Wilderness Living in Alaska

Factual Questions
1

I’ve seen some documentaries and read one book (recommended by someone here) about people choosing a life in the wilds in Alaska. I have some questions about the logistics of this lifestyle.

The gentleman in the book built a log house next to a lake. The lake served as a landing spot for a float plane and he made arrangements with a pilot to fly in supplies on a regular schedule. The same is true for one of the families in one of the documentaries. My question is, how do they pay for the supply flights?

I assume that groceries, medicine, clothes, etc. are expensive already in Alaska. Add to that the cost of having a private plane fly them to your house, and I would imagine they get darned expensive. How does one generate a cash flow to pay the pilot in sustenance lifestyle?

2

You may find some of your questions answered here.

But the burning question from Alaska is, "Who will saaaave your soooouuuul? Those lies that you told boy. . " :smiley:

3

Was the book “Alone in the Wilderness”? PBS had an excellent documentary on this man with footage he shot over the years he was there in the wilderness. He would go on hikes, and along the way hike forward, setup the camera, then hike back so it showed him walking back towards the camera. The whole thing is narrated right out of the journal he kept as well. Seems to me he was a retired single guy who wanted some adventure, had a pension and a brother in california that helped with keeping his finaces set. In that kind of setting, there did not seem to be a whole lot of expenses to worry about, he fished alot, shot and smoked game did a lot of living of the land, burning firewood for heat and cooking and what supplies did come in suplemented what he could not get otherwise.

4

That sounds like the same guy. The book’s at home, I’m not. The question he didn’t answer in the book was, how and how much did he pay the guy to fly in the supplies.

5

“In the Wild” is another very good book - John Krakaur

6

That might have been me.

Here’s an article on Richard Proenneke.

Skipper Too pretty much answered it. Proenneke was only in his 50s when he retired to his homestead. Seems a bit young, but he did mention (could have been in the second book) that he had a pension. He also seems to have gotten money from the Forest Service for providing them with photographs and footage.

7

That’s the guy from the book. So, he used retirement money and supplemented with his bio and photos.

How do some of the other folks do it?

If I were 20 again, I would learn to fly and move there, but alas …

8

A great book.
About Doing It Wrong. :smack:

9

Doh!! :smack:

Into The Wild - By John Krakaur was the book.

The kid basically sold all of his worldly posessions and walked from North Carolina to Alaska getting into different adventures the whole way across. He died while living in a bus just north of Fairbanks. I’m not spoiling anything for the book, it’s written on the front cover that he dies. Just like the previous poster said, you have to be prepared, and he only thought he was…turns out he makes a classic blunder that costs him his life. Good read if you are so inclined.

As for Alaska Proper, I have a good friend who retired from the forest service up there. Aparently there are quite a few people who homestead and live off the land up there…Common almost.

10

Note that you can’t literally homestead anymore…you can’t claim unused government land, improve it, and be granted that land. You can buy land, but the trouble is that 95+% of land in Alaska is government owned in some fashion and not for sale. So the fantasy of owning thousands of acres of wilderness is just a fantasy. You can buy land in Alaska, but it isn’t particularly cheap compared to the Lower 48, especially anything accessable by road.

The reality of bush living in Alaska is often pretty grim. People shooting each other, alcohol, kids huffing gasoline, no jobs, no future, no hope. Of course, that’s bush village life. You’re talking about living in an isolated cabin and only seeing other people a few times a year. Are you really up for that, psychologically? 99% of people just aren’t, even if they could live comfortably in the wilderness most people couldn’t stand to be isolated like that.

And lots of people who try to live that way are really engaging in a form of slow-motion suicide, like that kid from “Into the Wild”. He wasn’t an outdoorsman who made a mistake and paid for it with his life, he committed suicide by wilderness.

And the other thing is, winter. In the interior the first snows start in September, and doesn’t completely melt until May. Sure, September isn’t really winter, and May isn’t either. But are you psychologically prepared for 6 months of winter? Are you prepared for 2-3 months of only a few hours of daylight every day?

Of course, the reality is that most people in Alaska don’t live in an isolated cabin only accessable by float plane, they might live in a cabin, but the cabin has a driveway that connects to a road and the road leads to a village or a town, and they can go in and buy stuff. But then you need to pay for that stuff, and how do you do that? You can dig gold out of the ground, you can trap animals for fur, and people really do make a living as trappers and gold miners. But the gold miners aren’t living in a cabin with a gold pan and a pick axe and a mule, they’ve got tractors and dredges and sluices and high pressure hoses. And to be a gold miner you’ve got to find an economically worthwhile place to mine, and that ain’t easy.

So yeah, it’s possible to “live off the land” but only if you understand what that really means, and what it takes to actually do it. Just building a cabin is a pretty big undertaking if you expect to do it with just an axe and a hand saw.

11

For additional interesting reading, consider Coming Into the Country by John McPhee.

12

The Wal-Marts in Alaska have a counter for Bush orders. Things aren’t that much more expensive then in the lower 48. It’s getting them home that will put a dent in the pocketbook.

Living in the bush is doable but unforgiving. Small problems in the south are greatly increased in the bush. Running out of food or fuel can be a fatal mistake. Minor health issues become major problems.

However, most people up there have a bit of sense about them. Hunt and fish when you can. Run trap lines in the winter. Grow some giant cabbages in the summer. There is also a lot of sharing. People will look out for you if you are going to be looking out for them. Not to say that there aren’t the lone wolves out there.

Many people do it but they are smart and practical about it. Don’t think that you can be a vegan and survive the winter. McCandless was idealistic and not very practical.

Years ago a friends brother-in-law worked on a book about homesteaders in the Yukon Territory. They were given the land if they spent the winter. Not too many claimed their land.

Suggested readings (from what I have read):

Alaska Bear Stories - If you want to go into the woods after reading this series, you are good to go.

Ordinary Wolves - Fictional account of growing up white on the tundra.

Coming into the Country - McPhee’s classic about Alaska at the time of the Native Settlement Act. The first book is about homesteaders on the Yukon River.

Fifty Years Below Zero - Charles Brower’s autobiography of life at Point Barrow.

Homestead Kid - Cherie Curtis -

13

I know one guy that did this 30+ years ago but without the float-plane backup. He and two other guys built a cabin, etc. It was a religious thing. They hunted for food and were quite successful until late in the winter. They could still find animals to hunt but discovered they had scurvy. Quite a few of their teeth fell out and they were in bad shape by the time they escaped.

Regards

Testy

14

I worked with a fellow in Wyoming who decided he wanted to spend a winter in the Uintah mountains. They are actually in Utah but only a few miles south of the border and not too much farther than that from his house.

This was in the late 70s or early 80s.

He stocked up on food. Rode in. Built a simple cabin. Spent a considerable amount of time cutting firewood and hay. But it was an unusually cold and long winter. He said he ran out of firewood in early January and food not too much later. He ended up killing his horse and eating it.

15

I would never consider Alaska personally because I couldn’t handle the winters. But, all I’ve seen or read suggested that one would be dependent on bush pilots and I wondered how folks generated the cash flow to pay them.

I could imagine being able to trap enough to buy stuff like salt, coffee, and medicine if you trekked into town. But, when you have to have those flown in, I can’t imagine being able to afford that.

What I’ve collected so far from this thread (besides some good book suggestions) is, folks either choose a location with road access or they mine for gold or trap to get currency to pay a pilot.

I’ve wondered the same things about a life in a beach hut in Costa Rica, which is more my speed. Somehow, one has to find a way to gather a little coin to pay for the necessities. Like burboun, books, and fish hooks.

16

Well, gold mining from an inaccessable cabin just won’t work. Gold mining is possible, but you can’t do it with a gold pan and a pickaxe.

Also, it might not cost as much as you might think to get a delivery from a bush pilot. There are lots of small planes in Alaska, and lots of bush pilots. You don’t have to go very far into the bush to be completely isolated. A one hour hop in a plane every other month isn’t out of the question.

17

If one can get on a route with a pilot, then he can share the fuel costs with other subscribers. Some people live in areas where they can snowmachine in and out in the winter off somewhere on the road system, hauling a lot of their consumables on sleds behind them. For instance, one can snowmachine from Anchorage all the way to Nome (over 1000 miles), if desired. There are lodges that stay open all winter that will sell fuel along the way. It takes a lot of planning, a lot of grit, a lot of determination, and a lot of luck to actually live in the Bush full time.

18

Alaskans have by far the most private airplanes per capita and pilots in the U.S. and probably in the world. One of my favorite books is Flying the Alaska Wild: The Adventures and Misadventures of an Alaska Bush Pilot
and I keep it in my car.

It is a little dated. However, Alaskan bush pilots tend to fly very simple planes like a Cessna 150 or a 172 or a Piper SuperCub or an Aviat Husky. There is nothing cheap about flying in Alaska but the former two have widespread support and the latter two are built to be durable and fully capable of Alaska bush repairs. Using these types of planes, $100 an hour would be workable. It adds a lot to the cost of a single delivery but well-planned deliveries with hundreds of individual supplies would be economical at least in Alaska terms.

19

The other thing is, to live completely isolated from other people is just totally unrealistic. “Living off the land” is possible, but the people who actually lived (or who still live) off the land didn’t do so by themselves alone in a cabin, they lived in communities. They helped each other, they traded and shared resources and knowledge. Without the support of your community, one tiny accident or run of bad luck means you’re dead, dead, dead.

20

RE: the guy who lived alone in the cabin: I saw the film, it was pretty amazing that the guy was happy to live alone. I remeber how he had tokeep clearing off the snow, from his path to the lake (eventually the snow was 12’ deep). Hi water supply was the lake-and getting water on a cold day must have been a big chore. The isolation would get to me-I can’t imagine lasting through a long alaskan winter, all alone.