Alaska Part IV: July 11-July 17, 2005
Journals
We saved the best for last-and it was well worth it! Cordova is a small town about 86 nautical miles from Valdez:: I mention this because the only way to reach Cordova is by ferry boat from Valdez, or by air. Cordova is on the mainland of Alaska but there is no way to reach it by road. During the copper boom in Kennicott & McCarthy (you may recall that we visited these towns and the Wrangell St. Elias National Park during our first week in Alaska), Cordova was the end point of the railroad line to McCarthy. Supplies were brought in by boat to Cordova and then taken by rail to McCarthy, and the copper ore was shipped out the same way. The rail line was abandoned after the mining activity died down, and there's no plan that we have heard of to restore it. There is a road heading east out of Cordova for 48 miles through the Copper River basin. I don't know the entire story, but I think that a road was started to reach McCarthy, but the funding ran out at the "million dollar bridge" which spans the Copper Rover. There is talk of renewing this project (a highly political issue in this town), but our local source assures us it will never happen. If they did complete the road, it would certainly alter the character of the town. The Frommer's guide book for Alaska reads that Cordova "is not only off the beaten track [for tourists], but not on the track at all." It's true too because the big cruise ships don't stop there at all, and the ferries that many people take from Seattle and Vancouver stop south of Cordova at Skagway. The Alaska State ferry boat does run a regular schedule, but it's not big enough to bring that many people. Early in the planning stages for our trip, we decided that we wanted to take the ferry somewhere along the way. I initially considered going out to Kodiak Island. Although I am sure that Kodiak would have been great, it's pretty expensive, and there is not a lot you can do without working through pricey "backcountry lodge" type companies. On the other hand, Cordova had the road and glaciers with easy access. In addition, a guy I worked with at Kerr-McGee told me about some Forest Service cabins in the Cordova area that he had visited while living in Alaska for eight years. Once I checked out the cabins on the internet, and considering the comments in the Frommer's book, I knew that Cordova was our kind of place. We spent Sunday night the 10th at a campground on top of Thompson Pass outside of Valdez. We spent the evening rearranging our gear for the ferry ride to Cordova because we only bought a ticket for the truck on the ferry, not the RV. The ferry charges by the foot for vehicles, and the truck was expensive enough at 21 feet. You could easily enjoy all that Cordova has to offer without a vehicle, but with the dogs we thought it would be best to bring the truck. On Monday, we drove into Valdez and parked the camper in the long-term parking lot at the ferry terminal-no charge for this! We did some last minute errands in town, and then spent the rest of the afternoon bumming around. Valdez was not as nice as Homer, Seward, or some of the other small towns we have visited. This seems to be because the original town was mostly destroyed during the massive earthquake of 1964, and the new town was rebuilt in a different location about 4 miles from the old town. Therefore, the historic feeling in the other small ocean towns is not present in Valdez. Our ferry ride was at 7:15pm, and it's a 5 hour trip to Cordova so we didn't get there until 12:15am. There is supposed to be a new, fast ferry taking over this route but there have been numerous delays bringing the new boat into service (another political issue in Valdez and Cordova). The tickets I bought were for the fast ferry, but we got an e-mail a while back saying that the new ferry was not ready and that we would have to reschedule on the old ferry. Not a big deal really, but it did provide some unpleasant travel timing. The ferry arrived at 12:30am, and we drove off and headed out of town to our first lodging destination, the McKinley Trail Cabin. It's one of the Forest Service cabins I mentioned before, but the only one that can be reached by car. We mainly decided to stay there because it's cheap ($35/night), and a lot more comfortable than sleeping in some unknown location in the back of our truck. However, it was 21 miles down the road on the Copper River Highway out of Cordova. Turns out that it is getting pretty dark in Cordova by 1am due to our being further south, the advancing date and some low, dark clouds. The cabin is in dense woods about 100 yards off the road on a trail: fortunately, I had our lantern or we would have been stumbling around in the dark. This is the first time in a very long time that we've had to use an artificial light source (aside from inside the RV) for anything, and I almost left the lantern in Valdez. We found the cabin, hauled up some essential gear, and had a shot of tequila before hitting the sack-we were feeling a little adventurous by this point! On Tuesday, we slept in before driving back into town to meet our pilot for the next part of our stay in Cordova. The plan was for Larry of Copper River Air to fly us out to the Softuk Bar Cabin on Wednesday morning at 8am-this cabin is on a remote beach on a strip of land off the mainland facing south into the open Gulf of Alaska (read North Pacific Ocean). You can only reach this cabin via wheeled plane at low tide (the beach is too shallow to land boats or floatplanes), and in "reasonable" weather. Since it was pouring rain on Tuesday when we met Larry, we were skeptical about what "reasonable" weather means-we are talking about a small 4-person (max) capacity plane. Larry assured us that he can handle the weather unless it gets "really severe." We also stopped by the Chugach National Forest Service office to check on the status on the cabin-they mentioned that several parties have spent time out in the cabin recently-this was reassuring. Tuesday afternoon we drove back out of town the 48 miles to the end of the road at the "Million Dollar Bridge" and the Childs Glacier. The road ends pretty much at the bridge-maybe a jeep could go a little further. The glacier is immense, and comes right down to the Copper River: it's constantly calving ice into the river, and there are small icebergs floating away. Apparently, they occasionally get very large calving events which cause flooding of the viewing area-lots of warning signs to this effect. Even the small chunks make a pretty impressive racket-the glacier stands 300 vertical feet about the river! After this, we drove back to the same cabin from Monday night, and spent the evening preparing our gear for the flight. Wednesday morning, we cleared out of the McKinley cabin and headed into town to meet Larry at the "airport"-gravel runway next to the lake. They take people out on float or wheel planes, and there are maybe three or four small charter companies operating here. The vast majority of the clientele are heading to expensive backcountry lodges for salmon fishing. Although the flight out was expensive for us on this trip, the Softuk Cabin rents for only $25/night. The weather still looked a little questionable, but Larry said all was OK so we loaded up and headed out. Aside from a couple of bumps, the ride was pretty smooth-this is the first time the dogs have ever taken a plane ride, and they did great! As expected, we landed right on the beach. Larry helped us unload, and before long we were standing on the beach with our gear. The beach was about 1/4 mile wide between the ocean and the treeline, and many miles long heading from west to east. The cabin stands right on the edge of the beach and treeline, so we had to haul our gear over. We got settled in, and then headed out to investigate our environment. The dogs got to run free all over the beach (once Lisa completed a survey for bears), and had the time of their lives. For those interested in cabins, there are about 35-40 of these cabins within plane or boat range from Valdez or Cordova. Most require a bush flight like ours out of Cordova, although many can use a float plane. They are all similar in structure, and hold up to 6 people. They are not quite as nice as the 10th Mountain Huts we use in Colorado (no solar lighting, cookstoves, or dishes), but they are still very nice and well worth the cost. Many of these huts are near good salmon fishing, but ours is mainly there to enjoy the beautiful beach. Weather after landing Wednesday morning went downhill-lot's of wind and some rain. However, we still got out and hiked around a bit. Total change for Thursday and Friday thought-sunny and very few clouds both days-simply unbelievable beauty, and no one at all around. I've spent a fair amount of time on many beaches in my life, but never experienced anything as nice as this place-the coast of Maine is the only place that comes close in my mind. We did basically the same thing both Thursday and Friday-big breakfast followed by a big hike down the beach-went west on Thursday, and east past Martin Point on Friday. We'd return to the cabin at about 5pm, and then spend the rest of the evening with the dogs on the beach in front of the cabin-great stunt kite flying winds on the beach. Late dinner and wine, then a good book until bed. I should mention at this point that we had planned to go clamming on the beach, but we never were able to find any-low tides not low enough to reach the clams. However, we did find a basically unlimited supply of ripe marion berries (very similar to red raspberry), so we had plenty for berry pancakes. Saturday morning, we awoke to the return of clouds and rain. Larry was scheduled to pick us up around noon, so we packed up our gear. As the morning wore on, and noon approached, we got a little anxious due the worsening weather and increasing rain squalls. The Forest Service (and Larry) warn that weather can cause an unexpected delay of your trip at any time, so we did have plenty of spare food. However, Larry came flying in at around 1pm-said he delayed a little, but that the weather would only be getting worse throughout the day. Good thing he came then too because it did get much worse-he confided to us later at dinner that the weather was "marginal" for our extraction. We had a reservation at the Just for Halibut B&B (recommended by Larry) for Saturday night. The plan was to clean up, enjoy a nice dinner, and then get on the 8am Sunday ferry. Unfortunately, the rescheduled slow ferry leaves the dock at 5:45am Sunday morning, meaning we had to be there at 5am! As I mentioned, Larry recommended the B&B, and it was very clean and nice-this was the first time we have showered and slept in a building since our stay with the Ligeskis at the start of this trip-nice! Larry showed up around 7pm, and invited us down for a salmon BBQ with the owner of the B&B (Wally). Wally and his wife are selling out of the B&B, and she has already moved down to their new place in Ketchikan, so Larry & Wally have a weekly BBQ. Very nice of them to invite us, and some of the best salmon I have ever eaten. It turned out to be a good way to meet some of the local folks, and was a highlight of our week in Cordova, which in itself was certainly the highlight of a great month in Alaska. On Sunday, we awoke and caught the ferry back to Valdez. We reached there and then loaded up to drive back northeast 250 miles to Tok, Alaska. I'm finishing this log as we reach Tok on Sunday evening. A long day of travel, but we are now officially on the way home, and want to get a good start on the northern part of the drive home before slowing down in the Canadian Rockies. We've both had the time of our lives on this trip, but we are also starting to get a little homesick up here away from home, friends and family. Our original trip calendar puts us back in Lawson, Colorado on August 8th. We are now thinking that we may reach home on the 2nd or 3rd-we still want to enjoy the drive down, but might just cut out a few days in Yellowstone or something (been there anyway, and it's close enough to visit any time). We'll keep you posted, and I'll keep this site updated when I can. Best wishes to everyone!! Love, Eric & Lisa
Click any of the above photos to enlarge the image!