The Klondike Cafe by Miller Chinle

Author:Miller, Chinle
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Yellow Cat Publishing
Published: 2019-10-05T00:00:00+00:00

21

After breakfast, Bud and Shorty buttoned up camp and put everything away. The wind was really picking up, and they hoped it would soon die down and the day would warm up.

It was still chilly when they finally filled their daypacks with food and water and headed out, hiking along a long valley that appeared to go into the heart of the Tombstone Range.

The weather appeared to be getting worse the farther they went. The skies were now overcast and the clouds had an ominous blue tinge to them, which made Bud wary. The serrated ridges above them had disappeared in the mists.

“Do they have tornadoes up in this country?” Bud asked Shorty, who was ahead of him.

“Tornadoes?” Shorty asked. “I’ve never heard of one up here. But those clouds do look serious, don't they? I wish it would warm up.”

They had started out following the creek, which Shorty had told Bud was called Wolf Creek, bushwhacking through a thick mosaic of willows interspersed with occasional white spruce, poplar, and aspen, startling birds and even what Shorty said was an Arctic squirrel.

As they continued on, they eventually left the creek, gradually gaining altitude, the going getting easier as the willows and trees were replaced by bushes and soft tundra. Most of the tundra plants had lost their autumn color, but Bud could tell they'd put on quite a show from the few that still had bright red and yellow leaves.

They now headed straight up a side slope, and once high enough, Bud could see a sharp scree-covered ridge ahead.

“Welcome to the Tombstones,” Shorty said as they stopped to catch their breath. “The other side of this ridge is where Anderson died. We'll climb to the top where you can see the avalanche. If there weren't clouds, you'd have an awesome view of Tombstone Mountain that way and Mount Monolith over there.”

He pointed, but Bud saw only gray clouds, which appeared to be moving in even faster.

“Then we'll be wanting to get the heck out of here,” Shorty added. “Because it feels like snow.”

Bud thought of the girls’ hockey team and hoped they were on their way out, too. He then asked, “What were you guys doing up here?”

Shorty replied, “We were doing some geologic mapping for the government. The Tombstones are the southern part of the Ogilvie Mountains, which are near the Tintina Trench, which stretches from the Rocky Mountain Trench in British Columbia across the Yukon and into Alaska. It marks a collision point between the ancient North American continent and drifting fragments of other continents, called exotic terranes—exotic, because they came from other regions. Anyway, this area was mis-mapped by early geologists, and we were updating things a bit.”

“Sounds really interesting,” Bud said. “If you do make it back to Green River someday, I'd really enjoy going out with you and learning some geology.”

Shorty replied, “The Colorado Plateau's really unique. Sometimes I really miss it. You know, Utah was also the edge of the ancient North American continent, just farther south from here.

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