Stage One: Wintering Grounds January 1998
Dispatches are logged most recent at top. They are sent by radio from the Thayers in the field to the base camp. From base camp an email transcription is forwarded to GOALS.

Dispatch 10
Day 25: We were met at the Kobuk by our support team. Our return journey will be by snowmobile. What a luxury after our long ski journey with heavy backpacks. We look forward to fairly flying along by snowmobile with little effort compared to our traveling on foot.

When we return in March to trek with the herd as it begins the great migration north, we will be skiing again—carrying back packs, pulling sleds with our equipment, food and fuel. We will travel the second stage from the wintering grounds through the Brooks Range to the calving grounds on the North Slope. This will be another approximately 350 miles, but the miles will be much more rugged than the first stage. It with require careful navigation through the valleys and peaks of the mountains. Unless the caribou begin to move north early, we will begin our second stage about mid March.

Join is again at that time for this continuing adventure with the Arctic caribou. to stage two...

Dispatch 9
Day 23: Today we reached the Kobuk base camp where we will stop and prepared to return to our starting point. We have traveled on skis more than 300 miles in 23 days. During that time, only two days were lost when blizzards made it impossible to travel. Because of the distance and our time frame, we traveled on some days when visibility was cut down so badly that we groped along—using our compass and GPS to find our way in the blowing snow.

Dispatch 9
Day 23: Today we reached the Kobuk base camp where we will stop and prepared to return to our starting point. We have traveled on skis more than 300 miles in 23 days. During that time, only two days were lost when blizzards made it impossible to travel. Because of the distance and our time frame, we traveled on some days when visibility was cut down so badly that we groped along—using our compass and GPS to find our way in the blowing snow.

Dispatch 8
Day 22: We are approaching the end of the first stage of our expedition. For days we have watched the herd foraging for lichens—the mainstay of their winter diet—and sedges and evergreen leaves from the black and white spruce in the wooded areas. With a keen sense of smell the caribou can detect food beneath the snow and with their shovel-like hooves they scrape the snow aside to expose their food. They constantly move about looking for the best food sources and a thinner snow cover. During winter they must survive temperatures in the mid, minus 30 degree range and at times considerably lower. Winter is a critical time for survival. They need to survive winter in reasonably good condition to make the migration north in the spring.
Late afternoon we watched as five wolves trotted about 300 yards in front of us going west. They stopped only long enough to look us over, then apparently deciding that we were of no interest to them, they resumed their ground covering gait with long legs that seemed tireless. They were magnificient in their winter coats. We soon crossed their tracks and stopped to look at their impressively large paw prints in the soft snow.

Dispatch 7
Day 20: For several days we have followed the icy ribbon of the Kobuk River, which grew narrow as we traveled closer to its headwaters. We have traveled many miles northeast, and have crossed the southern unmarked boundary of the Gates of the Arctic Preserve. We are now north of the caribou wintering grounds, well below the Arctic tree-line on the edge of the foothills of the Brooks Range.

Dispatch 6
Day 16: Yesterday we reached the area well east of the coastal town called Selewick. It was time to turn inland and head toward the Kobuk River where it flows into the Gates of the Arctic Preserve. We cut between ranges of hills finding ourselves in stands of black and white spruce and thickets of willows. We crossed small streams, creeks and side rivers frozen still in the whiteness of mid winter. As we get closer to the Kobuk River we find fewer caribou. We are now at the northern limit of the wintering territory and the caribou are sparsely scattered. They feed continually during the long daylight hours of last summer. The summer growth becomes the winter food for the herd—sufficient to sustain the herd through the long winter until they begin the migration over the Brooks Range to the calving grounds and more food on the North Slope.

Dispatch 5
Day 12: Today we crossed the snowmobile tracks of Native hunters. One day we met a hunter named Joe who almost fell off his snowmobile at the unexpected sight of two skiers in the middle of this wilderness. He couldn't believe that anyone would travel on foot here in January. And it was just beyond his imagination to understand why anyone would be out in winter conditions and not even hunt. He left on his roaring machine, leaving us in a cloud of blue smoke, shaking his head in disbelief.

Dispatch 4
Day 8: Today we passed large groups of resting or grazing caribou; they watched with only a mild curiosity. Their coats are thick to ward off chilling winter temperatures which this year we found to be as low as minus 38 degrees F. This has been an unusual year with warmer temperatures interspersed with plunging temperatures into the low minus column.
As we watched the caribou we noticed a shadowy figure of a wolf in the far distance. It was soon joined by two more. They slowly approached a small group of three caribou without any sign of urgency. Soon, one of the caribou raised its head then trotted off for a short distance followed by the other two. They soon stopped and resumed foraging for food without any apparent alarm or panic. The wolves melted into the low forest and the incident was over.

Dispatch 3
Day 5: The first couple of days the low hills were very close to the coast, now the land has flattened to the north, forming a wide plain that stretches to the rolling hills to the east. We are making good progress north. We meet increasing numbers of caribou daily, seeking the food and shelter of the coastal plains and inland hills. Here it is much warmer than the calving grounds far to the north—the herd's destination in a few short months—the windswept treeless, barren North Slope. January on the North Slope knows only the bone chilling deep cold of the Arctic.

Dispatch 2
Day 2: We're off! We are carrying back packs loaded with fifty pounds of fuel and food. We navigate by map, compass and GPS (Global Position System). Even though daylight hours are limited, the clear nights will be bright with a star filled sky and reflected light of the snow covered land. Under these ideal conditions we often extended our daylight skiing hours far into the night to make better time and make up for any time lost due to blizzards.
One day we saw a snowshoe hare explode from a willow thicket with a large grey, cat-like animal in hot pursuit. It had to be a lynx. We thought we saw long tuffs of hair that grow from the top of a lynx ears, the tell-tale sign of these wary and elusive animals. They were gone in a flash, leaving us astonished at their tremendous speed.