We spent the day and most of the next in Tok, AK, the first real town you hit after crossing the border. It’s fairly busy as the intersection of the Alaska Highway and Tok Cutoff, which takes you south to the Richardson Highway. There is a great visitors center with good wifi and great bathrooms as well as an Alaska State Fish and Game Office.
I was able to pick up fishing regulations for the areas of Alaska we’ll be visiting. Lots of rules! The day turned rainy so we decided to just hang out; shopping, maintenance, etc. Diesel prices in Alaska are a welcome respite from Canadian prices and the local Chevron offered free camping and free water with a fill up! One interesting thing I like about these remote places is how the people tend to do multiple things to earn a living. For example, Auntie Helena’s Coffee Shop (where I wrote the last post) and The Bears Den Lounge (next door and well, you know) are owned by the same couple who are also local contractors.
The next day started out rainy as well so, after paying our respects at the visitors center, we headed south on Tok Cutoff. At the “town” of Slana, we headed east on Nabesna Road which is one of only two access roads into Wrangell-St. Elias NP. For context, this park is larger in size than Yellowstone, Yosemite and Switzerland combined. That fact along with only two relatively short access roads means you aren’t getting to most of it. Fortunately, the mountains are big and the views are spectacular. We stopped along the road to hike the Caribou Creek Trail , however, after a mile or so the creek became the trail.
Also worth noting that the name “Caribou Creek Trail” apparently applies to almost 30 trails in Alaska. We camped for the night at Kendesnii Campground, a free campground provided by the NPS.
As road conditions from this point further were a little sketchy (creekbed crossings with large rocks,) we elected to move back toward Tok Cutoff. We tried a few stops along the way to hike……think MUD.
As we moved further south, we would occasionally stop at a creek, river or lake for me to attempt a little fishing.
So far, not much luck. Most of the rivers have been running fast and dirty as we are a bit early. And for the record, I’ve only slipped on a muddy bank and fallen in once (so far.) We visited the Wrangell-St. Elias NP visitors center to pick up some intelligence, specifically on McCarthy Road. This road is the second access road to the park. To get there, you must first turn on to the Edgerton Highway for 33 miles to the town of Chitina. From there, McCarthy Road is 58.8 mile dirt road that sits on an old railroad track bed. As such, you can see old railroad ties embedded in the road and an occasional old railroad spike. I say 35 mph is the key to not having a flat tire, but the locals drive like hell. There are also other things to look out for.
Once you reach the end of the road, there is a foot bridge flanked by a parking lot and a “campground.” You can get vehicles into McCarthy, AK via another route for a $600 annual permit fee. We did pay for a night in Base Camp Kennicott campground (no other options) along the river with an awesome view.
Walking around McCarthy is like another world. They have their own power plant, a couple of bars/restaurants, one hotel, one store and a large population of dogs that appear to run the place. Only the hotel has wifi and they won’t even give the password to their employees.
The next day we took a shuttle 5 miles further to Kennecott, AK to explore the abandoned copper mine as well the Root Glacier.
After returning from the trail and touring some of the historic mine buildings, we were still 90 minutes early for the next shuttle back to McCarthy. Kennicott Glacier Lodge to the rescue with a meat loaf sandwich special and beer! We boondocked that night at a pulloff next to the Kuskulana River Bridge on McCarthy Rd. Long single lane wooden bridge over a deep gorge.
We headed south on the Richardson Hwy for Valdez, AK. It’s an interesting drive through Thompson Pass (only 2,677 ft. el.) in the Chugach Mountains. It averages 500 inches of snow per year….and it looked like it. We timed our arrival with the opening of Valdez Brewing. Great beer and an awesome cajun food truck out front. We took a glacier and wildlife cruise the next day. Since we are early in the season, we basically had the boat to ourselves. Tons of wildlife not to mention the glaciers!
The cruise aboard Stan Stephens Glacier and Wildlife Cruises was a great value and a great way to spend the day. Highly recommend! We visited Valdez Brewing again before returning to our boondocking site at the old Valdez townsite. After the 1964 earthquake, the town was destroyed and subsequently move 4 miles away to more stable ground. We tried a few short hike the next day before moving on. Snow and mud ruled the day.
We retraced our route north, boondocking in GlenAllen, AK for the night. Not much happening here except for relatively cheap diesel and an IGA grocery store.
We continued along the Glenn Highway, stopping occasionally to fish or take a side road. One side road took us to Lake Louise and past several other smaller lakes for a little fishing. Iced in!
We continued along, stopping at a short trail offering a viewpoint to the Matanuska Glacier.
While we were on the hike, we happened to look down on the Matanuska River and saw several prime boondocking sites. Turned out to be the best campsite of the trip so far!
We moved on to Palmer, AK the next day. Palmer is an agricultural town and actually very cool. There was a Friday Market going on when we got there and all the breweries (3) were in walking distance of each other. I was able to find a campsite to make the most of it.
Matanuska Brewing is one of several locations in the state. The food looked to be really good. Bleeding Heart Brewery was a really funky place with some great beer. Palmer Alehouse ended up getting most of our attention due to having live music both nights, great pizza and letting me bring in a big ice cube from the van for a whiskey on my birthday!
We hiked the Lazy Mountain Trail outside of Palmer. Six miles round trip and two of those are really steep.
We moved toward Anchorage, AK, stopping to hike Thunderbird Falls along the way.
Once in Anchorage, we set up camp at the Cabelas RV Park. Cabelas is awesome in that they almost universally allow RV’s to park overnight in their lots. We ended up staying here for 8 nights while we restocked from Walmart and Costco, checked out the local breweries and hiked both in the city as well as the surrounding mountains.
We enjoyed 49th State Brewing, Glacier Brewhouse, King Street Brewing and Ravens Ring Brewing. We also met one of Amy Jo’s former teaching colleagues at Firetap Alehouse for a nice dinner. We didn’t hit them all, but we’ll be back through Anchorage at least once this summer.
We also enjoyed a couple of coffee shops. That Feeling Co and SteamDot Coffee both provided great places to use wifi, work on this blog as well as travel planning. That Feeling Co was really cool as it was a combination coffee shop/plant store/produce store.
Anchorage is like any other major city in that there are problems such as homeless encampments, etc. This was especially apparent on some of the hikes we did along the many parks and greenbelts, such as Campbell Creek Trail. Beautiful urban trail along a creek with later season salmon runs, but dotted with tents/encampments and poor souls in not so good mental states. One great urban trail was the Tony Knowles Coastal Path. We hiked it through Earthquake Park and had the awesome experience of a mother moose and calf trotting past us on the PAVED trail.
There is some great mountain hiking east of Anchorage. We hiked Little O’Malley Peak, Flattop Sunnyside and Silver Fern, Blueberry Hallow, Powerline Loop to name a few. The hiking has been steadily improving in terms of trail conditions.
We will be heading down to the Kenai Peninsula shortly. Should be fun! Stay tuned.
Thanks!
Tom and I are living vicariously through the two of you. Thanks for sharing.