It is probably the most famous of all the Alaskan Salmon rivers.
In 2005 commercial fishermen took 1.3 Million Sockeye salmon out of the river
on the Chitina flats are many fishwheels. Native Alaskans can use those and dipnets for subsistence fishing
it is like a paddlewheel, held between two pontoons.
It has four arms, two with the basket that scoops the fish and two paddles driving the wheel
They can only be used in murky water, otherwise the salmon would see the basket and avoid it.
The streams are murky or milky from the glacier dust, that the enormous pressure of the glacier ice has ground off the rock
It starts in Chitina with cut
always on the railroad right-of-way.
Where the road dips into a valley like here, the RR went across on a trestle
the road goes across it.
The Kuskulana river is 580 feet below
single lane traffic across the asbyss
The engineers laying out this RR track made it as straight as possible
Kennecott Mill can be seen 5 miles in the distance
crossing the foot bridge from the parking lot
The Mercantile
I had a wonderful home-baked blueberry muffin in there
4.5 miles on the RR track
wispy clouds keep us company
This is the picture you can see in the brochures
The building is the Concentration Mill
the view from the other side
The NPS is trying to stabilise and rehab those buildings which still can be saved
the harsh climate has done its job since 1937 when the mines closed
In 1938 mining operations ceased and they just walked away, leaving everything in place, like a time capsule
