Chitina Day Tours & Attractions
Chitina—the gateway to the Copper River and the western entrance to Wrangell St. Elias National Park—is a great basecamp and access point for exploring many of Alaska’s wonders. This Alaskan community offers the opportunity to see fishing wheels, hop on a fishing charter, drive a portion of the McCarthy Road, or take a flightseeing tour.
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Day Tours & Attractions
Points of Interest
How do you fish in a river full of glacial silt? The easiest way is to use the iconic fish wheel — long associated with Alaska Native subsistence. See them in action in the Copper River near Chitina.
Eight signs will guide you through the Copper River watershed landscape. See if you can visit all eight signs on your tour through this upriver basin formed by the ancient, glacial Lake Atna!
There’s a story about a local pioneer who in the 1950’s walked the entire way to McCarthy from Cordova. Across the Copper River was a steel cable, the current bridge having not been built until 1973.
Chitina (pop. 105) came to life almost overnight with arrival of the Copper River & Northwestern Railway on September 11, 1910. The railway was built to haul ore from Kennicott Copper Mines at McCarthy to Cordova for shipment to Seattle. Chitina became a supply town for both the railway and the mine. When the mine closed in 1938, Chitina became a ghost town almost overnight. In the 1950s and 1970s, ghosts were painted on some of the old ...more
Parks & Trails
Want to feel like you’ve stumbled into an old Indiana Jones movie? A rugged cliff-top trail reaches south from Chitina along the Copper River into the gorge of Wood Canyon — offering access to three creeks, the ruins of an old trestle, a historic train tunnel and, finally, a sandy beach suitable for camping.
The rock cut you’re about to drive through was blasted out in 1909 as a railway to supply and support the Kennecott Copper Mines when they were being built. The railroad began in Cordova and followed the Copper River to current day Chitina before turning through the rock cut and heading east towards the Wrangell Mountains.
Flightseeing Tours
If you want to get a true sense of the 13 million acres within Wrangell-St. Elias National Park — which has a mere 100 miles of roadways — start with an aerial view. Since 1992, Wrangell Mountain Air has been offering safe and fascinating tours of this remote kingdom, which boasts North America’s largest assemblage of glaciers as well as its largest collection of peaks above 16,000 feet. Choose from three main tours.
Historic Park or Site
The rock cut you’re about to drive through was blasted out in the early 1900’s when the railroad to the copper mines of Kennicott was being built. The railroad began in Cordova and followed the Copper River to current day Chitina before turning through the rock cut and heading east towards the Wrangell Mountains. In the 1960’s the railroad handed over the land, and liability, to the newly established State of Alaska which promptly began… ...more
Eight signs will guide you through the Copper River watershed landscape. See if you can visit all eight signs on your tour through this upriver basin formed by the ancient, glacial Lake Atna!