I.I HEADING NORTH

 

EPISODE I: HEADING NORTH

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“I learned so much about my own resources. If you run out of something, you’ll think of something else. If you don’t run out of it, you never will”
— CAROLE MORRISON

EPISODE NOTES

For Gary Green, it was gold prospecting. He wanted a place that was wild and lonely like the Westerns of his youth.

For Carole and Daniel Morrison, it was chance.

And for Greg Runyan and Kristin Link, it was the adventure, the community and the lifestyle.

And love.

Everyone has their own story. 

Some people come here to run away from the world. Others are seeking adventure and an alternative way of living.

Some stumble in as seasonal workers and never leave. Others build a house and a life and then move on. A few are born here.

The journey to get here is just the beginning.

At one point, there was no road. It was a fly-in only ghost town. When it did come, it was called the worst road in Alaska. There were mudslides, road glaciers and a rotting plank bridge across a 238-foot drop.

A lot of people turned back. But a few kept going all the way to the end of the 60-mile dirt road and beyond, heading toward the dark and the cold and the emptiness, toward a place with no services, no public utilities, no grocery stores and only their own resources to help.

What kept them going? Listen on, my friends.

Music from Galen Huckins and Blue Dot Sessions / Ultima Thule, Arctic Draba, McCarthy, Careless Morning, Building the Sled, Snowmelt, A Rush of Clear Water, Sweetly / Episode artwork from Ian Gyori / Financial assistance from the Duffy Fund and the University of Missouri / Guidance and support from Scott Swafford, Sara Shahriari and Dr. Cristina Mislan / Featured in this episode: Gary Green, Carole Morrison, Greg Runyan and Kristin Link

 

I.II BUILDING IN THE WILDERNESS

 

EPISODE II: BUILDING IN THE WILDERNESS

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“You get into things you don’t know how to do, and you just learn as you go. If you’re not willing to do that, you’re not going to survive out here.”
— GREG FENSTERMAN

EPISODE NOTES

Building is what brought Karla Freivalds and Martin Morrison together.

Karla worked as a television producer on a show called "Building Alaska." Martin was on the show. Two years later they're still together, and they're renting the log cabin Martin helped build for the tv show. 

But they're not going to stay there forever. They want to try their hands at building a cabin on their own.

"It's kind of like a right of passage," Martin said.

The turn of a faucet, the flip of the switch, the drive to the grocery store: things we take for granted. But out here, you have to build it all from scratch: the cabin, the road in, the utility systems, the knowledge base that comes with off-the-grid living.

And a lot of people who come here, have no idea where to start.

"Everybody's always worried: How am I gonna build this house? I don't know how to build a house. And you're like, of course you don't know how to build a house," 35-year resident Malcolm Vance said.

"It's just a lot of mini-failures."

On this episode of Out Here: stories of building a cabin and a life in McCarthy.

Because there's a lot of different ways to go about it. And you have to get creative when the nearest Home Depot is an eight-hour drive, and the only person providing your utilities is you.

Music from Galen Huckins and Blue Dot Sessions / Ultima Thule, Valantis, Burrow Burrow, Club Count, Swapping Tubes, The One Shot / Episode artwork from Ian Gyori / Financial Assistance from the Duffy Fund and the University of Missouri / Guidance and support from Scott Swafford, Sara Shahriari and Dr. Cristina Mislan / Featured in this episode: Martin Morrison, Karla Freivalds, Greg Fensterman, Greg Runyan, Ian Gyori, Stephens Harper, Tamara Harper, Mark Vail, Carole Morrison and Malcolm Vance