Next we visited the carving building. They demonstrated how they would make the tools and then use them to hack out carvings from wood.

Next we enjoyed authentic Native Alaskan storytelling and dancing. The stage told the story of a tribe that had a wealth of supplies for winter. While they were away for a multi-tribal meeting some men came upon their stash. They took all the food and other supplies and traveled down the river thinking they were set for the winter. Only, the supplies disappeared. When the tribe returned, the stores were all in place. So this group used the story of ancestors as the backdrop to their ceremonial stage. 

Next, they told of this totem which is the story of how their tribe came to be. The best hunter had been kicked out of the tribe for an adulterous affair with the chief’s wife. So he took his three son’s thus taking the 4 best hunters of the tribe. They all split up to find the best land to build their new tribe.  Ultimately, the location we sat was decided upon since it was so close to the salmon spawning, good hunting, and defendable location.

The tribe thanked us for visiting since our interest funded their revival of their culture which had been repressed until recently.

During lunch my mother and I sat with the female leader. I told her of the similarities their practices had with the ancient and current Norwegians. She showed interest so I told her that I had made a movie about the Norwegians in a film called “The History of the Arctic Cod”. She asked my name, but I had to admit that I had no byline even though I was the producer, writer, and editor. I also told her of Teresa’s plans to travel around Australia which intrigued her, and I handed her Teresa’s a card.

We left the tribe by inflatable raft down the river. The guide told us that the water we were on hand only melted about 8 hours previously from a glacier. The brown color of the water was from the minerals trapped in the glacier. Unfortunately, this also hid the salmon coming to spawn up the river. Thousands of fish swam below us and we couldn’t see a one.

As we traveled down, we could see the remains of the land once inhabited by a Native Alaskan tribe. The last photo had been taken in 1850. Shortly thereafter, a landslide completely covered the village leaving no servivors. As you can see in the photo, the damage to the area has never recovered.

As we floated down the river we spotted many bald eagles. Many were on the shore waiting for fish blinded by the brown water to swim right onto the land where the eagles waited for the easy meal. We even saw young eagles who had not changed from the camouflaged mottled brown. We could spot the eagles by tiny white spots in the top of the trees. 

As we cruised down the waterway, many fallen trees were trapped in the river. The river ran so fast that it wore away the dirt under the trees at the edge of the river. One tree decided to dislodge just as we were floating by. We all held our breath to see if we could get out of the way of the tree before it slammed into our now fragile looking boat.

We safely landed by the bus and enjoyed hot drinks with cookies. Now that was quite a day.

By: Guest Writer Tiffany Diehl