Into the wild. . .but not very far

Stampede Road, about eight miles from Healy, AK

Copyright 2007 Lydia Hinshaw

HEALY, AK -- In April of 1992, a young man named Chris McCandless set out into the tundra north of Denali National Park, abandoning his previous life for what he envisioned as a simple, self-sufficient existence in the wilderness.
His body was found four months later, in an old bus used for years as a shelter for hunters.
His story was chronicled in a book, Into the Wild, by Jon Krakauer, and now has been made into a movie, directed by Sean Penn and filmed in this area. The movie opened with a special screening in Fairbanks Monday night, and is due to open across the country later this month.

Tuesday morning, Prince Charming and I set out to retrace a bit of McCandless' journey. We turned west off the Parks Highway on Stampede Road, drove six paved miles followed by two more bouncy potholed ones. I got tired of the bumps, so we got out and walked.
We probably covered a bit more than two more miles before we encountered lake-sized puddles and turned back. The bus where McCandless died is about 22 miles past this point.
I read Into the Wild when it came out in 1996, not knowing then that I would spend four months in this part of the world, under very different circumstances, 11 years later.
On this September day, the wilderness was benign, mild temperatures and fall colors under a big sky worthy of Montana. When McCandless traveled this road, hitchhiking with an Alaskan who tried but failed to talk him out of his adventure, this was a white world, shivering under the snowpack, still getting temperatures in the teens every night.
No one knows exactly what killed McCandless, or why he was driven to take what seem like senseless risks.
But after four months here, I can certainly understand a bit of what drew him to this place.