Chugach State Park

Elaine and I squirreled off to Anchorage for a four day whirlwind tour, leaving Sierra and Cooper with Aunt Margaret and Uncle Jeff (Elaine's Sister and her husband) up in Cleveland. Elaine said that she wanted to go backpacking, and realizing that we had a limited amount of time 'on the ground' we decided that Chugach State Park just outside of Anchorage would be perfect for our needs. My friend Ken recommended a 26 mile hike through the park over Crow Pass retracing part of the Iditarod Trail. We were a bit wary, as the trail was not a loop, meaning that we would have to commit to hitchhiking 70 miles around the mountains back to where our car was parked. As it turned out the friendly people of Alaska helped us out by shuttling us back - our last ride (Dave) even went out of his way to drop us off at our rental car (at the dead end of a mining road . . . and even gave us a couple of beers to celebrate our accomplishment)!

The trail itself was fantastic, providing plenty of exercise with spectacular scenery (rivers, waterfalls, glaciers) along with a plethora of wild life (mountain goats, moose, bald eagles, and black bear). The weather cooperated, with mild temperatures and partly cloudy skies (not to hot or rainy). The 'crux' of the hike, if you will, was the fording of waist deep Eagle river (which was running high because of the spring run off, and is a consistent 37 degrees year round - burr!). Elaine later said that if the river crossing would have been closer to the trailhead (and we hadn't seen black bears in that drainage), she would have turned around. It was a great way to spend three days!

Another interesting factoid - because we were in the state near summer solstice, we had almost 21 hours of sunlight a day. That much sunlight is an odd sensation.

Going to Alaska for me was like going to Meca is to a person who believes Islam. I had heard so much about the wonders of the outdoor paradise that I was a bit skeptical, not sure if it was possible for any one place to live up to such mythic proportions. But the small part of the state that I saw surpassed all of my preconceived notions of what I thought possible. It is a truly amazing place that words cannot begin to describe.