We woke up to a sunny day this morning and with it came calls for camping from the kids. I was scheduled to teach Sunday school in the morning so a hike it was. Jake looked out our front window and made up his mind as he stared up at the tallest accessible peak, Pyramid.

The Ugadaga Bay Trail is probably one of the most popular hikes outside of Ballyhoo and Bunker Hill. It’s a relatively short trail (approximately 4 miles roundtrip) with some elevation gain on the return trip. It has one of the most pronounced paths of all of the ones listed on the OC Trail Map.

The plan was to navigate the ridge line starting near Split Top and Morris Cove all the way to Lofty Mountain and down to English Bay the first day. After spending the night, we would navigate the English Bay valley toward Agamgik Bay and finally take the valley leading back to Morris Cove.

This was my fifth summit attempt of Makushin Volcano and we were changing up the approach route a bit to abbreviate the excursion. Not to mention, we were able to cut out a bunch of swamp walking on the way back by avoiding Makushin Valley.

Ever since I came to Dutch Harbor/Unalaska back in the late 90’s, I had heard about the Makushin Volcano, from time to time, in talking with the local people who lived here year round. Sometimes there seemed to be a little mystery in the air whenever the big mountain was mentioned, although it can’t easily be seen directly from the Port of Dutch Harbor. I would often look in the direction of where I knew it to be located and would wonder about what it looked like. On perfectly clear days (not a common sight here in the Aleutians) I was occasionally rewarded with the sight of a small waft of steam rising from the caldera of the glacier laden peak.

After our expedition to Chernofski and back I immediately looked forward to sharing the experience with everyone. Over the course of a three part blog post I was only able to share a limited amount of pictures due to the format limitations of the posts. Having took more than 2,000 pictures during our trip I've wanted to share more photographs, so I've distilled almost 400 of the best pictures into a gallery. I hope you enjoy the images as much as I enjoyed the adventure.

We awoke that next morning to partly sunny skies and a gentle breeze. Our view of the bay just outside the tent door was enticing with a white sandy beach extending out for quite a ways into the shallow waters surrounding Williwaw Point producing tropical like colors all along the shoreline. The scattered clouds were casting decorative shadows over the mountain peaks while exposing large portions of the blue sky above the ocean.

We decided to leave early on the 16th, weather permitting of course, and it was certainly bittersweet to leave both the ranch and Art as we had really enjoyed our time there – we even discussed potential return dates. To our delight, that Wednesday morning turned out to be sunny with only marginal winds. Art pointed out what appeared to be a horse trail crossing the valley and heading up the neighboring ridgeline. The trail led us across an old bridge that was in a state of disrepair. Art explained that a horse had fallen through one of the floor boards and that he was forced to remove many of the planks to free the horse.

Our trip started with a plane ride from Unalaska to Fort Glenn Ranch on Umnak Island. Clint Huling had just recently flown his personal aircraft to Unalaska from Wasilla the previous day. He was kind enough to let Jeremiah and I tag along with him to the ranch. The flight was smooth and took about an hour from takeoff to landing. The vistas along the way were exciting, yet daunting. The idea that we were going to hike back to Unalaska from the Chernofski Ranch via the terrain we were marveling at was nothing short of intimidating.

I just got back from my fourth summit attempt of Makushin Volcano and it was without a doubt the most successful. I was finally able to reach the highest peak on the mountain at around 6,010 feet! The fumarole was spectacular and I was even able to get a closer look at the active vents.

Our plan was to depart Friday evening via boat from the new boat harbor to Broad Bay and to conclude our expedition upon reaching the top of the Makushin Volcano.  We had until that following Wednesday, five full days, to summit the volcano and rendezvous for pickup at Broad Bay in order to make it home in time to return to work on Thursday. My hiking partner and good friend, Albert Burnham, had to catch a flight late Thursday evening in preparation for his wedding, just a week later. Our hope was to set up base camp near the volcano and wait for an optimal day to attempt a full ascent.

There is not a specifically mapped trail for hiking up Split Top Mountain. A very rudimentary trail does exist for the first half mile or so which eventually heads in a different direction toward Constantine and Kalekta Bays. The best location to start is at the end of the road at Morris Cove.  There is a single pull off along the left side of the road that can accommodate several vehicles.

The Agamgik trailhead is located along the road near Humpy Cove. Just prior to reaching the small bridge that crosses the creek in the valley, a pull off is situated on the right side of the road for those looking to park at the trailhead. The trail starts out as an old military road which winds back to an old rusty bridge. Shortly thereafter, the road turns from gravel into muddy ruts that meander through low growing willow bushes. If you aren’t watchful, you can easily veer to the right down dead end paths. Make sure to stay to the left and out of marshy areas. Unless it has rained significantly the night before, the trail should stay rather dry and passable.

The skies were nearly clear and the winds were almost calm. We had planned on setting out early Friday morning to begin our journey to the summit of Makushin Volcano but the weather on Thursday proved too placid to waste. So we quickly packed our gear after work and loaded the two kayaks on top of Jeremiah’s Durango.  Our wives and children accompanied us to the southern beach of Bunker Hill more locally known as Little South America.

On an early Friday morning, only an hour after sunrise, around 8AM, we headed down Captain’s Bay Road. The skies were overcast and the winds were calm. The forecast called for light rain but there were no indication of any pressing storms. The long term animated weather predictions actually showed an area of high pressure pushing through as the weekend progressed. This meant we might have a chance at some sun on either Saturday or Sunday so we headed out hoping for the best.