Tangle Lakes/Delta River via the Denali Highway

For the 4th of July long weekend we paddled the Tangle Lakes and Delta River with Mike, Arianne, Luke, Emily, Jeff, and Heather. We took the Denali Highway after work on Thursday, arriving at the put in around 1 am. We saw a beautiful midnight sunset along

the way. We saw a plethora of porcupines along the road. We camped at the Tangle Lakes Campground the first night, planning to meet up with the others the next day. For the trip, we borrowed Luke and Emily's inflatable canoe for Mike and Arianne to use. We grilled caribou brats and burgers that night.

We shoved off the next morning and soon met up with an apparently common headwind on the very large and long lake. This made paddling the inflatable difficult. Mike and Arianne overcame the challenge with finesse. We finally found Luke and Emily at

their campsite around 2pm and decided to camp their since it was a good campsite for a larger group, we had paddled 1/3 of the distance to our destination, and the Lake Trout were biting in the area. We cooked up fish, and Luke and Emily brought hobo dinners for us.

The next morning (Saturday), while I was boiling water for coffee with our unstable little pocket rocket, a strong wind blew the pot of boiling water onto both of my feet. I don't think I have ever taken off socks and Tevas so quickly as I ran squealing down to the river. Emily tended to the tiny little tundra fire after helping to tear my socks off. (First Aid event #1).

Since Jeff was doing one of his 100 mile bike rides on the way to meeting up with all of us, he and Heather didn't catch up with us until Saturday. They brought their dogs Harriet and Hadley. Harriet added an extra thrill to fishing for the rest of the trip as she tried to bite off every fish we caught as we reeled them in. She also tries to dive in and catch them herself. Though she has never caught one, her persistence is impressive and highly entertaining.

On this day we did the 2 1/4 mile portages which were separated by a small pond followed by a 3 mile section of class II rapids! We beat other groups to the coveted "beaver campsite" which Emily was adamant about getting to, since it accommodates a large group. We saw at least 3 beavers and a large beaver lodge. Scott and I made venison steak fajitas for everyone for dinner and Jeff and Heather brought a salad.

The grayling were biting, so poor Jeff had to hold onto Harriet for dear life. One of the more aggressive grayling decided that a fishermen's finger is a better place for a treble hook than its own mouth. Unfortunately Mike had to learn this the hard way as the fish sunk it into his pointer finger, barbs and all. (1st Aid event #2). After 35 ideas and several trials with various equipment, Mike was finally sufficiently frustrated enough to cut off each section a little at a time with Scott's small sized leatherman freeing him from the hooks.

On the last day of the paddle the river slows down and a few silty tributaries meet up with the Delta. The scenery becomes even more spectacular at this point as the beautiful mountains close in. We saw a moose cow and calf and a whole flock of Common Merganser ducklings with their mother. While Luke, Heather, and I drove to do the shuttle, the other 4 stayed and waited. Some yahoo was brandishing a gun (very common here) but what was uncommon was the way he was flashing it around and inadvertently aiming it at our crew. Scott said, "Would you do me a favor and turn around and point that away from us". A girl in his group said "Yeah I don't like guns either". Scott said "I don't mind guns, I just don't like them pointed at me". He sheepishly finished unloading it, facing away and that was the end of it.

We then headed north to Fairbanks with a mandatory ice cream stop in Delta Junction along the way. Mike and Arianne flew away at 0100 am.