Saturday July 16 we left Fairbanks for Denali NP. Beautiful day and we decided not to put the cover on the Saturn. Big mistake! No more than 20 minutes south of Fairbanks we hit major road construction. We stopped for a flagman and in about 2 minutes we got out and got the cover on it. Done in record time and before the flagman gave the signal for traffic to go. In fact probably ten minutes before we could continue on our way. Lots of messy road construction with mounds of new gravel being applied and stones flying everywhere. The drive was the usual beautiful scenery of forest, lakes and vistas. Made only one stop for the Teklineka Trading Co. where they had a polar bear and other mounted animals on display. As always bought some items.
Arrived at the relatively small commercial strip just a mile north of the Denali Park entrance and found a campsite for the night to allow us to get a timely start into the park tomorrow. Visited the park visitors center and got our tickets and the refund of half our payment, as we now are eligible for the Golden Eagle Passport discount. The campground was very crowded but had great wi-fi connections so Dick got to post what he had ready of this Blog and finally put up some photos.
We have been looking forward to today, Sunday the 17th, since we made our Denali reservations, the only pre-made reservations of our entire trip, way back in February! Unfortunately it was raining when we awoke. We topped off the fresh water and dumped the RV as our four nights camped in the park will be dry camping (without any connections) and we are permitted to only run the generator from 8-10 AM and 4-8 PM inside the park. We detached the Saturn and left it in a long term parking area within the park. Once you enter you must go to your campsite and park the RV. Then all travels are by foot or on the park busses, and we are only allowed to take the bus further into the park and not to take it back out toward the entrance. The rain continued intermittently until just before we reached our campground at which time the sun came out and the day turned very nice.
We stayed at Teklineka Campground, an area 38 miles into the park where only hard-sided campers are allowed. No tents are allowed due to prior wolf activity in the area. The drive in to Teklineka is through varied terrain with mountains and valleys of boreal forest. The mountains become treeless near the top. We chose our campsite from about ten open spots in the two loops of the camp. We took a spot backing up to the Teklineka River bed with a view of mountains nearly all around us. It is so quiet and beautiful here! We can’t wait to go further into the park and see what awaits us there.
We had pre-purchased our bus tickets and they are for Monday morning at 8:30 but we found that we could use them to go on the busses today on a standby basis the same as we will after we use our guaranteed Monday trip. The busses have only 8 designated stops in the park while covering over 120 miles one way on the only road into the park. Our campground is their 3rd stop in. They do also stop whenever you encounter animals or someone wants to stop to take a scenery photo and that can vary a trip length by half an hour or more.
Denali is a designated wilderness area that is to leave nature and the animals undisturbed. Fortunately the road was in place before the designation so it is exempt and remains the primary way to view the park and the animals. The other way is to be a hiker and/or backpacker and be allowed to go anywhere on foot within one of the designated sections of the park or be a mountain climber on Mount McKinley. The Park Service only allows about 12 hikers in any area at a given time. Instructional videos and proper camping gear are required. There are almost no bridges in the park other than several for the road so many hikers must ford streams and rivers to get where they want to go.
We took a bus to Polychrome Mountain, a beautiful area aptly named for the multi colors of the rock on the mountain.
On the way out we saw Dahl sheep on the mountainsides, had a large black wolf walk right up the road by the bus (a very unusual sight we are told), saw caribou and one grizzly bear (also called brown bears). We decided to take a later bus back and took a short hike up over the top of the drop off area.
We got back to our campground about 8 PM and after dinner we took a walk down on the rocky braided riverbed. The very late daylight and setting sun on the mountains made it an even more beautiful night.
Monday – Rain and muddy windows
To go on our scheduled bus trip we both donned our full GorTex rain suits over fleece jackets as the rain was coming down and the wind had picked up too. The bus windows were literally coated with muddy water thrown up by the bus wheels and visibility was nearly impossible much of the trip. We took the bus to Fish Creek turnaround where if you are lucky you could see Mount McKinley but not in the weather we had today. Despite the weather we did see some animals, another wolf, several bears, sheep and caribou. We packed sandwiches and snacks and ate on the bus. We got back from the trip about 2:30.
About 6:30 a young Ranger stopped by to invite us to a presentation he would be giving at 7. He was announcing that it was being held at the bus shelter
instead of the amphitheater benches since the rain was continuing. We went and he gave a very good presentation on raptors in the park. He presented it in the form of a mystery game with the poor lowly Artic Ground Squirrel as the victim and the Eagle, Owl and Falcon as the suspects. He had props and photos and did a great job of both educating and entertaining everyone. All in all it was a pretty good first day despite the weather.
Tuesday was sunny with puffy clouds and we decided to take a bus all the way to Wonder Lake, which is nearly all the way into the end of the road. There is one stop a couple of miles past but it is for a lodge for overnight stays. What a difference a day makes! We saw mountains and valleys and vistas we never saw the day before due to the muddy windows.
We also saw the tremendous drop offs that we were riding next to and looking nearly straight down into the valleys with no guard rails!
We again lucked out and spotted not just one wolf but a family of wolves and Dick actually caught their howling on the video camera tape as the Alpha female was apparently talking/howling with or to her cubs. Really rare and neat stuff! We also saw a number of Grizzly bears, more caribou and sheep plus beautiful flowers and of course tremendous vistas of the mountains and rivers. Pat will make a later post of just photosof the beautiful wild flowers we have seen on our trip.
It took about 5 hours to reach Wonder Lake where we were hoping to see Mount McKinley. But the top was clouded and all we could see was the lower of two peaks through the clouds.
If you enlarge this photo you can see the mountain in the clouds. We are told that no more than 30% of visitors to the park get to see the mountain due to weather. It is the highest peak in North America and is 20,230 feet or very nearly 4 miles high! It has the second largest distance to top from base of any mountain in the world and is always snow covered. It is so big it is said to create it’s own weather. At Wonder Lake we got off the bus and took a short hike in the surrounding forest and then lunched back at the bus stop while waiting for a subsequent bus to take back to camp.
The return trip was another beautiful ride with plenty of animals and vistas along the way. 
See photo of bear with cub.
Having a good talkative bus driver makes for an even better trip and this one was very good. We got back to camp around 7:30 PM getting off the bus at a stop before the campsite and hiking the last mile and a half to camp. A fantastic day!
Wednesday Pat decided she didn’t want to spend another day riding a bus but she encouraged Dick to go for it and he did. Well as luck would have it in addition to seeing a wolf and other animals again, Mount McKinley was fully visible and nearly cloud free.
Dick was really sorry Pat wasn’t along. Got lots of photos but will only post a few here from this bus ride. The rangers did put on another camp program that evening on park controls and history.
Thursday morning, since we had not seen a moose in Denali, we decided to leave early and hope to see some moose in the area near the entrance as folks on the buses had told us that is where they had seen them before they got to our bus stop. Well the weather was perfect and as we rounded a bend on the way out suddenly Mount McKinley appeared in all its magnificence! Pat got to see it and we took many more photos from several locations. Here is the last view of Mount McKinley that we had from within the park.
There is a 1.8 mile walking loop up Savage Creek next to the ranger check-in point about 10 miles into the park. We decided to stop and take the hike and it took us about an hour as we kept stopping to take photos of the scenery and plants in the gulch.
We left the park and headed down the Glenn Highway, or Alaska Highway 1, headed toward Talkeetna and Anchorage. We planned to just make time down the road to get to the turnoff back to Talkeetna but suddenly we had new vistas of Mount McKinley from the East and from the South and they were magnificent so we stopped for more photo sessions.
At one point Dick got onto the roof of the RV and took a 360 degree video of the mountains all around as well as Mount McKinley. Can’t wait to show that to folks back home.
Reached the turnoff to drive back to Talkeetna, a small town that is used for the base camp for many people who fly to Mount McKinley to land on glaciers and/or to climb the mountain. Found space at the only RV park in town and went down to town to treat ourselves to dinner out since we had all meals in the RV at Denali. Found a neat little spot called the West Rib Pub and Grill. Dick thought the place would have ribs but the West Rib was a reference to the West Rib of Mount McKinley that climbers use to go up the mountain! Dinner was still good and Dick tried some local beer that turned out to be very sweet but good. Talkeetna has lots of small shops but many were closing by the time we finished dinner and Dick wanted to try the bakery we saw at one place to find more rhubarb pie! He was in luck and got some blackberry rhubarb pie ala mode that was worth writing home about!
Arrived at the relatively small commercial strip just a mile north of the Denali Park entrance and found a campsite for the night to allow us to get a timely start into the park tomorrow. Visited the park visitors center and got our tickets and the refund of half our payment, as we now are eligible for the Golden Eagle Passport discount. The campground was very crowded but had great wi-fi connections so Dick got to post what he had ready of this Blog and finally put up some photos.
We have been looking forward to today, Sunday the 17th, since we made our Denali reservations, the only pre-made reservations of our entire trip, way back in February! Unfortunately it was raining when we awoke. We topped off the fresh water and dumped the RV as our four nights camped in the park will be dry camping (without any connections) and we are permitted to only run the generator from 8-10 AM and 4-8 PM inside the park. We detached the Saturn and left it in a long term parking area within the park. Once you enter you must go to your campsite and park the RV. Then all travels are by foot or on the park busses, and we are only allowed to take the bus further into the park and not to take it back out toward the entrance. The rain continued intermittently until just before we reached our campground at which time the sun came out and the day turned very nice.
We stayed at Teklineka Campground, an area 38 miles into the park where only hard-sided campers are allowed. No tents are allowed due to prior wolf activity in the area. The drive in to Teklineka is through varied terrain with mountains and valleys of boreal forest. The mountains become treeless near the top. We chose our campsite from about ten open spots in the two loops of the camp. We took a spot backing up to the Teklineka River bed with a view of mountains nearly all around us. It is so quiet and beautiful here! We can’t wait to go further into the park and see what awaits us there.
We had pre-purchased our bus tickets and they are for Monday morning at 8:30 but we found that we could use them to go on the busses today on a standby basis the same as we will after we use our guaranteed Monday trip. The busses have only 8 designated stops in the park while covering over 120 miles one way on the only road into the park. Our campground is their 3rd stop in. They do also stop whenever you encounter animals or someone wants to stop to take a scenery photo and that can vary a trip length by half an hour or more.
Denali is a designated wilderness area that is to leave nature and the animals undisturbed. Fortunately the road was in place before the designation so it is exempt and remains the primary way to view the park and the animals. The other way is to be a hiker and/or backpacker and be allowed to go anywhere on foot within one of the designated sections of the park or be a mountain climber on Mount McKinley. The Park Service only allows about 12 hikers in any area at a given time. Instructional videos and proper camping gear are required. There are almost no bridges in the park other than several for the road so many hikers must ford streams and rivers to get where they want to go.
We took a bus to Polychrome Mountain, a beautiful area aptly named for the multi colors of the rock on the mountain.
On the way out we saw Dahl sheep on the mountainsides, had a large black wolf walk right up the road by the bus (a very unusual sight we are told), saw caribou and one grizzly bear (also called brown bears). We decided to take a later bus back and took a short hike up over the top of the drop off area.
We got back to our campground about 8 PM and after dinner we took a walk down on the rocky braided riverbed. The very late daylight and setting sun on the mountains made it an even more beautiful night.
Monday – Rain and muddy windows
To go on our scheduled bus trip we both donned our full GorTex rain suits over fleece jackets as the rain was coming down and the wind had picked up too. The bus windows were literally coated with muddy water thrown up by the bus wheels and visibility was nearly impossible much of the trip. We took the bus to Fish Creek turnaround where if you are lucky you could see Mount McKinley but not in the weather we had today. Despite the weather we did see some animals, another wolf, several bears, sheep and caribou. We packed sandwiches and snacks and ate on the bus. We got back from the trip about 2:30.
About 6:30 a young Ranger stopped by to invite us to a presentation he would be giving at 7. He was announcing that it was being held at the bus shelter
instead of the amphitheater benches since the rain was continuing. We went and he gave a very good presentation on raptors in the park. He presented it in the form of a mystery game with the poor lowly Artic Ground Squirrel as the victim and the Eagle, Owl and Falcon as the suspects. He had props and photos and did a great job of both educating and entertaining everyone. All in all it was a pretty good first day despite the weather.Tuesday was sunny with puffy clouds and we decided to take a bus all the way to Wonder Lake, which is nearly all the way into the end of the road. There is one stop a couple of miles past but it is for a lodge for overnight stays. What a difference a day makes! We saw mountains and valleys and vistas we never saw the day before due to the muddy windows.
We also saw the tremendous drop offs that we were riding next to and looking nearly straight down into the valleys with no guard rails! We again lucked out and spotted not just one wolf but a family of wolves and Dick actually caught their howling on the video camera tape as the Alpha female was apparently talking/howling with or to her cubs. Really rare and neat stuff! We also saw a number of Grizzly bears, more caribou and sheep plus beautiful flowers and of course tremendous vistas of the mountains and rivers. Pat will make a later post of just photosof the beautiful wild flowers we have seen on our trip.
It took about 5 hours to reach Wonder Lake where we were hoping to see Mount McKinley. But the top was clouded and all we could see was the lower of two peaks through the clouds.
If you enlarge this photo you can see the mountain in the clouds. We are told that no more than 30% of visitors to the park get to see the mountain due to weather. It is the highest peak in North America and is 20,230 feet or very nearly 4 miles high! It has the second largest distance to top from base of any mountain in the world and is always snow covered. It is so big it is said to create it’s own weather. At Wonder Lake we got off the bus and took a short hike in the surrounding forest and then lunched back at the bus stop while waiting for a subsequent bus to take back to camp.
The return trip was another beautiful ride with plenty of animals and vistas along the way. 
See photo of bear with cub.Having a good talkative bus driver makes for an even better trip and this one was very good. We got back to camp around 7:30 PM getting off the bus at a stop before the campsite and hiking the last mile and a half to camp. A fantastic day!
Wednesday Pat decided she didn’t want to spend another day riding a bus but she encouraged Dick to go for it and he did. Well as luck would have it in addition to seeing a wolf and other animals again, Mount McKinley was fully visible and nearly cloud free.
Dick was really sorry Pat wasn’t along. Got lots of photos but will only post a few here from this bus ride. The rangers did put on another camp program that evening on park controls and history.
Thursday morning, since we had not seen a moose in Denali, we decided to leave early and hope to see some moose in the area near the entrance as folks on the buses had told us that is where they had seen them before they got to our bus stop. Well the weather was perfect and as we rounded a bend on the way out suddenly Mount McKinley appeared in all its magnificence! Pat got to see it and we took many more photos from several locations. Here is the last view of Mount McKinley that we had from within the park.
There is a 1.8 mile walking loop up Savage Creek next to the ranger check-in point about 10 miles into the park. We decided to stop and take the hike and it took us about an hour as we kept stopping to take photos of the scenery and plants in the gulch.
We left the park and headed down the Glenn Highway, or Alaska Highway 1, headed toward Talkeetna and Anchorage. We planned to just make time down the road to get to the turnoff back to Talkeetna but suddenly we had new vistas of Mount McKinley from the East and from the South and they were magnificent so we stopped for more photo sessions.
At one point Dick got onto the roof of the RV and took a 360 degree video of the mountains all around as well as Mount McKinley. Can’t wait to show that to folks back home.Reached the turnoff to drive back to Talkeetna, a small town that is used for the base camp for many people who fly to Mount McKinley to land on glaciers and/or to climb the mountain. Found space at the only RV park in town and went down to town to treat ourselves to dinner out since we had all meals in the RV at Denali. Found a neat little spot called the West Rib Pub and Grill. Dick thought the place would have ribs but the West Rib was a reference to the West Rib of Mount McKinley that climbers use to go up the mountain! Dinner was still good and Dick tried some local beer that turned out to be very sweet but good. Talkeetna has lots of small shops but many were closing by the time we finished dinner and Dick wanted to try the bakery we saw at one place to find more rhubarb pie! He was in luck and got some blackberry rhubarb pie ala mode that was worth writing home about!
1 comment:
Dick/Pat .. great report. I can't wait to make our pilgramidge trip - by vehicle - to AK! AK by bus in '07! When we were in AK last September we went to Talkeetna and flew out of there for a full-trip around Denali. What a trip!! Costly, but worth every penny! I only wish I had my Canon 350D DSLR then that I use now! Next time.
Keep 'em comin' - super stories!
ofieldstream
PS.. you can put video clips on this blog as well.
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