When I was younger, I used to wander freely. I would pack up at a moment’s notice, load up my truck and take a drive. I might have had a vague plan, maybe somewhere to start, but other than that I would wander without a destination in mind.
I thought back to these rambling trips I did, a decade ago, and remembered traveling to Haines Junction. It was just me and my husky staying in a small cabin. It had been my birthday and I decided to take myself for a drive to somewhere I had never been before. I ended up in the Donjek River Valley.
Inspired by this more-spontaneous version of myself, I decided that it was time for me to get back out into the world, if only for a local excursion. I would revisit the trip I had made to Haines Junction, years prior, as a known starting point.
The clouds were low as I drove into Haines Junction, so it was hard to see the impressive backdrop. Even so, I could still make out the base of the mountains and could sense their grandeur.
I had rented the same small cabin that I had rented nearly a decade prior, The Wolf’s Den. I drove through town and found its location by memory. The cabin was almost exactly as I had left it, and I could almost feel my old dog’s spirit greeting me at the door as I entered. I started a fire in the wood stove, tucked into some food and snuggled with my two dogs. Returning to a place that I knew felt like a comfortable way for me to revisit my relationship with wandering.
It was evening, but my dogs didn’t let me rest after the drive. I looked down at their eager faces and put on their leashes. “Well guys, let the wandering begin!” We trundled back into the truck and headed down the Haines Highway in search of a hiking trail. Within 10 minutes, we came across the Auriol cross-country ski trail. I stopped the truck and we headed down the well-packed trail and into the rolling hills. The weather cleared and the setting sun glowed reassuringly through the trees, soothing my anxieties about being in a new country.
The next morning brought cold weather and lark-blue skies. Although it was brisk, I couldn’t have asked for a nicer day to check out the area. Today, I would make extra effort to leave the places I knew and venture more into the unknown. Instead of heading north towards Burwash Landing and the Donjek River, I drove back down the Haines Highway and continued on past the Auriol Trail. The new surroundings unfolded all around me. Every corner and horizon brought with it a unique, never-seen-by-me collage of frozen lakes, trees and mountains.
As I entered Kluane National Park, the mountains grew in size and splendour. Their stark white bodies contrasted sharply against the vibrant blue of the late-morning sky. They were radiant, and I could imagine bright, haloed light jumping off their peaks and ridges and into the blue. Some mountains grew together in clusters, as impermeable walls of beauty, while others held on to their unique characters by rising alone.
I stopped at a pullout, overlooking the Tatshenshini River Valley, and read the information boards. They told of how the Tutchone used to live in the valley, harvesting salmon, and about the extensive trade relationships with the coastal Tlingit. That very highway itself had been a well-used overland trade route from that era. I felt humbled to know that my apparent “wandering” was on a well-established historic trail. The road may have been new to me but was so intimately known by the people who established the trade system, hundreds of years prior.
After driving farther, the landscape became powerfully serene, covered in pure white snow and dotted with dark-green subalpine fir trees. I stopped the truck and walked out into the middle of the open valley with my dogs. Without many landmarks, the distances seemed deceivingly close. As I walked to what I thought was a nearby creek, I had lots of time to observe my surroundings.
I noticed how each tree had a snow mound on its leeward side. The prevailing wind had deposited the snow in noticeable mounds behind each tree, creating a hummocked pattern across the landscape. I finally got to the creek and walked up a small hill on the other side, for a better view of the area. Pristine white mountains lined the horizon in all directions around the wide, snow-covered valley. In awe of the beauty, I snapped panoramic photos of the scenery before heading back to the truck.
The highway continued between mountain ranges and through narrow valleys, before peaking at Haines Summit. I decided to end my journey on this high note, immersed in white mountains and blue sky. Thankfully, I turned around just in time to get ahead of the snowplow.
As I headed back along the highway, I noticed that the surroundings still looked beautiful but, for some reason, felt less magical. I began to realize that when I first ventured out, the surroundings were all new to me. Because they were unknown, I had been more present to take in their newness. When I was more in the moment, I was better able to see how truly beautiful and magical the surroundings were. As I retraced the way I had come, it felt like my surroundings were known to me, so I engaged less with them and no longer saw them for what they truly were.
Recognizing this, I tried to bring my attention to the mountains directly in front of me, to see them again, as if for the first time. For a moment, I saw how truly magical and beautiful they were, but as I relaxed my effort, they faded away into a backdrop. I wonder if I could experience my life as new, in each moment, as if it were unknown? Well, maybe it is unknown, each moment is new to me. I continued along the highway, mulling over these realizations. Eventually, the dramatic mountainous landscape changed back into thick forest and rolling hills.
An hour passed and I descended the hill into Haines Junction. Mount Martha Black rose dramatically on the horizon to my left. Unlike yesterday, when it was invisible and covered in clouds, today it looked astounding. I thought back to my contemplations on the drive, about how the newness of the unknown helped me see things as they truly were.
I wonder how I would feel waking up to this mountain each morning? Would I come to know the mountain so well that I would no longer see her magic? Or does the mountain wander often enough behind the clouds and into the unknown that, upon her return, I would continue to greet her as if for the very first time?
