Our last camp was about 20 miles from the Arctic Ocean. We hiked on the tundra on the last full day and saw a young wolf and a grizzly sow with two yearling cubs sliding in a lingering patch of snow. We circled back around the river, crested the last rise, and found thousands of caribou on both sides of the river. Here on our last day on the edge of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, we had finally caught up with a large band of the Porcupine Caribou Herd. One group was walking single file across the aufeis, appearing to have crossed from the east side (our side) of the river to the west side. They passed a group of 50 that were laying the ice. On our side, hundreds were grazing on the northern extension of the tundra bench we were camped on two miles to the south. They made a pastoral scene spread out along the green field. As we scanned and scoped the west side, we saw hundreds of caribou moving south along the river and hundreds more on the plain farther west and north.
I crawled into my tent that night wearing fleece from head to toe. I woke up at 1:40 am and the chill Arctic wind of the day before had finally stopped. I crawled out of the tent to river and fog. On the other side of the river, I could see a dozen silhouettes of caribou moving up river through the fog. I woke again at 6:40 when Lisa told me that caribou were crossing the river near camp and going up a stream drainage near by. Within minutes they were all up the drainage, though hundreds still moved south along the west side.
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