Chitina, Alaska

Good morning, my friends. We're in Chitina this morning, which bills itself as the gateway to Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve. The national park is our sole reason for being here. 

Yesterday was a driving day. If you've been paying attention, then you might remember in my first post from Valdez, I told you we'd missed seeing some of the things the Milepost told us to look out for. And so, as we left Valdez, we kept an eagle eye out for those things. They were just 15 miles out of town. We missed them when we drove in because they were behind us as we drove south. Heading in the other direction, it was easier to spot them.

First...this unfinished railroad tunnel. Here's the story behind it, and the text from this sign was printed in our Milepost.

There's the unfinished tunnel. There was no sign of any railroad tracks.

Just around the bend, this sign. This was also printed in our Milepost.

Zooming in, you can see the original road.

Here, I've just backed up a little to give you a better view of what the place looks like.

We looked high above the river, but we couldn't pick out the pack trail.

Moving on...You might remember I barely caught this tunnel as we sped by on our drive into Valdez.

I got a better picture of it on the way out.

As a reminder, this is what our Milepost told us about this spot.

Okay, and those were the only things I wanted to revisit. From there, we headed on up the dusty trail. I took this next picture to show you the markers for the snow plows. It appears they have some kind of reflectors at the top. Not sure what that's all about.

And we couldn't resist stopping again at this pullout near Thompson Pass. It's just beautiful here, and at a different time of the day, it looked different. The next several images are taken panning left to right.

This next shot impresses me most. Look at that huge crevasse left of center. You can see where the landscape split apart at that point.

Eventually, we reached the intersection with the Edgerton Highway. This was the first new highway we traveled on our day of driving. As my mother would have said, there goes the road.

Not too far down the road, we stopped at this viewpoint to take in the expansive view of the Copper River.

Looking west, we could see this:

Looking in the other direction, we saw this:

We saw plenty of fireweed growing here, and we also saw these berries. Wild raspberries is my guess.

Here's what the Milepost told us about this area:

We didn't find a good place to get a picture of the mountains, but I did take this one of Mt. Wrangell. I've edited out some structures at the bottom of the image below. Look just above the tree line and to the right of center. There is a flat-top mountain there with clouds overhead. At over 14,000 feet, it’s a big boy, but with its domed shape, it doesn’t look as tall.

We made our way to our RV park. After getting set up, eating some lunch, and taking our naps, we headed five miles into the tiny town of Chitina. Here's what our Milepost tells us about Chitina.

There's the hotel.

And there's the Spirit Mountain Artworks.

We drove on down to the ranger station for Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve. It was closed, and the only information we could find was on the sign posted to the left of the structure. We suspect it was closed because of DOGE cuts. Just sayin’.

Here's what our Milepost tells us about the ranger station.

Ed S. Orr was the superintendent of Orr Stage. You can read information about him and his stage line right here. It's worth a look. Interesting history about the area.

We drove just a few miles down McCarthy Road. It's always a thrill driving through a single-lane road like this:

Coming out the other side, we crossed the bridge over the Copper River. And if you like salmon, you know that the best salmon comes from right here.

Looking west, it looks like this:

Looking east, it looks like this:

Just past the river, we came to this sign. The road to McCarthy is notoriously rough. The sign at the ranger station told us to expect a 3-hour journey (both ways) to travel the 60 miles. Also, the sign says it all.

We turned around there, and we'll give it a try today. I have serious doubts about whether we can make it to McCarthy. We'll go until we've had enough of the rough road (we're not into self-flagellation), and then turn around and return to the camper. 

As we headed back to the camper, we were able to see something else mentioned in our Milepost. This is a fishwheel. The man there was explaining how it works to the younger person to his left.

Here's what the Milepost says about it.

Since I don't know how a fish wheel works, I inquired of The Google. Here's a video that explains it. If you can't see the video, then click right here.

The campground was full last night, and it is supposed to be full for the next two nights. (We're only here for two.) Before other campers arrived, we took advantage of the quiet to get Smitty out for a walk. He was very brave for this walk.

As anyone knows, the grass is always tastier next to the sewer connection.

Okay. So we're packing along some sandwiches and some water and any other life-preserving equipment we might need today. We'll go as far as our rough-road tolerance will take us, and then return later this afternoon. If you're going with us, consider this excellent advice we received while ATVing in Tucson a few years back.

Safe and Sound

Good morning, my friends. First, I need to express my gratitude to the many of you who wrote to inquire about our safety yesterday. Apparently, there was a big earthquake 50+ miles off the Alaska coastline. We didn't feel the earthquake. After hearing from so many of you, I did a search on Facebook and found multiple warnings about the water receding and other alarming news about an impending tsunami. One post indicated the tsunami warning had been canceled three hours earlier. We never knew a thing until it was all over, which makes you wonder, doesn't it? In any case, we saw nothing, we heard nothing, we knew nothing, and we are completely safe.

It's probably just as well we didn't know about it because we would have been in a heap of trouble. The camper was off the truck because we'd taken the truck in to have the A/C problem diagnosed. We had the Jeep if we'd truly needed to move to higher ground, but we'd have had to leave the camper behind. Sheesh. As I always say, all's well that ends well, and nobody died. We're calling it a good day.

Getting back to our morning activities, we took the truck in early. Along the way, we were again blown away by the beauty of the mountains in Alaska. Just look at those pointy peaks in the image below. Even if you could climb to the top, I doubt there would be any place to stand.

This was the view out my side window.

We decided to take our Lu-Lu Belle captain's advice and drive out to see the Valdez glacier. This is what we saw on the short drive out there. You can just see a little smidge of it to the right of center in the image below.

There's a whole park there for your enjoyment, although the "park" consisted of nothing more than a parking lot.

Certainly we've seen more impressive glaciers. There was a glass-smooth lake.

Also, some ice floes.

We also saw some wildflowers. My phone tells me this is "willowherb."

I was having a hard time finding a way to photograph it without casting a shadow on it.

Back at the RV and waiting for news on our truck, I finished the 8th block for the Raggedy & Friends project.

Sadie helped me spread out the blocks for their group photo.

Here are the eight blocks I have for this project so far:

By then, we had the verdict on our truck. As it turns out, it's a problem that will need to wait until we get home. These folks could have fixed it, but we need to be out of here this morning. We have reservations up the road, and so there's no delaying our departure. We're hoping it won't be too uncomfortable driving through the Yukon and British Columbia as we head for home.

After picking up our truck, I noticed a sign along the roadside directing us to the original location of Valdez. If you've been paying attention, you might remember when I posted this section from our Milepost:

So when we saw the sign, we decided to go take a look. There isn't a lot to see there, but here goes. There were actually two sites. The first was this one:

It was really more about historical Valdez when it was originally settled.

Down the road a little way was this site that was devoted to the period of time following the earthquake.

Here were the two plaques posted there:

There were some pretty flower pots there too.

Okay, so that brings our time in Valdez to an end. Our next stop will be Chitina. Our goal in Chitina will be to visit Wrangell-St. Elias National Park and Preserve. There's a road out to McCarthy and Kennecott Mines National Historic Landmark. We're hoping to travel that road, but we'll have to wait until we can see the conditions. Our Jeep should have no problem with it, but it is a fair distance. No doubt we'll drive at least part way since it will be our only opportunity to visit the national park. We can decide to turn around at some point if the road proves to punishing.

All right. Time to get going. Breakfast is next, and then we'll be on our way.