Wrangell-St Elias NP was the first stop on our month long Alaska parks adventure. It’s the largest park in the system, bigger than Yellowstone, Yosemite, and Switzerland combined. And it has more mountains too. We visited Denali and Kenai Fjords on a previous visit since you can drive to those parks. For the remaining 6 remote parks in Alaska, flying small planes is in order. And as it turns out, those plane trips are a big part of the fun. Buckle up!
We visited Wrangell-St Elias in June 2021
Getting
There
Our first Alaska experience, several years back, was a cruise with the kids. A great trip, but really, that’s Alaska for beginners. Then our 2019 visit to Denali and Kenai Fjords was a step up, journeying out to some more remote spots. Call that “intermediate Alaska.” Wrangell-St Elias is definitely “advanced Alaska” and requires commitment to get there. But the reward justifies the effort. McCarthy is the town that serves to park and nearby Kennecott hosts the visitor center and an old copper mine that was booming in the early 1900’s. There are two primary ways to get to McCarthy. You can drive the 60 mile McCarthy Road, which can take up to 3 hours given sometimes awful conditions. They suggest you carry a couple full sized spare tires given the frequency of flat tires. So rental car companies prohibit driving on the road and we would not take our RV, even if we could (due to Covid, the Canadian border was closed to non-essential travel). The other route is to take a bush plane. This was fantastic, albeit a bit more expensive. Wrangell Mountain Air has 3 flights daily from nearby Chitina which is about 4-5 hours from Anchorage and a beautiful drive on nice roads. You will find the Copper Center Visitor Center before getting to the Chitina airstrip. It’s literally a strip of compressed gravel along the Copper River that has a small parking lot, a porta potty, and a hut with a scale to weigh your bags. Wrangell Mountain Air recommended that you arrive an hour early for the 2pm flight and grab a bite to eat in town at the local tavern which sounded perfect. Just a couple of issues there… Chitina is a very small “town” with a hotel that looks like its last guest was sometime in the 1800’s. When we got to the tavern, it was padlocked. We backtracked a mile to a liquor store we had passed, figuring they’d have some snacks for us as we hadn’t eaten all day. It was also closed with a sign out front that said “Closed for Funeral.” We had to make a food decision. We thought there was a country store back about 20 miles. If our guess was right, that would put us back at the airstrip about 10 minutes before the flight. So we went for it. Success. We found some survival PopTarts, Nuts, Cheese, and drinks which we weren’t about to complain about given said funeral. And we made our flight just fine. It’s about a 45 minute flight of pure beauty that flies between the Wrangell and Chugach ranges, over glaciers, and into McCarthy’s gravel airstrip. Some might fear the small plane, but it was a piece of cake. Jared, our pilot, explained all about the local mountains and formation/retreat of the glaciers as he cruised between the rugged mountain peaks.
Staying
There
Most people stay at the Kennecott Lodge a few miles up from McCarthy and we definitely heard good things about the place. We chose to stay in McCarthy at two different rentals since I added an extra day late in the process as bad weather insurance. There are probably a dozen or so McCarthy options, including an old time hotel, but most places had either shared bathrooms or outdoor outhouses. We stayed 3 nights in the Kennecott-Mt Blackburn B&B which was a great place. Daniel, our awesome host, is also the local shuttle owner/driver, so we were able to get around town and back/forth to Kennecott easily. The B&B itself is a super clean single cabin with a private bath, plenty of hot water, and likely the best view in the area. It looked out at 16000’+ Mt Blackburn and the Root Glacier. It made for a great sunset view, except that the sun never really set in June for us. Fortunately, the bedroom had blackout drapes and we had brought our eye masks to complete our 1950’s nighttime attire. It earns the B&B moniker since it was well stocked with cereal and pancake mix. On our last night, we stayed at the Blackburn Cabins, which was also very good. The individual cabins there are tucked into the woods and are nicely decorated. The showers and toilet there are outdoors, but completely functional. The outdoor shower was great. The outdoor outhouse was clean and only a few steps from our cabin. Our initial worry was getting to the outhouse at night, but since it’s never completely dark in June, there were no issues. Additionally, they had several bikes available for patrons which we used to ride the mile or so into McCarthy. So thumbs up on that place too. A final note for those who stay the night(s) in the area – Verizon cell service works really well, but other carriers are non-existent. Other than Anchorage/Fairbanks, it was our best service in Alaska.
Eating
There
In McCarthy, there are few options for food. Thankfully, we had breakfast covered in our AirBnB. There is a small grocery store with an adequate selection, but prices are understandably high given the difficulty of flying/stocking in this part of the world. There is a tavern that offers meals, but we had our first dinner at a local spot called The Potato. This place was perfect. We ate there 5 times during our stay and pretty much sampled the entire menu. They also had a good beer selection, including several IPAs which we tried after a couple of our tiring adventures. Service was super friendly and quick. Most likely, if you have a meal in McCarthy, it’ll be at the Potato and you’ll enjoy it.
Playing
There
On our flight in from Chitina, the other passenger on the flight was heading out for wilderness camping which might have sounded appealing a couple decades ago for us. It made us think of a sticker we recently saw that showed a person in a sleeping bag that was labeled “Bear Soft Tacos.” Instead, we chose to do a couple of day trips. First, we went on a whitewater raft trip from the end of the glacier down several rivers. The water was 36F, but we almost never got splashed. It was more like a float with a couple of class I-II rapids. But the scenery was stunning. We didn’t see any notable wildlife, but we did see some bear, moose, and wolf tracks. We did the trip with Copper Oar which was a classy, safe outfit. Our guide, Merritt was such a cool person. Like most of the locals we met, he was here by choice because of the beauty, solitude, and lifestyle. When the raft trip was over, we were picked up by a float plane for another trek through the mountains back to McCarthy. It didn’t get old. The next day, we took it easy and toured the old mines at Kennecott. The NPS has done a great job refurbishing the place and creating interesting/educational exhibits. The mine operated for less than 30 years and the processes they used to mine the copper were fascinating. They were able to separate something like 98% of the copper which is remarkable even by today’s standards. The community was booming and they not only had a school, but had a hospital that attracted expectant moms from bigger cities to come have their kids. It closed down in 1938 and soon fell into disrepair until the formation of the National Park in 1980 and acquisition of the historical mine in 1998. It’s really cool and a definite stop in the park. On our last full day in the park, we arranged for a private glacier hike on the Root Glacier. We weren’t sure how difficult it would be and we didn’t want to slow anyone down. Turns out we were fine and ventured out as far as any of the others that day. Our guide, Katie from the Blackburn Cabins was wonderful. We had never used crampons before, but hiking on the ice was a piece of cake. The blueish color from the deoxygenated ice was stunning. The stairway icefall, well up the valley, was amazing even though we never even got close to it. It’s a 7000 foot vertical wall of ice, tumbling down from the huge ice field above, to form the Root Glacier. The total hike was about 8 miles R/T, including just getting to the glacier from Kennecott and the air temp was probably around 70F. After hiking on the glacier for a mile or so, we came to a pool where meltwater was draining and rested for a bit. The pool was incredibly blue and Katie even made us some hot tea from the glacier water. So fun! Double thumbs up on the glacier hike and the beer at the Potato was a welcome reward. On our last day, after we checked out of our cabin and before our quick flight back to Chitina, we hiked down to the toe of the glacier. Although, it’s mostly moraine on top of ice, the melt formed a cool lake and occasionally we’d witness a rockfall or ice calving into the water. We even saw a couple kayaking on the lake which looked fun. If you’re in McCarthy, it’s a 1-2 hour side trip and well worth the time.
Unless you’re aiming for all the national parks, Wrangell-St Elias may be off your radar. But if you truly want adventure, this is an entirely doable trip. The number and size of the mountains will stick in your memory and the people will touch your soul. They are genuinely kind and have found their happy place. Take a chance and it may become yours too.
