The Colville River is the largest and most complex river ecosystem in the U.S. Arctic. Flowing east along the northern slope of the Brooks Range, and fed by countless small streams and tributaries, it bends near Umiat, and flows north to the Arctic Ocean, traversing nearly 430 miles of Arctic wilderness. We explore the very headwaters of this remote river.

The upper Colville River provides habitat for a unique population of peregrine falcons, as well as other raptors, including gyrfalcons, rough-legged hawks and golden eagles, and, in fact, has one of the highest densities of nesting birds of prey and songbirds in the Arctic. The Colville is part of the National Petroleum Reserve, the largest single block of undeveloped land left in the United States. This vast arctic ecosystem, comprising 23.5 million acres of wetlands, wild rivers, rolling hills and coastal plain, is one of America's most spectacular bird, wildlife and wilderness sanctuaries.

Along its banks, we find a fascinating combination of towering cliffs, bluffs, and huge gravel bars with a rich riparian community of willows and alders, mosses and lichens, beyond which spread rolling tundra hills. Moose, grizzly bears, wolves and wolverines live here, and the nearly half-million-strong Western Arctic caribou herd traverses the area throughout the spring, summer and fall. The waters of the Colville support over 20 species of freshwater and anadromous fish, including arctic char and grayling.

As we move downriver beneath the bluffs, we find nesting raptors at every turn. In cutbanks and on the beaches, we find remnants of ancient creatures and cultures long past.

Paleontological evidence, in the form of bones, teeth, and ivory, may be found, from the time that mastodons and woolly mammoths roamed these grassland steppes. Further downriver on the Colville, dinosaur bones have been found in fossil beds in the mud cliffs. Evidence of dinosaur trackways have also been discovered, lending credence to the idea that a land bridge between Asian and North America may have existed millions of years earlier than previously documented.

The Colville is a fascinating float through a remote wilderness rich in birds, wildlife, and prehistory.