Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Alaskans: opinions/enlightenment, please.

My family left Alaska when I was very young; so my claim to an opinion as an Alaskan is small.

These people seem to be placing two of the most integral components forming Alaskan culture at odds: Alaska as a place to remake yourself and be "different", and Alaska as true wilderness that requires real effort to access.

I have to wonder if the latter does not provide the "relief valve" and "good fences" that allows the former, and that perhaps these people are shooting themselves in the foot.

I also wonder if any other private holdings exist nearby. If other private land is near the rights of these property owners, who may have bought specifically for the remoteness, would come into play. I would little appreciate having a road dozed right past my fly in only hunting cabin.

Fireplug

I agree with 458 Lott. These are people who came knowing little about what they were getting into. They're paying $450,000 for this land, using their Permanent Fund for the down payment, and probably for a fair amount of the future payments. So what do they do if the PF disappears?
Also they bought the land not knowing there had been a road, and thinking they could hack living out there with only fly in, walk in, ride in access, and then they found out that was a little tougher than they thought.
I'm a landowner and strong believer in individual landowners rights, but I think these people want to go beyond that. They were building a trail on Park land, to a cave, so they could set up a tourist outfit to take tours there. No permits, no checking it out first; they just started ripping and tearing. Sounds like they wanna have their rights, and walk over the top of other's rights too.

This is another Ruby Ridge in the making and I hate to see it coming in AK. It would be nice to see these folks use their PFD to buy transportation to a warmer climate for living off the land in what ever manner they see fit.

The reason I asked for opinions was that this story is all over the internet gunboards. It's mostly reported, in the most breathless terms, about how the Jack Booted Thugs of the Nat'l Park Service are gearing for another Ruby Ridge type scenario.

My natural anti-gov't bias goes right to that place but something about the story seems off, somehow. Those Park Rangers DO NOT look like BATFE thugs or FBI sniper/thrill killers (Lon Horiuchi, call your office). Pa' Pilgrim seems to want no government interference into his exercise of soveriegnty over his family unit but he seems perfectly OK with accepting gov't (APF) checks for doing nothing more than drawing breath. He's probably accepting Social Security checks, too.

Yeah, the Parkies are a bit too anal about having all their forms filled out. Whatever would they do with all those file cabinets if everybody quit doing the paperwork? I mean, if the Pilgrim family goes away, the cut through the forest will grow back. Right? Alaska will probably be better off without any chipmunks that got squished because they were too slow to get out of the way of the dozer.

Even religious kooks (if he be one) have a right to exist without being harrassed but I think someone needs to tell Pa' to get with the program. The Parkies seem like they want to negotiate an equitable solution and the Pilgrims probably should have asked some questions before moving up to the mountain (I sure would have).

OMG!!! I think I'm beginning to lean toward the Gummint on this issue. I better have a beer and think on this one some more.

Land rights folks from the lower 48 are chipping in $ to ship in food and supplies to these folks. They are making him the poster child for the land rights movement. I firmly believe they are backing the wrong horse. Many people in Alaska live where air access is the only way in and out. This guy just can't hack it. He's just an old hippy that has managed to make it off the sweat of others brows for a long time.

I like that someone has finally stood up to the Park Service right or wrong. I think the person that did is not credible. With the right person utilizing access to his or her land I think Alaskans would have had a better chance in court. But someone has to challenge existing access laws.
Look at how Kantishna mining claims were handled in Denali Nat. Park look at how in holders are treated in Nat. Parks.
Try and hunt in your Nat. Preserve and see how
receptive they are to access.

I suppose the fact that the elders are 'old hippies' doesn't look good.

I'd dare say that most of us non-hippies have NOT swung a $450,000 land deal lately. <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" /> <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif" alt="" />

Would it be different if these people were rich and 'in-step' with the current political climate?