I was reading this article recently in the San Francisco Chronicle titled Into The Wild pilgrimages increase in Alaska. The article talks about an increasing number of young males making a pilgrimage to Alaska that’s similar to the real life pilgrimage of the late Christopher McCandless. After graduating from Emory University in 1990 Christopher McCandless gave away his savings and hitchhiked across the country to Alaska.

The young men are going to Alaska to see the abandoned bus where Christopher died in 1992.

‘Into the Wild’ pilgrimages increase in Alaska

By RACHEL D’ORO
Associated Press Writer

Ron Alexander has long been intrigued with the true story of a young idealist who met his death in Alaska’s unyielding wilderness in 1992.

The film adaptation of the book “Into the Wild” only cemented the mystique for Alexander and others heading to Alaska this summer, hoping to retrace the last steps of Christopher McCandless along the Stampede Road near Denali National Park.

Alexander and his fellow travelers want, in particular, to see the old abandoned bus where the 24-year-old Virginian starved to death after more than three months alone in the harsh landscape.

“That’s sort of the heart of the story,” said Alexander, 44, of Arlington, Va. “It’s almost like a Jim Morrison grave site, where people just want to go see it.”

This is exactly what residents in the interior town of Healy, 25 miles east of the bus, feared with the release last fall of the movie adapted from Jon Krakauer’s best-seller of the same name.

They envisioned hordes of copycats making dangerous pilgrimages in the footsteps of a character often seen as a spiritual visionary rather than an ill-prepared misfit, as many Alaskans view McCandless.

People from all over the world have journeyed to the rusted bus over the years. But there are signs this could be a boom year for those captivated by a college graduate who turned his back on his wealthy family for his restless wanderings.

The local chamber of commerce has already received a few dozen e-mails from would-be visitors wanting to track the unmonitored route taken by McCandless to the 1940s-era bus, used for decades as a shelter for hunters and other backcountry travelers.

Former chamber president Neal Laugman warns visitors about a terrain — about 180 miles north of Anchorage — with no cell phone service, unpredictable weather, clouds of mosquitoes and the raging Teklanika River, whose swollen banks prevented McCandless from seeking help. Laugman has gotten replies from people who are determined to make it to the bus no matter what.

“I don’t want people to go out there and die. It’s that simple,” Laugman said. “We won’t know that they’re there until it’s too late.”

Earlier this year I had a chance to see the movie Into the Wild that’s based on Christopher’s pilgrimage to Alaska. The movie was released last year and directed by Academy Award winner Sean Penn. Emile Hirsch portrayed Christopher and he did a fantastic job. I was surprised he didn’t receive an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.

Jon Krakauer wrote the bestselling book Into The Wild in 1996.

Into the Wild (1996) by Jon Krakauer is a bestselling non-fiction book about the adventures of Christopher McCandless. It is an expansion of Krakauer’s 9,000-word article, “Death of an Innocent”, which appeared in the January 1993 issue of Outside.[1] Krakauer intersperses McCandless’s story with a discussion of the wilderness experiences of people such as John Muir and John Menlove Edwards, as well as some of his own adventures. Krakauer first went to Alaska in 1974 and has returned there twenty times since. He spent three years carrying out the background research work for this biography.

The book has been adapted into a movie of the same name directed by Sean Penn with Emile Hirsch starring as McCandless. The film’s U.S. release date was September 21, 2007.

Anyway if you’re looking for a really good film check out Into the Wild.

You can also check out the music video. The Into The Wild soundtrack was performed by Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder.