Wrangell-St. Elias National Park

Day 28 Tuesday July 12, 2016                   Tolsona Wilderness Campground, Tolsona, AK, day 2

273 non-towing miles    19.3 mpg

One of the main reason for going to the Glennallen area was to have a base camp to go visit the Wrangle-St. Elias National Park and Preserve.  There are only two roads that penetrate the park.  One is a 45 mile unpaved road from the Tok Cutoff Highway to Nebesna.  We will check that out on the way home.  The other road into the park is the McCarthy road which is a 61 mile unpaved road to McCarthy, an old mining town inside the park. 

We left Tolsona at 08:00 with a plan to eat breakfast at a lodge in Glennallen that we passed by on the way here last night.  We got there and couldn’t find it!  We saw a café sign ½ mile up the Richardson and ended up there.  A little mom and pop place.  Our waitress was a high school kid and the mom did the cooking.  It was very good food and reasonable for Alaska. 

Topped off the gas tank with 20 gallons of $3.00 gas at the local Tesoro.  They are all over Alaska.

There were some prominent peaks in view the whole way south.  Mt. Drum, 12,010 ft., Mt. Sanford, 16,237 ft., Mt. Wrangle, 14,163 ft., and Mt. Blackburn at 16,390 ft.  These were the prominent ones, but we saw mountains all day long.

We stopped at the visitor center and they had a fish wheel there.  These were used to catch salmon during the runs.  The baskets turn by the action of the current and scoop up the fish and deposit the fish in a catch basin.

In 25 more miles down the Richardson, we turned onto the Edgerton Highway to Chitina.  This road was all paved and was 32 miles long.  But being paved doesn’t mean it’s a good road.  These roads are loaded with dips and frost heaves.  Here’s some of our pictures for the day.

This bridge is an old railroad bridge that is now

used for car traffic.  It is 250 ft. above the river.

In Chitina, we cross the Copper River and saw salmon fisherman and fish wheels in action.  The natives are allowed to use the fish wheels.

In McCarthy we pulled into a “visitor center” which was another tourist trap trying to sell us helicopter rides to the Kennecott Glacier or a tour of the Kennecott Mine in McCarthy or a flight seeing tour.  We opted not to do that.  It was already 3:00 PM (15:00) and we weren’t in the mood for a two -our tour and a four-hour drive back home. 

We walked the ¼ mile to the footbridge over the Kennecott River which is the melt water from the Kennecott Glacier on Mt. Washburn.

Ed taking some pictures of the Kennecott Glacier from the foot bridge.

There was a shuttle that picks you up on the other side of the footbridge and takes you to the town of Kennecott where you can walk around on your own.  We did not take up that offer and was happy with returning to the campground.

All the way back took pictures of awesome scenery.

This is that big high bridge taken on the way back.

Stopped at the Glennallen IGA for a $4.00 7 lb bag of ice and a $10.00 1 lb. package of bacon.

Made some pork chops, egg noodles, and peas at the campground and ate it on glass dishes.

The Tolson Creek was running very muddy which is not good for fishing.  We planned on staying one more day to try to use their WiFi and I could fish the creek.