About My History

The podcast and the book are based on my journals I’ve kept since 1972, myself a midwest boy who left home at 19 years old to live in the Alaskan wilderness, in the most remote places I could find. I built a log cabin with mostly an ax, chinked it with moss, and roofed with printer plates in a remote area. I ran a trapline every winter from the cabin, running a dog team for 18 years, and then running a snow machine after that. There were over 30 years during the winters, with no electricity, no running water, and no communication except for the KCAM radio in Glennallen, Alaska for Caribou Clatters, one way messages for the bush people with no communications.

I guided during the spring and falls with various outfits all over Alaska, beginning with horse guides in the Wrangell Mountains. In the spring I would guide for many

years out of Kodiak Island for brown bear, and have guided for spring bear on the Alaska Peninsula, Cordova, Seward Peninsula, the Alaska Range, and the Brooks Range.

During the fall, I guided with other horse outfits in the Wrangell Mountains, Alaska Range and the Brooks Range.I got my Registered guide license and then guided my hunters with horses for years, guiding myself, along with a camp cook and wrangler.

Eventually, I got more horses, hired two guides besides myself that were friends. I kept the number of hunters to 3 per hunt, and maintained this for years in the same area up North. The game population was as good when I left the business as it was when I first rode into that wild country years ago. I have a Master Guide license #107, I guided for over 40 years, and am now retired. I have always guided fair chase, and have never had a fishing, hunting, trapping nor guiding violation ever. I have a deep love and respect for all the game I trap and hunt, as I have lived out with them in the middle of nowhere.

I have lived a very unusual life and I have been getting ready to release a podcast, and also publish a book about my adventures hunting, trapping and living a remote life in some of the harshest conditions in the world. I have a myriad of exciting stories, including being caught in raging floods,

shot bears coming through tents, and have been around people that pulled out guns, with the intent to use them. I have crashed in small bush planes, fallen through river ice, camped out many nights without food or sleeping bag, survived 63 below weather, and have been seriously injured in the most remote country in North America, only to survive and tell the story. But the stories and tales are not only about myself, but of the people I have known, including bush pilots, hunting guides, trappers, gold miners, Indians and Eskimos, living raw and rugged lives in a carnivorous land. These include stories of people that got mauled by grizzlies, that were murdered in cold blood, frozen to death, drowned or lost in the wilderness never to be found. I have become one of a wilder breed of people and I would like to tell the story of my Alaska and the people that has never been told before. Looking back over my journals I have kept since 1972, I am very amazed that I am still alive. These are some of the best stories from my time in the wilderness that I am going to tell in my podcast and in my book.

I hope you enjoy them !

Alaska became my home, and still is to this day.

Happy Trails,

Mike McCann

Explore Alaskan Wilderness Tales

Discover stories from Michael McCann's adventures in Alaska since 1972, guided by experience.

Photo Gallery

Contact Us

Reach out for inquiries about Alaskan Tales podcast, Or information on publishing date of the book Chisana Kid, or sharing your own wilderness stories.