Iditarod Trail

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  • Main route of the Iditarod Trail
  • Connecting routes and secondary routes
  • Route of the Serum Run to Nome

    • The Iditarod Trail , formerly called Seward-to-Nome Mail Trail , is a historical and currently 1,600 km long trail system in Alaska . The trail is known today for the Iditarod dog sled race named after it. It originally ran from the end of the Alaska Railroad about 80 km north of Seward via the eponymous town of Iditarod , which is now a ghost town , to Nome .

    To commemorate the historical role of the trail, a 3780 km route was designated in 1978 under the name Iditarod National Historic Trail . It is the only trail in Alaska that is part of the National Historic Trails System .

    history

    The trail was created in 1908 from the need to transport mail and goods from the southern coast of Alaska on the Gulf of Alaska inland and on to the port of Nome in the northwest on the Seward Peninsula on Norton Sound during the gold rush . The route was created on behalf of the government and followed over long stretches of already existing trails of the indigenous people of Alaska . In the interior , paths of the Tanaina and Ingalik and in the west those of the Inupiaq and Yupik were used.

    course

    Start of the National Historic Trail in Seward

    The historic trail began about 80 km north of Seward at the end of a former Alaska Railroad line , followed briefly the Turnagain Arm , crossed the Crow Pass in the Chugach Mountains , then ran along the valley of the Eagle River and on to Knik on the Knik Arm of the Cook inlets . Then the trail followed the valleys of the Susitna and Yentna rivers westward and crossed the Alaska range at Rainy Pass . After crossing the Kuskokwim River , the trail ran southwest from Ophir through the Kuskokwim Mountains to Iditarod , then turned north to Kaltag on the Yukon , from where the 145 km long Kaltag Portage through the Nulato Hills to Unalakleet on Norton Sound followed. From here the trail ran along the coast of the Seward Peninsula to Front Street of Nome .

    The route of today's Iditarod dog sled race largely follows the historical course. The middle section between Ophir and Kaltag is driven annually alternately on a northern and a southern route around the Innoko National Wildlife Refuge .

    The dog sled relay that had brought serum from Nenana to Nome in 1925 because of a diphtheria epidemic in Nome , had followed the Iditarod Trail from Kaltag.

    Individual evidence

    1. ^ Alaska Public Lands Information Center: The Iditarod National Historic Trail
    2. ^ Bureau of Land Management: The Iditarod National Historic Trail: Historic Overview. Retrieved May 17, 2020 (English).

    Web links