Meet the AIT Team

Rich Montagna - Owner:

I first got involved with the Iditarod Sled Dog Race as a volunteer in 1981 manning an information booth at the state fair in Fairbanks. A couple of years later I moved to the village of McGrath, one of the major checkpoints along the Iditarod trail. With dozens of Iditarod veterans living in the village, I quickly caught the dog mushing bug and put together my own team. Over the years I mushed thousands of miles along the Iditarod Trail and competed in mid-distance races up to 200 miles in length. I also continued volunteering at the checkpoint during the Iditarod race, housed Iditarod racers at my home and spent many hours visiting with legendary mushers such as Joe Reddington, Norman Vaughn and others.

Around 1997 I decided I wanted to share the uniqueness of the Iditarod Race with others and formed Alaska Iditarod Tours, a tour company specializing in tours along the Iditarod Trail and of the Iditarod Sled Dog Race. Having trained as a professional photographer in the 80's, check out my photo website, I originally brought professional and amateur photographers to McGrath to photograph the race. Our 1st tour was sponsored by Hasseblad and Kodak camera companies and covered in Outdoor Photographer magazine. Since then, the business has morphed into a full service tour company and it has been my privilege to share the amazing Iditarod experience with hundreds of clients from all over the world. We use our 1st hand experience and intimate knowledge of the race and the people who live on the Iditarod trail to make sure you have a truly unique and enriching experience.

If you would like to know more about myself and this company, click here to listen to a short radio interview I did with CBS radio, or read this interview I did with Smithsonian Journeys

Natalie Glass-Tour Guide:

Natalie Glass is originally from the south shores of Lake Superior in northern Wisconsin. After high school, she immediately relocated to city life in Portland Oregon. There, she earned her B.A. in Applied Linguistics from Portland State University. Natalie speaks Spanish and Mandarine Chinese but has little use for those skills in the Arctic, unless it is summer and tourists are around. After college, Natalie decided to go on a summer road trip to Alaska, in search of the Midnight Sun. That was in 2010 and she hasn't left the 49th state since. When not guiding our tours or exploring Alaska, she is a proud member of the 176th Wing of the Alaska Air National Guard.