Beavers!

Beaver Pond and Hatcher Pass Road

We asked the guides at the Musk Ox Farm where we should go to find a good place to camp, and they both recommended Hatcher Pass Road.  The turn off was close to the farm, and we soon turned onto a lovely rural tree lines road that quickly began to climb beside a beautiful river called Little Susitna, or Little Su.  It tumbled over large rocks, clear water, with blue hues that sparkled in the afternoon sun.

We decided to follow the road, with stunning vies of the Mat-Su valley and the Knik Arm of the Cook Inlet in the background.  At the top, there is an n Historical Park called Independence Mine, and it features old buildings that were part of a gold mining operation.  This whole area was geared for winter sports, and the “camping area” at that point was a huge parking lot designed to accommodate all kinds of snow machinery.  In reading our guidebook, this area is for hiking, picnicking, berry picking, camping, skiing, snow machining, snow boarding, fishing, grazing, hunting, trapping, snow mobiling, cross country skiing, and recreational gold panning, as long as it’s not on a staked claim.

The rest of the loop over the pass was closed, and would not open until the first Saturday in June, which was the following weekend.  The area had been covered with snow that had only melted within the last few days.

At the very top of the mountain, I got a call on my cell phone from my daughter in law Maria and was so startled to have reception.  We had not spoken directly to anyone for a couple of weeks and I hadn’t talked to her since we started the trip!   There was nobody up on this hill, and as we started down, we lost reception as we ducked back into the v-shaped valley that held the river.

The Little Su is a gold bearing river and starts at Mint Glacier in the Talkeetna Mountains and flows 110 miles into Cook Inlet.  All of the rivers we have seen have been identified with that type of specificity—i.e. where they started, how long they were, where then emptied.  I guess because it’s such a straight show down these mountains.

We were headed to a small camping area we had spotted, right by the river.  There were only six sights but they we all open with no trees, etc. around them.  But it was better than the parking lot at the top!  As we rounded a bend, we saw a man with a large telescope and saw what he was looking at.  It was a perfect, textbook beaver pond, complete with beaver.  We stopped and watched for quite a while. There was a second smaller beaver, and they had the dam, the hutch and two ponds.  It was quite a sight!
They hid when John got close, but came back out when we were farther away.