To bag a closed contour is a source of great joy, and I am nearing four hundred overall from my teenage years.  Often the draw is distraction from the cares of this world, as in last night’s slog across muskeg and up an unnamed summit I dubbed “Distraction Peak.”  Sometimes, it’s simply about a mountaineering challenge, simple aerobic exercise, or the quest for a grouping of peaks boasting summits exceeding a general elevation in a particular area.  Still yet, the desire may spring simply from a title, a enigmatic peak name worth adding to my resume.  Many such examples come to mind:  Big Butt, Thermo Knob, and Dog Loser Knob in the Great Smokies; S’brutal Tower, Mt. Lyell, and the Checkered Demon in the Sierra Nevada; Shivapuri in Nepal; and Alaska’s A.B. Peak.  In 2005, while pedaling a bicycle from the northernmost point in Maine down to Key West, Florida, my route included the entire Blue Ridge Parkway.  This road took me near several summits worth dismounting the bicycle to run up through the woods and bag, simply because these peaks bore a bedazzling name.  One such mountain was Yellow Face in North Carolina’s Plott Balsams.  One of forty Southern Sixers, this mountain got its audacious name from yellowish colorings in the rock of its precipitous south face.  What a cool peak to add to my resume, I thought.  So, after pedaling up from Asheville that morning, I hid the bicycle behind a tree and bushwhacked over a mile out to the difficult-to-find true summit in a mess of pricker bushes and blowdowns.  There was no view and nothing to show for my effort save a makeshift summit register that I put together and mounted to a tree trunk.  Two years later, I went back with a friend and was unable to locate the register.  Still, all the satisfaction I needed was in the name, and it was well worth the extra slog.

Last night, while trying to sleep in the back of my S.A.G. vehicle high above the Arctic Circle on Alaska’s James Dalton Highway, I found myself reminiscing about that strange North Carolina peak.  Really, though, such mental gymnastics were only a distraction from my longings for the real yellow face that I hadn’t seen in so long.  Would it show itself on the morrow, I thought?  If not, I was done.

This morning, my S.A.G. partner was sound asleep and snoring.  Suddenly, he was jolted awake by loud shouting and boisterous bellowing.  “Woo, Woooo, Woo; Woo, Woooo, Woo.”  It was me, howling for joy.  The journey would continue, for I had awoken to a clear blue sky and watched as the yellow face crested the ridge to the east.  There was not a cloud to be seen, and the gorgeous fall landscape had taken on a life in the boreal forest that I had yet to experience.  Fresh snow glistened on the surrounding peaks.  Morning had broken like the first morning, and Slogfest Boreal would continue.

This warm, sunny day, I slogged up and over Atigun Pass (At 4,800 feet, this is the highest point on any road in Alaska), being forced to endure some nasty mud and walk several sections of 10-12% grade.  Nevertheless, I had the company of the yellow face to dry me out and lift my spirits.  Eventually,  I passed the farthest north spruce tree, and boom, I was whisked into the barren tundra.  There will be no more trees heading north.  The scenery up on the Chandalar Shelf was incredible as the Dalton ran beside the Alaska Pipeline.  I was reminded of the Tso Moriri area in Ladakh, India:  VAST GRANDEUR.  One final slog up a muddy mountainside, and I was sitting at the pass.  Amazingly, it was still, about 50 degrees, and intoxicatingly calm.  Three to four inches of fresh snow lay on the ground, likewise capping the surrounding peaks.  I could only pause and soak up the beauty of that place.  My S.A.G. partner and I pulled out  the lawn chairs, cooked some ramen, played in the white stuff, and basked in the gaze of the yellow face.

Down the other side of Atigun Pass was long and arduous.  There was a lot of downgrade but still a few nasty uphills in a toilsome headwind as the topography raced toward the Arctic Coastal Plain.  The Dalton ran right up beside the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), but I saw little in terms of living creatures, save a couple of ravens, an owl, and an arctic fox near the Atigun River.  Earlier this evening, it clouded up quick, and the wind began to howl.  After I had pedaled 66 miles on the day, my partner and I stopped beside this rocky formation and set up camp.  Now, I find myself huddled in the back of the truck as rain falls in torrents and the wind blows in a direction that will prove most difficult on the bicycle should it continue into tomorrow. 

What lies between me and Prudhoe Bay is 115 miles of the North Slope that is often engulfed in fog and a dreary mist.  Raging winds out of the north are to be expected--a sure recipe for discouragement and disillusion.  Unlike yesterday, however, I am not of a morbid mindset.  I saw the yellow face today, and there’s always the chance that it will look upon me tomorrow.  Besides, I have a pair of TCK Slog Series on my feet--a prescription for contentment in the most uncomfortable of conditions.  Prudhoe Bay, here I come!

-Jesse Boyd