kenai Fjords National Park. Just to attempt to put Alaska’s size into perspective, the Wrangell St. Elias park alone is bigger than the entire country of Switzerland and has some of the highest coastal mountains in the world (also bigger than the Swiss Alps)! We camped for a few days along Kenai Lake where we hiked along side the lake every evening until 10 or 11 pm, since it was still light. We enjoyed the alpine glow as the sun slipped behind the mountains and the many spring flowers that were beginning to pop out. We went on a day cruise through the Kenai Fjords National Park and saw and learned about the many marine wildlife. Aialik Glacier was the main destination that day and what a sight that was. The captain of the boat turned off the motor, allowing us to hear the thunderous crashes from the glacier calving into the bay. We could even hear the weight of the glacier grinding against the adjacent mountains. It was incredible to see how the landscape was shaped by the mountains, glaciers and ice fields and just how truly wild the coast was. There were little towns, such as Seward, tucked in between the mountains near the water. However, nothing was nearly as developed as around Chautauqua Lake for example.
Alpine glow on the Alaskan mountains surrounding Kenai Lake.
Fireweed (Chamerion angustifolium)
Wrangell St. Elias Mountains
Horned Puffin (Fratercula corniculata)
Aialik Glacier
From the coast, we continued our trip into the interior of Alaska, heading towards Tok and Fairbanks. The ecosystem changed quite drastically from coastal mountains to forests full of spindly black spruce and tundra with a number of dwarfed plants. Once again we were struck by how the landscape influenced the people rather than how the people influenced the landscape. Wild fires are one of the main managers of the forests while the Alaska Department of Fish and Game keep a close watch on the wildlife populations, working to improve caribou offspring recruitment and keeping wolf packs in check. Being that the climate and changes between seasons are so much more drastic than that of our own, any significant changes that humans attempt to make to the environment, nature just seems to take back over. The main road going through the area was heaved by permafrost, several hundreds of miles were scarred by fires (even near residential towns) with new early successional plants filling back in, and large animals like grizzly bear and moose were close by.
Bearberry (Arctostaphylos) a dwarf shrub well adapted to the Alaskan tundra.
Fires are a natural part of the successional process in Alaskan forests.
Our last main stop was Denali National Park and Preserve, the “place to go” when you are in Alaska. From our campground we could see Mt. McKinley’s main peak and buttresses jutting into the sky some 20, 320 feet up. We got the opportunity to take a bus tour into the park where we saw moose, caribou, Dall’s sheep, red fox, ground squirrels and even a grizzly bear. By design, there is only one road in and out of the six million acre park and a few maintained trails for people to hike or bike, minimizing the disturbance on the tiaga forests, open tundra and abundant wildlife. The road has traffic restrictions, allowing only buses and very few other vehicles past certain checkpoints. Once again, it was interesting to see a completely intact and naturally functioning ecosystem with such little human influence. There were no beeping horns, construction noise, nothing unnatural to be seen or heard. Only the rushing of a glacial braided stream and rocks sliding down the mountain sides were noticeable.
Denali National Park and Preserve
Dall’s Sheep (Ovis dalli) at Polychrome Pass in Denali
Mount McKinley from 70-80 miles away
Our class from Houghton College
After two weeks of seeing just a small portion of the state that was accessible by vehicle, we flew out and first landed in Chicago for a layover. I can say that was quite a shock after seeing mountains and glaciers for miles upon miles and then suddenly seeing nothing but buildings, busy roads, interstates and a huge airport. We went from a place that the environment was naturally wild and purposely kept that way to an environment that had nothing natural about it. Everything in the city appeared to have man’s touch on it in some way or another. Then we flew to Buffalo and drove the rest of the way home towards Jamestown. As we made the way home, I saw an environment that has had man’s touch on it, but has been left in many places to return to its natural state or is being managed so that it can be restored near its original state.
Although we don’t have millions of acres of preserved wilderness in the immediate area, we have a lot of healthy ecosystems worth enjoying. We also don’t have to put up with -80°F days (although this winter we got a little closer to that!), allowing us to get out anytime of the year. So let us allow the rolling hills, hundreds of year old trees, wild animals and abundance of green inspire us. Let us let the landscape here in the Chautauqua-Allegheny Region influence us rather than us trying to always influence it. Let us find our own little Alaska right here in our hometown or favorite place to visit in any season. And let us enjoy it whether we be birders, snowmobilers, hikers, bikers, quiet sitters or fast pace lifers.
Elyse Henshaw
Conservation Technician
