The Johnston's of Chulitna (formerly North Pole) | Adventures in Alaska

Dipnetting at Chitna on the Copper River

Posted on July 21, 2017 by John

Everyone decided to leave Summit Lake where we were ATVing and head back to town, me I decided to head to Chitna and do some dipnetting for Salmon. The reds were in and I figured since I hadn’t been dipnetting for a quite a few years it was time I did it again.

I got to Chitna and took to the road to O’Brien Creek, this is actually the road that was started by in the 60’s I think, that was supposed to connect Cordova AK to the main highway system, leave it to say it was another Alaskan Politicians blunder, no the road never got done, but it does make a great ATV trail for 15 or 20 miles, maybe more I don’t know.

Down the road about 1.9 miles you come to a steep grade and one I wouldn’t take the RV down, but heck you can only go another ¼ mile anyway and no more road. So I parked in the large turn out just near the top and as dipnetting was closed until Tuesday morning, not a sole in sight, I got my pick of parking spots, beautiful view of the Copper River.

While cooking dinner, momma moose and her baby come along and hang out for bit, kool I thought, nice scenery and wildlife, if I only knew.

So my week starts out with breakfast Monday morning, thinking this will be enjoyable, quite breakfast watching the river flow by down the hill and just relaxing for the day, fishing opened at 12:01 AM Tuesday, so I had a day to just do nothing. My breakfast is made and I’m sitting at the table, all I need is my orange juice, so as I get my cup and turn around to eat, what should be watching me with his noise pressed on the dining area window, a black bear. He kind of looked like he was trying to figure where his plate was, I make noise and he walks to the front of the RV, stand on my cooler and then looks in the front of the RV. Dang pest, after he figured he wasn’t getting in, he walk off to the trash can about 50 feet away and tried to find a snack there. Good thing to, because by that time I had the sawed off shotgun in hand and a round jacked in, ready for him to break a window or door. Well this guy hung around for a day or two and then when went on his merry way.

Dipnetting Chitna July 2017

Dipnetting in Chitna for Reds

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ATVing at Summit Lake

Posted on July 21, 2017 by John

So a week after I get home from the Lower 48 I load up the RV and hit the road for Summit Lake on the Richardson. This is the same location that the Arcticman event is every year. Been down most of trails in the winter but never in the summer.

Trish and I were suppose to leave together Thursday evening, but she had to work until late and being a short 3 hour drive in her car, she decided to follow me down after she got done.

I love Alaska in the summer and the scenery is always beautiful and this trip was no different, good weather and sunshine, most of it anyway.
So we rode Saturday along the Alaska Pipeline trail, actually the maintenance road for Alyeska Pipeline Service Company, but still nice. I didn’t get to go down the one trail I really wanted to explore, but I guess I have reason to go back some day.

So you’ll see my bride in the pictures below, she is just covered in dust. There was 7 of us with Stony as our leader and he prefers to drive a faster pace than most of us, but Trish was determined to stay right on his butt, ATV butt that is and she got covered with trail dust for her efforts, but danf she did a good job of staying with him

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Road Trip

Posted on July 21, 2017 by John

So one day in April I’m just hanging out on the deck and my sister calls, she has decided to move from Calif to Lawrence Kansas and as we’re talking she mentioned that she really needs to drive to Kansas with some items and her dog. Her dog is a sweetie but older and I know she wouldn’t make the plane trip, dog that is.

So being the kind younger brother than I am (yeah lots of patting self on the back there) I agreed to fly to So. Calif and drive her to her new home. It was a pretty good trip I have to say, we left Calif on Tuesday morning and hit the road. First day was long, 11 hours and we made it to Salina Utah, a nice quite community. When we pulled in I see all these Polaris ATV’s and after talking to the folks a bit I discovered their on an 800 mile ATV ride across the state and not a big deal, or so they said. I seems Utah has excellent ATV trails and they ride from small town to small town and stay the nights in hotels, 4 days to do the 800 miles. Dang I wish we had those kind of trails.

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Mt Ryan Cabin Site

Posted on June 14, 2017 by John

Dean needed to check on Tiff’s cabin on Mt Ryan and since I was there any way, we did a work little to the foundation and beams for my cabin. Leveled the beams and made up a material list to get the platform in. I don’t plan to put up the walls and roof for while, so I figured I’d at least get the deck (eventual floor) in and use it as a platform for the wall tent during the summers. Will have to see what’s the best exterior floor paint these days to protect it.

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Scoping material needs to finish cabin foundation

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It was a beautiful day and we did notice that some 4×4 trucks had been down the trail, suckers rutted it out big time. I don’t mind 4×4 trucks, but when they drive on trails that they aren’t legally allowed on, due to weight limits and then destroy them, I have issues with that. Probable the same A-holes who destroyed the walking trail in town.

We did find a a nice chainsaw someone dropped in the trail, trying to locate the owner, but if its one of those 4x4ers, oh well, their loss is our gain.

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Fairbanks – Circle Mail Trail, Mile 24

Posted on June 12, 2017 by John

Saturday, June 11, 2017, a beautiful day and a lot cooler than the 90 degree weather we’ve been having for the past few days.

This was the 2nd Snow Travelers summer ATV ride for the year. Only three of us showed up and I figured that was due to folks either not wanting to deal with the forecasted rain or else they were sitting on the banks of the river(s) staying cool.

Kerrey, Dean and I started out from Kokomo Creek and the Fairbanks Creek Rd. junction, of course it’s all dirt at this point and the smoothest part of the ride. I figured we’d head to Sorrel Creek, about 20 miles down the trail and try to figure out how to get to the top of the ridges from there. So we spent a few hours riding and exploring the valleys on our way and after a few wrong turns made it to Sorrel Creek. I hadn’t been in this neck of the woods for at least 7 years and there were changes of course, more moose camps than I remember, hum, maybe I need to consider that for this year’s moose hunt.

After exploring around Sorrel Creek we figured out that we needed to back track a mile or two and take the trail that went up, turns out it’s a trapper line and a nice easy ride up to the top of ridges.
We made it about a mile past the Historical Fairbanks-Circle Mail Trail post 23. For those of you unfamiliar with the trail, this was the original route used back in the day to get mail from Fairbanks to the gold diggings in Circle and those old bays who ran this route were some tough dudes, especially considering they did it all on horseback or shanks mare. Some steep hills to go up and down.

At 3:00 PM we made it to where we turned around at the 2731 foot elevation of the trail and my fuel gage was showing ½ a tank of gas left. But the view was spectacular, we could see the U.S. Creek Rd that is at 57 mile of the Steese Hwy, probable a good 5 to 10 miles to the north-west.

Anyway, for those who missed it, it was a great 61 mile ride and an excellent day, no rain and sunshine with a bit of wind on the ridge tops. The video is the top of the ridge we turned around at and then headed back down to the valleys.

June 11, 2017, Fairbanks - Circle Mail Trail

FST ATV ride on the Historical Fairbanks-Circle Mail Trail

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View from the top

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Memorial Weekend 2017

Posted on June 8, 2017 by John

Was a good weekend, not many FST folks showed up, but then there wasn’t many folks at the Nome Creek area at all, probable the lowest number of campers I’ve seen at Nome Creek for a number of years.

Steve and Stoney left early, so Ingrid, David and I rode the Quartz Creek trail, it was beautiful, rough, but beautiful with patches of snow still in the mountains. We only made it in 10 miles of the 16 mile trail, got stopped by the snow pack covering the trail. Think I’ll go back in July one day and try to make the whole 16 miles in, might be a good spot for future moose hunts.

The attached photos tell it best. The last 7 or so are from Steve 🙂

Memorial Weekend 2017

Nome Creek area on Memorial Weekend. Enjoyable three days camping in a quite setting.

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Short video of the area we were riding in, about half way down the trail. P5270014

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Pax and Turkeys

Posted on May 22, 2017 by John

So the turkeys kept/keep trying to get out of their coop, I let a couple out the other the day and they seemed to like it, Solution, I threw up some 4 foot fencing and made a temporary run for them and of course Pax, our 17 pound Snorkey thinks the turkeys are his friends and family, wonder how he’ll do when they weight 50 pounds.

Think I’ll make the fence more stable and add a gate to get in and out, tired of step over it all the time :<) Video of Pax running with the birds P5170008

May 18, 2017 Pax and Turkeys

Pax trying to get the turkeys to play

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Chicken Update

Posted on May 11, 2017 by John

So the chickens and turkeys are getting bigger and I put the turkeys and Corniish Crosses out in the chicken coop last Saturday, they were getting to big for their chick boxes and the amonnia smell was driving me crazy.

I’m thinking tomorrow I’ll put the Sex Links out with the Cornish gals and see how they do. Temps are getting better, but I’m still turning on the heat lamp at night.

May 11, 2017 Chickens, turkeys

Turkeys and chickens at 4 weeks

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Chickens, Turkey’s and coop

Posted on April 27, 2017 by John

Pictures of the chicken and turkey chicks we have. The small chickens are Sex Link for egg laying, the big white ones are Cornish Cross for meat, and the Turkeys are bronze and white turkeys for, well turkey days. Their between 2 to 3 weeks in these pics., Still too cold to put them out in the coop, snow on the ground, so they reside in the garage for a few more weeks.

Pictures of the coop, turkey’s to the left of me, chickens to the right, here I am stuck in the chicken s**t again.

April 27, 2017 Chickens and Turkeys

Chicken and Turkey chicks

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Cornish Cross

Cronish Cross

Sex Link

Turkeys

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April 8th, 42 Mile Steese to Cache Mtn

Posted on April 9, 2017 by John

Another great day and ride for this spring of 2017. Six of us meet at Chatanika Lodge for breakfast at 9:00 AM and then drove to 42 Mile Steese to hit the White Mtn Trails. We discussed going to 85 Mile, but the clouds were looking low and it was windy, figured it’d be a miserable ride higher up.

The parking lot was bare of any snow and that made getting the 100 feet to the trail and snow interesting, dang sleds don’t like turning on dry asphalt and dirt. Anywho, we all got on the trail and headed to Cache Mtn Cabin. The ride was good, new snow from the past couple days and the sun was out most of the time, a bit flat light and no tracks to see, so leading I did miss a couple turns, Ooops.

4_8_17 Cache Mtn

Cache Mountain in the White Mtn Rec Area April 2017

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