Caribou, Birds, and Bears
Presented by Brian Elliott
Tuesday, Nov 3, 2015, 7:30 PM
San Bernardino County Museum, 2024 Orange Tree Lane, Redlands
Our speaker at the November 3 chapter meeting is Brian Elliot. Brian’s presentation is titled Caribou, Birds, and Bears: Canoeing the Utukok and Kokolik Rivers of the western north slope of Alaska. Sierra Club member Brian, along with three friends, canoed these two rivers that flow north on Alaska’s North Slope above the Arctic Circle. Brian has given us talks on several of his other Alaskan adventures over the years. The meeting starts at 7:30 PM at the San Bernardino County Museum, 2024 Orange Tree Lane, Redlands. It’s just east of the California St. exit from Interstate 10 on the north frontage road.
Brian and his friends canoed for ten days in 2014 on the Kokolik River. They returned this past summer to canoe nine days on the Utukok River, just east of the Kokolik River. He and his friends were then air shuttled back to the Kokolik where they canoed for 15 days, this time all the way to the Kokolik’s River’s mouth at the small Inuit village of Pt. Lay, a subsistence village of 190 people at the Chukchi Sea’s coast.
The rivers flow through some of the most remote wilderness in North America and are renowned for viewing of the western Arctic caribou herd migration. Brian and his friends saw thousands of caribou along with much other wildlife. Each river is primarily located within the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska, an area of national interest by the Sierra Club and other environmental groups who are trying to preserve its great wilderness and wildlife. Brian will share his photos of his trip and advocate for the region’s protection.
