To visit Kennicott and McCarthy, one must travel 60 miles down an old railroad track, which has been converted into a dirt road. This rail sytem was the Copper River and Northwestern Railway (CR and NW, affectionately called the "Can't Run and Never Will") and was used to transport copper from Kennicott to Cordova, where it could be shipped to Tacoma and sold. The DOT just added the rails to the bridge in this picture.

Once you reach the end of the road, you cross over the Chitina River on foot. You can use the wagons placed on either end of the bridge if you need them. The closest town, McCarthy, is about 1 mile from the footbridge. Most people who live here do have cars. They just wait until the river freezes in the winter to drive them across.

This was our first "sign" of civilization on our walk to McCarthy.

We finally reached the town of McCarthy!

And found our hotel!

Then we decided to take a little walk until the mosquitos proved to be too much for our shorts and short sleeves! This bridge was pretty fun to cross, but ONLY if you had good balance!

The next day, we took a ride to Kennicott to see some of the old copper mining town. When the Kennicott Copper Corporation closed, the workers were given only hours to pack and board the last train out of Kennicott!

Kennicott is about 5 miles from McCarthy. The copper was discovered in 1900 by gold-hungry pioneers who saw a green patch on the side of a mountain. They thought it would be a good place for their horses to graze. When they arrived the green color they had seen was not grass, but copper. The strike proved to be the richest known concentration of copper ore in the world.

It's amazing that these buildings are still standing! This is the town where the copper was sent from the mines.

Some of the buildings were 10-12 stories tall and built on the side of a mountain!

Well, you all probably know Robert and me by now; we didn't want to just see the town, we wanted to see the actual mines, so we decided to hike to the nearest one: Bonanza Mine. Along the way, we had great views of Root Glacier!

We stopped for lunch about 4 hours into our hike! This is part of the copper transport system. The copper would pass through here on its way to Kennicott.

Some of the old mining equipment was scattered along the way.

Eight hours later in the middle of a rainstorm, we FINALLY arrived at Bonanza Mine ...

And saw this on the ground!!! There is still plenty of copper in these hills, but the value and location makes mining unprofitable! After this hike, we can certainly understand about the location!!! WHEW!!