Glennallen, AlaskaJul 31, 2009
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Beginning of the Edgerton highway looking at the Wrangell Mountain Range
Fish wheels on Copper River
Single lane on McCarthy Road
Our route today: North on Alaska 4 Richardson Highway then east on Alaska 10 Edgerton Highway to Chitina AK, then west on the McCarthy Road to the Copper River. After a short time near the Copper River, we backtracked and again headed north on Alaska 4 Richardson Highway and West on Alaska 1 Glenn Highway to Glennallen.
This morning was a slow start after our big day yesterday. All our winter clothing was wet, so Cheryl used the dryers in the Laundromat to dry them. She also did 2 loads of laundry. We slowly packed and secured all our “stuff” for travel, shook the throw rugs, swept the floors, updated this journal, indexed our photos from yesterday, and hooked the truck to the trailer. We pulled out of Valdez at about 11:30 am.
Our route back north on the Richardson Highway in clear weather looked much different than it had on our way down to Valdez the other morning in the fog. We spotted more features that we had missed including the Keystone Glacier, and we had clear views thru Thompson Pass, and of the Worthington Glacier. The drive east on the Edgerton Highway was very nice. There are nice farms in the Kenny Lake area and we saw hay fields, and cattle. Chitina was a contrast. On one hand there was a very modern wayside with covered picnic tables, toilets, pay telephone, and paved parking. On the other hand was junk vehicles, old buildings (most with for sale signs), and rough gravel roads. McCarthy Road was in very poor condition but passable. The Copper River is very wide and we watched people attending their fish wheels for a while, but did not see any fish being taken. We had planned to boondock tonight on the shore of the Copper River; however it was extremely windy with lots of sand blowing and cold. We returned to Chitina and ate lunch at the Chitina Wayside.
In Glennallen the truck and auxiliary tank were refilled with diesel fuel, and we selected site #16 at the Northern Nights RV Park. After dinner, we took a short walk around town. That did not take too long ...... An episode of Northern Exposure completed the day.
Weather at start: 53° F – partly to mostly clear
Miles start / stop / total today / total trip 9,929 / 10,125 / 196 / 3,826
Altitude 1,530 ft.
End location for the day: Northern Nights RV Park - Site #16, Glennallen, Alaska
(62° 6’ 31’’ N, 145° 29’ 13’’ W) Weather at stop: 67° F – clear and sunny
