Some of my favorite songs are about hitting the road. Many of my life’s most inspiring moments came from traveling down unknown roads until I found something that surprised me and I stopped for a bit. But in Alaska, so many places cannot be reached by a road. Cordova, Alaska, is one of them. Dominating barriers surround this picturesque fishing village. The Chugach Mountains and the Robinson Mountains rise up on one side, the Copper River delta on another. The ocean, which has taken so many lives, is on the other. Adding to the city’s protection is glacier after glacier after glacier after glacier. They seem at first glance to be coming to crush the city, but actually they are retreating ever so slowly. Beyond that first row of mountain, water, or glacier blockades lie even more. There are the Wrangell Mountains, which are part of the 13-million-acre Wrangell–St. Elias National Park and Preserve, the largest U.S. national park. There are also the Talkeetna Mountains, and beyond them, the Alaska Range.
