Visiting Hughes: new group offers eco-immersion tours of traditional Athabascan culture.

• Author: Mackenzie, Kathryn
• Position: TOURISM

The first thing I notice about the Koyukuk River region from my perch in the cockpit of the tiny bush plane transporting a handful of villagers, visitors, and supplies to the Koyukon Athabascan village of Hughes are the magnificent splashes of bright magenta covering the mountains. Fireweed, true to its name, has completely overtaken the burned remains of hundreds of thousands of forestland left behind after massive fires raged on both sides of the Koyukuk River in 2015. Once we've made our requisite stops along the way from Fairbanks, we finally arrive at Hughes, some 210 air miles and three hours northwest from where we began at the Wright Airport. We step off the plane onto the dirt runway with our host for weekend, Edwin Bifelt (picked up from the neighboring village of Huslia), who has deep ties to Hughes where nearly everyone is related in one way or another.

Bifelt's business, Zane Hills Capital, contracted with the Hughes Village Council to create a business plan for a "proposed tourism operation," says Bifelt. "This was the starting point for Koyukuk River Tribal Tours [KRTT]. A challenge we are currently experiencing is sales and booking clients. We believe if we are able to partner with travel agencies and other industry participants, the tour can become sustainable in the long term." KRTT (krttalaska.com) guests choose from either a three- or six-day immersive, guided river and camping tour designed to introduce visitors to the Koyukon Athabascan way of life through exploration, storytelling, and time spent with locals.

Day One:

It's hot in July in Hughes; this particular Thursday afternoon the temperature is a sweltering 86 degrees, making the sparkling river just to the left of the runway particularly inviting. Located below a five-hundred-foot bluff on the south bank of the Koyukuk River, the Koyukon Athabascans have lived here for thousands of years, moving camps up and down river, following the food: fish, moose, and other wild game.

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Once we've deplaned, we stow our backpacks in the tribal offices and take a walking tour of the roughly three-square-mile village, founded about one hundred years ago along the clean, clear Koyukuk River. Hughes, home to less than one hundred people, is only accessible by air and water. As we make our way from the river up toward the village center, people zoom past us on ATVs, smiling and waving. Children approach us shyly, introduce themselves, and quickly scatter away, back to the playground near the Johnny Oldman School.

Our little group of three visitors plus Bifelt head to the community center, an octagonal building in which the community gathers to socialize, celebrate, perform traditional ceremonies, and conduct business. This day, village First Chief Wilmer Beetus is here along with about a dozen...