When we arrived in Kiana, there was only a faint trail out of town. After spending the night in the school we slept in late, hoping the dog race’s trail crew would leave before us and put in a trail. As we rode out of town and down onto the Kobuk river, there was lath marking a trail out of town – yay!! We puttered along slowly, grinding away on a soft trail across the main channel only to find the trail turned around – doh! And back we went, slowly grinding back to town..
In 2023, Bill F and I talked a bit about biking the Kobuk 440 route. The Kobuk 440 is a dog sled race that goes from Kotzebue to Kobuk, then back, and is semi-legendary for bad weather.
It is well above the Arctic Circle, and the temperatures can be quite cold, but by early April it should have lots of daylight.. We had tentative plans to ride the route in 2024, but those fell through. Which was possibly for the best, as the dog race was delayed a few days due to a big storm system coming in. A friend was in Kotzebue teaching kids to ski for Skiku when the dog race was supposed to start. The wind was so strong that school was canceled. Kotzebue is a really windy place, so for school to be canceled, it must have been horrific!
With that gloomy backdrop, this year we tried again and were joined by Spencer M. We arrived in Kotzebue on the last day of March, and we flew right over the trail as we landed. I had never been north of Nome on the coast, and spent the last part of the flight with my head pressed against the window looking out for the trail, which wasn’t to be seen. The treeless alien wasteland was pretty intimidating, but I guess that is what the adventure is all about!
After spending the rest of the day getting the bikes ready to go and doing a bit of exploring in Kotzebue, we left the following day, April 1st.
Leaving town was a bit confusing, but we were soon on the right trail and on our way – the start of a new adventure in a completely new place, hurrah!
We spent most of the day biking to Noorvik, enjoying a wonderful sunny day with a brisk tailwind. It felt a bit like being on the planet Hoth from Star Wars – snowy, treeless, and exposed. Crossing Kobuk Lake topped things off, and I could almost hear the Imperial walkers stomping in the distance..
Fortunately, as we got closer to Noorvik, trees started to return.
We arrived in Noorvik in the early evening, when a regional basketball tournament was happening, and I enjoyed a healthy dinner of nachos and hot dogs from a stand the local kids were running. Alas, I was thinking we would make it to Kiana, but we were going slower than anticipated – a bit of a theme for this adventure, hah!
- Day 1:
- Distance 47.88 mi
- Elevation Gain 725 ft
- Moving Time 9h 29m
The next day we headed out into a snowy morning and slowly rode to Kiana, where we found the trail ended.
The folks in Noorvik had said that the trail from Kiana to Ambler doesn’t see much traffic, and I guess they were right. There was a faint trail, but it was well covered with snow, and it would have been slow pushing.. We stopped by the school and they put us up for the night. I was able to get pizza, pie, and other snacks from the store, hurrah! We went to bed with plans to head out in the late morning in hopes the dog race would have someone putting in a trail.
- Day 2:
- Distance 23.10 mi
- Elevation Gain 285 ft
- Moving Time 6h 1m
We packed up and headed out in the late morning, enjoying a leisurely morning in hopes there would be a trail when we left. On the way out of town we passed a group with the National Park Service who were heading out to staff the Portage / Tutasraq shelter cabin. Things were looking good! There was even a trail out of town marked by lath!
Alas, it ended a quarter of a mile out of town, and we turned around and went back to hang out at the Blankenship store and eat snacks. I looked out at every snow machine that passed by in hopes one would be the NPS heading out, but no luck. Eventually, I walked down to the river and a group on big machines went by and parked out where the trail ended, chatted, then took off and headed out. We spent most of the day riding slowly on very soft trail, enjoying the sun and hoping for better trail.
The trail slowly got better as the traffic increased, and got quite a bit better when a group went by pulling a big machine on a sled.
Eventually, the trail went close to the bank and we found a good place to bivy for the night. Just after sunset a group of snowmachines passed by with the dog race and stopped and chatted for a bit.
Photo complements of Bill Fleming.
I drifted off enjoying the northern lights, and in the early hours of the morning I was woken by dog teams passing, though I was too lazy to get up and cheer them on.
- Day 3:
- Distance 28.13 mi
- Elevation Gain 292 ft
- Moving Time 9h 50m
In the morning we packed up and enjoyed some nicer trail… until it started snowing again, and things slowed down. We passed by the Portage or Tutasraq cabin where we ran into our first mushers, and chatted a bit with the NPS folks who were camped nearby and were keeping the cabin warm.
Get all of me in the photo – Quince Mountain while taking photos of his mittens as booties cabin footwear. Mushers like Quince give me hope for humanity..
By evening our progress slowed down a fair bit in the new snow, and we camped in some bushes just off the trail a few miles from where the author Seth Kantner grew up.
- Day 4:
- Distance 40.29 mi
- Elevation Gain 876 ft
- Moving Time 10h 1m
In the morning the wind had died down, but it was still snowing lightly.
So many ptarmigan!
We rode slowly the rest of the way into Ambler, where we were excited to hear there was a place that served food – yay!
I was super amused by a poster with Iñupiaq seasons on it, with two springs – which seems very logical from my Fairbanks perspective. In early spring it is sunny, with warm days and cold nights and the best part of the winter. Late spring it is warm all day, mushy, and gross, and the worse part of the year.
- Day 5:
- Distance 18.61 mi
- Elevation Gain 735 ft
- Moving Time 6h 21m
We headed out of town after agreeing that if the trail was bad, we would turn back. The trail started slow but ridable, but gradually switched to mostly walking with short sections of riding.
There was lots of joking about the “well-used trail” the locals talked about. We didn’t see anybody. There were lots of clouds, and I couldn’t see the mountains and views the folks at the Noorvik basketball tournament told us about, alas. However, I did enjoy a nice long walk with the bike. Almost a marathon of pushing, hah!
We spent the night in the Shungnak school, where the principal gave us Shungnak hoodies!
- Day 6:
- Distance 26.17 mi
- Elevation Gain 404 ft
- Moving Time 10h 50m
On our final day, we rode on a much better trail for the 9 miles to Kobuk.
We had spent the afternoon and evening before in Shungnak talking to the kids and hanging out with locals. Folks seemed pretty interested in chatting with us about our ride. I learned that there are several Iñupiaq dialects in the area, and the language spoken by the folks in Noorvik (coastal Iñupiaq) is different enough from what is spoken in Kobuk (inland Iñupiaq), the locals weren’t able to tell us pronounce place names in a dialect spoken in the other region. I was super impressed how the local languages are apparently still in use! Keeping a language alive that is only spoken in three villages with a total population of under 2k is an amazing achievement!
- Day 7:
- Distance 8.92 mi
- Elevation Gain 223 ft
- Moving Time 2h 31m
The following afternoon we flew back to Kotzebue (morning flights having been canceled due to weather), and I flew back to Fairbanks via Anchorage the day after that.
Thanks for the adventure Bill and Spencer, it was great traveling with you!
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Notes:
This trip was super fun, and it was great spending time with Bill and Spencer!
Bill did most of the logistics for this trip, and contacted the schools in advance and got us permission to stay in them, and for Noorvik and Ambler, permission for us to send resupply boxes. It was generally $150 a night per person, and the schools were all pretty friendly.
The trail was very slow after Noorvik. It didn’t appear to be getting much traffic between Kiana and Ambler. We saw lots of traffic between Kotzebue and Noorvik, but otherwise we didn’t see many people on the trail.
The riding was mostly slow, but we had pretty good weather. It snowed most days, but we didn’t have any hard wind storms. It is very exposed from Kotz to Noorvik, and could be miserable if a storm came in.
The trail conditions were slow and soft for the most part. The locals say that it generally snows when the Kobuk 440 is happening, so maybe this is normal for this time of year.
The route was scenic, but it had a lot more river riding than I expected – which is my own fault, as I had a map. It was also very cloudy with limited visibility for a lot of the ride, so I had fewer views of the mountains than I would have liked, but such is life.
Everyone was very friendly!
There are flights twice a day from Kotz to all the villages on our route via Bering Air, as well as frequent flights from Kotz to Anchorage. Direct lights from Fairbanks to Kobuk, Shungnak, and a few other villages are available, although these are only offered a couple of times a week via Wright Air, and are not listed or advertised. Ryan Air handles freight (the bikes) in all these communities.
The hotel in Kotzebue is super nice!
The local native languages (Iñupiat dialects) were everywhere! It was really exciting to see the local languages are alive. The principal in Shungak said the students didn’t like going to their Inupiat classes, so maybe it is an uphill battle, but it is still very refreshing to see.
Skiing this route later in the year might be fun. Ned Rozell and Andy Sterns did that years ago and had a great time.
For anyone thinking of doing this route, it isn’t a beginner’s trip. It is very remote, and can be extremely cold and windy, with little traffic.
This was the first trip in a while where I wished for tires with more tread. I had big tires, HD 4.8s on wide rims, but with low-profile tread, and I think something with a bit more bite to it in the front might have worked better. And maybe an even bigger tire. We joked a bit about the new gearbox fat bike Surly is making, maybe that would have been ideal, or maybe not.