They Warned Us About this Road in Alaska (We Didn’t Listen)

This is one of Alaska's most infamous roads, and we have been warned to not bring our bus here. But where is the adventure in that? This is the McCarthy Road, a barely two-lane track stretching deep into the heart of Alaska's wild Wrangell Mountains. Once a railway bed, it is narrow, shoulderless, and notorious for tire-piercing railroad spikes still buried in the gravel. There must have been a really good reason a railway was built in nearly impossible terrain, and there was. This is the journey to McCarthy, Alaska, and a glimpse into the story of why this daring road even exists. The journey begins here in Chitna, Alaska. Almost a ghost town were it not for its 70 residents, Chitna sprang into existence in 1910, then just as quickly died overnight in 1938. Why? Well, it's all tied to the story of that railroad, which passed right through here, just as we are doing today. Here begins the McCarthy Road, and with all the signs telling you beware, it really makes you wonder, should I even attempt this road? Today, our answer is yes. This region of Alaska has called to us for a year now, and now is our last chance to take on this route. In our tiny home on wheels, we are ready. After crossing the mighty Copper River, we come upon the final set of warning signs that really hammer it home. Travel beyond this point not recommended. If you must use this road, tell someone where you're going. We have been warned. Out here, services are null and toes are expensive. In short, the risk is high, but the reward is great. The road starts off gravel, then quickly shifts to pavement, but we know better than to get lured into a false sense of security. The McCarthy Road stretches 60 miles from Chitna to teeny tiny McCarthy, population 107. The first 20 miles is mostly paved with heavy frost heaves and potholes. The remaining 40 is gravel with washboards and potholes. We are currently on the paved section, but honestly, our attention is drawn to what lies below us. Down below, the Chitna River steals the show, sprawling wide across the valley floor. A defining feature of the Alaskan landscape is the braided river. Braided rivers are not only mesmerizing to look at, they teach a great deal and speak volumes about what forces are currently shaping the land. Braided rivers form when the water is so loaded with sediments, it constantly creates gravel beds that it must then constantly maneuver around. The river winds and shifts, new channels can open without warning, and seemingly stable gravel bars can be swept away in minutes. Why are braided rivers so full of sediments? Well, if you've been with us on the journey for a while, you know exactly why. If you haven't, we will see when we reach McCarthy and see one of the sources of this river. It's a beautiful day for a drive along the McCarthy Road, and so far the bus is doing great. It's slow going, but honestly, why rush? Assuming you don't have engine problems or a punctured tire, you can drive the McCarthy Road in about two and a half hours. But if you've got the day, why not take your time and enjoy the beauty of Alaska? We are charting a course through a wide valley with the Chugach Mountains to our right and the Wrangell Mountains to our left. There is a beast lurking to the left behind those clouds. If we could see it, it would make the peaks we can see look like mere foothills. Maybe if we're lucky, down the road the skies will clear and we'll see it in its full glory. As we round a curve, we come up to intimately brush shoulders with a page of this road's history and the story of why it's even here. Imagine it's November 1910. You are part of the crew building an ambitious railway into the heart of wild Alaska, and you just reached the impassable Kuskalana Canyon. Only dark days and deepening cold lie ahead, but you have a vital job to do to build a bridge to span that mighty river. You can't wait until spring because bags of a certain precious ore are piling up 40 miles to the east. The railroad must reach that ore and transport it out by spring 1911, so you have work to do. The Kuskalana Bridge was completed in two short months amidst harsh winter conditions and sub-zero temperatures, but crews did it, completing a 525 foot bridge to carry the railroad a soaring 238 feet above the raging river. Today it's our turn to cross. The light is beginning to fade and near the Kuskalana seems as good a place as any to crash for the night. We hope that tomorrow goes as smoothly as today did. As the sun goes down, we get ready to do some work and if we're not too tired, maybe even watch a movie. So we both got a little bit of work done and we decided to call it a night and relax a little bit. So we're gonna watch a movie and you can't watch a movie without some popcorn. So I like to make popcorn the way my mama used to make it with butter and salt but also nutritional yeast. Jose Luis had never tried popcorn that way before meeting me but I have successfully converted him and he really likes it that way now. So if you've never done popcorn with nutritional yeast, you should give it a try. Popcorn's ready, so what are we watching? I'm still looking. Oh look, they got the Martian. How would you like to watch that one? The Martian it is then. Thank you. Delicious. So good. All right, let's heat the lights. Sweet and sour chicken. Today we take on the 40 unpaved miles of the McCarthy road. The sun is shining, the road is dry and we are about to say, you know, this road isn't so bad when the washboard starts. Oh boy, give me frost, heaves and potholes all day long but there is something about the incessant bone shaking of washboards that gets to be unbearable. If we are looking at 40 miles of this it's gonna be a long day. But history, history is a great distractor and soon we are wholly distracted by the Gilahina trestle, another spectacle of the past alongside this road. Now this is crazy. After finishing the Cuscalana bridge, crews took only 17 days to lay 13 miles of track before reaching this spot. Rather than build another steel structure like the Cuscalana, wood was chosen for this project. An 880 foot timber trestle was constructed during the most brutal cold snap of January 1911 with temperatures running between 30 to 60 degrees below zero. It was so cold that massive timber beams split like kindling and the frozen ground had to be blasted to anchor pilings. Despite those conditions, crews finished this 880 foot trestle in, you'll never guess it, eight days. After the feat of the Gilahina trestle, crews had just 36 miles of track to lay to reach that growing stockpile of ore. They did it in 60 days. To drive the McCarthy Road is as much a journey through history as it is through jaw-dropping wilderness. When you drive this road you trace the path of a monumental undertaking that was finished in a remarkable time frame. The Copper River and Northwestern Railway was considered by many to be a fool's errand. In fact, it was nicknamed the Can't Run, Never Will Railway. And get this, the section we are driving was actually just a fraction of it. In the end, the railway stretched 196 miles from the Wrangel Mountains to the port of Cordova. It crossed a glacier, many rivers, and the project in its entirety was completed in just four years. What was achieved out here was nothing short of monumental. And the speed at which the railway was built begs the question, what on earth did they find out here in the wild of the Wrangles that would fuel such a massive and fervent venture? If you think it's gold, guess again. We can't believe our luck to drive on a day like this. And the road? It's washboardy and the occasional pothole patch keeps you on your toes. But overall, we applaud the crew who maintains this old railway bed because it's a hell of a road cutting through truly spectacular country. We are now 15 miles from McCarthy and we begin to skirt along the edges of Long Lake, the site of one of the longest known salmon spawning periods in North America. Every year, red sockeye salmon make the arduous journey up the Chitna and Copper Rivers to eventually land here and spawn from August through April. Constant flow from an incoming stream stops a portion of the northern shoreline from freezing. Salmon congregate there to spawn through the winter, long after most other salmon in the state have died out. The sky has almost completely cleared and it is a fantastic lay hidden before is now out in force and dominating the sky. This is Mount Blackburn, the fifth highest peak in the United States. And get this, Blackburn is actually a volcano. Rising 16,390 feet from sea level, this is the second tallest volcano in the United States and the fifth tallest in North America. The Wrangle Mountains are almost entirely volcanic in origin, though their story doesn't end there. Later chapters in the story led to some of the richest deposits of a certain material at a very specific location within these peaks. In 1900, a discovery was made high on the flanks of one of these mountains and that, in the end, led to the road that we just drove. A road that honestly wasn't so bad. The washboards came and went and the potholes weren't horrendous and it does seem they've done a good job removing a lot of those old railroad spikes. But we are aware that we drove this road when dry. It's probably this bus knows that I am not the chef here. That would be José Luis. I have about five dishes that I can actually prepare and this is one of them. If you've been paying attention to the ingredients, you might know what I am making. So I gotta work on my measurements. Usually I make too much, so this time I tried to like halve that, but I think I did way less than half because we're having like a little baby version of hummus tonight. But it'll still be really good, really delicious. I'm just gonna have to use a So that's not bad, but now I think it needs a little more garlic, salt, and smoked paprika, which is the thing that I love to put in it that gives it a nice little kick and flavor. So whenever I make hummus, I like to make flatbread too. Cora made my cooking job easy tonight. All I have to do is cook this delicious salmon, which we actually caught in the sewer, and I'm also gonna make a little bit of a salad It's been almost a year since we were around this area and the rain was crazy. We went to hoping that after spending a week in Valdez, we're gonna come to McCarthy, but the whole time we were in Valdez, the rain was crazy. Non-stop rain for like about 10 days. And then we had to leave. We didn't have time to come to McCarthy. And now after almost a year, making this delicious hummus and flatbread. You're welcome. This is actually one of my favorite things that Cora makes, hummus and flatbread. So good. The hummus, I think this hummus is one of the best ones you've made so far. Really? Let's see. Everything tastes delicious. There's nothing better than a home-cooked meal after a long day driving on a horrible road. This is a good treat. Cheers to McCarthy. Now that we are here, there's a whole story to uncover. What was discovered all the way out here? Why was it such a big deal? And what pieces of that history still remain standing? It turns out, quite a bit. Join us in diving deep into an epic story of riches and industry, exploration and toil, boom and then bust, all next time on Art We Dare Yet. 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