The evidence suggests a man who was comfortable in challenging terrain — who had crossed the mountains before, or at least had extensive experience with the landscape of the Coast Ranges and the alpine environments that a crossing of the Tatshenshini-Alsek region requires.

Crossing a glacier is not casual travel.

It requires specific skills: knowledge of snow and ice conditions, understanding of crevasse hazards, the physical capacity to move at altitude, the navigational knowledge to find the route in terrain where landmarks are obscured by snow and fog.

He was a person who moved between worlds.

The coastal dietary signal in his tissues, the coastal hat on his head, the inland clothing on his body — these are the traces of a life that crossed the geographic and cultural divide between coast and interior.

Whether that crossing was part of a trade relationship, a family connection, or simply the specific range of an individual who had grown up in a community with strong connections to both sides of the mountains, he was not a person confined to one ecological zone or one cultural world.