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Wrangell - St. Elias National Park

Part 2 of 4: My Best Day Yet - Thanks to the People That I Met
(you have to read all four parts to fully understand the title)

As I was writing my blog about Denali National Park, I had the urge to write that it was the largest National Park in the United States.

Fortunately, I held back because this honour belongs to today's destination - Wrangell - Saint Elias National Park.

http://www.nps.gov/wrst/historyculture/who-were-wrangell-and -elias.htm


The name Wrangell came from a Baltic German "wunderkind" Baron Ferdinand Petrovich von Wrangell (1796-1870) who served in a multitude of administrative functions for the Russian crown. Included among these was governor of the Russian colony of Alaska whose capital was located in Sitka. He was also highly critical of the sale of the colony to the U.S.

The Alaska ferry also passes through the Wrangell Narrows and stops at the town of Wrangell on its way from Juneau to Bellingham, Washington.

It was the feast day of Saint Elias when Vitrus Bering, a Danish explorer also working for the Russian crown, first spotted the mountain peak he would name "Mount Saint Elias".

However, the park is named after two of its mountain ranges: the Wrangell and the Saint Elias Mountains.

In a previous blog I wrote about the massive glacial fields which are found in Kluane National Park - near Haines Junction, Yukon. Wrangell - Saint Elias National Park is a continuation in Alaska of the same ice fields. The ice fields in both parks have been named World Heritage Sites.

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The next day:

I was eagerly awaiting the crack of dawn to get a better grasp of my surroundings.

The first stop was to return to the unmanned Visitor's Center to study the information panels in the hopes of giving some direction to my day.

It became clear that the cup of coffee that I craved was not to be had on this side of the Kennicott River.

Other than a tire repair shop, everything was closed for the season.

My first discovery was that the hamlet of McCarthy was not located at the end of the road, as I thought, but one kilometer beyond the footbridge across the Kennicott River.


While my ultimate destination, the Kennicott Glacier, was 6 miles further, McCarthy was easily within walking distance.

That was a plan that I could surely execute. The rest of my itinerary was still in the realm of the unknown due to the fact that the shuttle between McCarthy and the abandoned mining town of Kennecott (note the different spelling) and the glacier had been shut down for the season.

Considering how I might have to walk a distance of about 20 km through Alaskan wilderness, albeit on a narrow dirt road, it took a long time to get the right combination of items to carry with me.

Water, rain gear, warmer clothing, gloves, toque, food, matches etc. all had to fit in my small backpack.

Then there was the matter of walking by myself through bear country. As I mentioned in a previous blog, walking trails in Alaska are marked by a pictogram showing two persons hiking. This sends the message that noise (conversation) is important in order not to surprise bears.

The making of noise was taken care of by my Nordic walking poles. The carbide tips dragging along the compacted gravel road did a great job in fulfilling that function.

What about the rest?

Being as paranoid as I am, I was prepared. Let's see, what was in my arsenal - bear spray, bear bangers and a huge Brazilian jungle knife.

If "ladytrapper" is still reading my blogs she would be shaking her head in disbelief since bears are a common occurrence on her property in New Brunswick. They even make cameo facial appearances on the video camera set up on her property.

After finally assembling the right combination of what I considered to be necessary, I was off across the footbridge to find a large wooden church - the McCarthy - Kennecott Community Church on the other side. It seemed a little large considering the lack of people.

After crossing another footbridge over a dry arm of the Kennicott River, I came upon the hamlet of McCarthy only about a half kilometer further.

According to the National Park's information panels, McCarthy was the last railway stop before the town of Kennecott.

McCarthy boomed during Alaska's last great gold rush in 1913. The town was founded as gold rushers headed for the near by Chisana gold fields.

The town thrived as gold and copper mining operations grew around the region. It was a colourful town that had everything - even a red-light district which catered to the needs of the nearby copper mining company town of Kennecott.

Everything came to a grinding halt when the company town - Kennecott closed suddenly in 1938.

With the opening of the park, McCarthy has had a slow rejuvenation and now has achieved almost a cult status in its appearance and mirror image of what Alaska used to be.

While it turned out to be a town that was far past its "good till" date, at the same time its inhabitants were a genre of hardy people who were determined to hold onto this little piece of past history or the essence of what Alaska used to be.

Its inhabitants have a deep commitment to living here and see it as an escape from conventional civilization.

In the end I concluded it is a cool place, no doubt about it.

That cup of coffee looked real promising when I followed an "expresso" sign only to find a "closed for the season" café.

I forgot the coffee however because it quickly became evident to me that McCarthy was like a little time capsule, frozen in time, in the 1920's.

I wandered "bouche bé" from one house to the next, enraptured by the quaintness that was all around me. I was like a kid in a candy shop because the material for photography was endless.

Even the buildings that had fallen apart or into a state of disrepair, offered themselves up as worthy objects for my camera.

If the offering was given, I was only too glad to accept it as I found myself going all out to capture this panoply of bygone Alaskan memorabilia.

Not falling apart and still very much alive was Ma Johnsons Hotel. It is a classic of old western architecture. I walked inside in the hopes of finding someone to give me some information about the hotel. The inside was even quainter than the outside. Despite ringing a bell, I could not conjure up an appearance behind the reception desk from Ma Johnson.

In my hour of walking around I only saw one person who confirmed my worst fears that there was no coffee to be had anywhere.

During my pleasant walk about quaint McCarthy, there was a tug of war going on in my mind precipitated by the non-availability of the shuttle service.

I kept going over the calculations of time and distance to walk the 4.5 miles to the abandoned mining town of Kennecott and the additional 1.5 miles to the glacier. No matter how you cut it that is a 12 mile (20 km) walk round-trip.

Once I had fully soaked up the beauties of McCarthy I had come to the firm conclusion that seeing McCarthy alone was worth the trip and that I would not walk 20 km to see Kennecott and the glacier. It was just too far.

So one last swing through the town and I was on my way out.

During that last swing, I happened to notice two people sitting on a front porch of the New Golden Saloon across from Ma Johnsons Hotel.

Not only were these two people sitting there but, even better, there were two cups of coffee sitting in front of them. I looked longingly at the coffees as I passed by the side of the building on my way back to the car.

I walked about another 50 meters before I overcame any scruples of appearing stupid in begging for a coffee. I turned around and headed for the front of the building where the two persons were sitting.

Yes, the saloon was closed but the young lady offered to get me a cup of coffee.

Hey, that was a good turn of events.

Further conversation revealed that the two people were Chris and Mike, seasonal employees of the New Golden Saloon which would not open till 18:00.

They both spoke with fond recollection of their summer's work experience in McCarthy and how wonderful it was to be working in such a beautiful setting.

I was impressed with the ability that Chris had to describe the surrounding landscape. She was very enthusiastic and was very capable of painting a vivid verbal image of the beautiful places she had visited in the area.

I started to feed off her colourful descriptions and started to think that maybe I was premature in having decided to head back and not walk to my far away destinations.

In the end, I just outright put the question to them. "If you were me, would you make the effort to walk to the glacier?" Their response was a unanimous, "of course!"

That did it for me, damn the long walk- I am going to go!

So thanks to the couple I met at the start of my Alaska trip back on Highway 16, I was here in McCarthy and Wrangell - Saint Elias National Park.

Thanks to Chris, Mike and my addiction to caffeine, I was walking to Kennecott and the glacier even though it was already around 13:00.

Little did I know that there was more to come.

..... continued in Part 3 of 4

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