Cordova day 2
The
next morning there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. I couldn’t believe what a perfect
day it was starting out as. I headed into town and got breakfast and gassed up
and then went exploring.
I started out heading down a dirt road unsure where it lead but it didn’r really matter though.
The road ended at a glacier and I have no idea what it’s name was but I saw a path leading towards it and headed down it.
The path ended at this glacial pool and I had no interest in trying to hike around it to get to the glacier. I knew that at the end of the main road would be Child’s Glacier and the Million Dollar bridge and I would rather head for that.
On the way there were marsh’s off each sides of the road with beautiful mountains in the background.
At the end of the road was the Million Dollar bridge and guess how much it cost to build back in 1905? This bridge as well as the road bed used to be a railroad path that brought supplies to and copper from Mccarthy during the copper era of this area. If you look at the far side you can see a span that collapsed back in the 1964 Earthquake.
They added in this planking to make it passable but I’m not really sure why the road past the bridge doesn’t seem to go anywhere. Just to the left of the bridge is the massive, childs glacier.
This is nthe main attraction for this area and I can see why. There is a campgrouns setup at the base and a day use area. In the day use area you can sit in front of it and watch the glacier calve Icebergs into the river. This has got to be one of the most awesome sights I’ve ever seen. The river is 300 yards across and the glacier is 20 stories high and when the ice hits it sounds like a bomb dropping and you can hear it echoing everywhere.
The next day I camped at this site but the weather was crap. It rained the whole night I was there and the entire next day. I rode the 60 miles back to town in wet, muddy, sloppy roads to make the ferry at 10:45 pm that night. As I was heading back in the distance I could see a dog running down the road when I got closer I realized it wasn’t a dog but a bear and as I got even closer I realized it was a really big bear, a grizzly. I reached for my camera but I stuck it in my jacket while breaking camp, then when I got it out the battery was dead from taking movies of the glacier. Bummer, my first close grizzly sighting in 8000 miles and my camera wasn’t where it should have been. It was way cool though. I’m back on the ferry now and headed for Valdez, I may or may not stay in Valdez but will definitely head for McCarthy and Kennicott and then down to Haines and Skagway before I get on the Alcan for the looong ride back.