Long distance hiking legend Andrew Skurka is preparing for another epic hike for 2010 and has begun to discuss the details on his website. Tentatively called “The Great Alaskan-Yukon Loop”, this adventure will see Andrew trekking through 4500 miles of wilderness, around the border of Alaska and Canada’s Yukon Territory.
The journey will begin in March of 2010, when Andrew will set out from the village of Kotzebue, in the northwest corner of Alaska, along the Chukchi Sea. From there, the plan is to ski south, sharing part of the Iditarod trail, and passing through the Alaska Range. As spring draws near, Andrew will take to the water, packrafting the Copper River to the ocean, then following the Lost Coast. With that stage behind him, he’ll go back on foot to hike the Chilkoot Pass Trail from the Inside Passage to the Yukon River, where he’ll once again take to the water, before trekking the length of the Brooks Range to finish up the hike.
Andrew expects the trip to take roughly seven months, in what he calls “a race against winter”. He hopes to complete the entire loop before the notoriously brutal Alaskan winter returns, but make no mistake, traveling on foot in Alaska in March is going to be plenty cold and challenging still. Of course, this is Andrew we’re talking about here. The man who has practically defined the long distance hike, covering more than 7700 miles trekking across North America back in 2004 and another 6875 miles on a grand loop of the western United States. If anyone can pull of this type of hike, it is him. I mean seriously, 4500 miles is like a walk in the park, right Andrew? 🙂
While plans for the hike are coming together Andrew is still looking for a sponsor and even a new name for the trek. So if you think you can come up with something better than The Great Alaskan-Yukon Loop, click here to offer a suggestion. Hmm… I think I’ll submit something like “The Great Alaskan Death March” or maybe “Skurka’s Folly”. (Aww…come on, that last one isn’t terrible considering the history of the state!)
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kthxby!