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For a little history about this trip. We had planned along with two other couples to make a Alaska trip this year. But as is the case, sometimes thing don't work and we had somethings come up that caused us to shift dates and plans. It looked as if we could not travel to Alaska this year, maybe pushing it to 2010.
In June, Barbara was talking to Jay, our son. He had vacationed in Denali last year and he came up with the idea that he could schedule his vacation so as to meet in Banff, AB, Canada. For many years we have had a interest in this area of Canada. We had, as a family visited Waterton Peace Park in the early '80 and marked it for a return. Jay worked on his calendar and we were able to make ours fit and off to the Canadian Rockies we went. We just extended ours to include a Denali trip.
We arrived at Denali Thursday, after traveling the 120 miles from Fairbanks. We traveled through thick smoke from a forest fire west and south from Fairbanks. see picture in Pi Fires are commons here, mostly caused by lighting. They can burn for a long time, but without the wind, they don't travel very fast. This one was a big one that had been burning over a month and still not controlled. The first night at the park was spent in Riley Creek campground, near the Wilderness Access Center. This is a big place. At the entrance, is a small town on state highway 3 with several large lodges, many parking lot style RV parks, gas station, park touring services, and plenty of restaurants, there just to serve the crowd of people that visit this park. This park attracts people from all around the world. This campground is filled with foreign visitors with rented motorhomes. Very easy to spot the rentals, big sign on the side that say " 1-800-RENTRV". We talked to a old German couple that said that every detail is arraigned by their travel club back home.
This afternoon we were able to stop by the Riley Creek Mercantile, to tour the Denali visitor center, and attend a evening ranger program in the amphitheater about the myths that the Athabaskan Indians held about the big black ravens. He weaved the Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven" into his talk that was mostly for the kids.
We are a little over 5 thousand miles and more than 35 days on the road and at the Teklanika campground 30 miles west into Denali for 10 days. As I type this, I look out the front window of the Bigfoot and see a view of the Teklanika River and the mountains in the background. From this campground, we can only go west on the green shuttle bus , but that takes us to all the areas west of mile 30. It takes us to our selected area and we get off and can spend several hours and then to get back to Teklanika we can choose any east bound shuttle. It makes a stop at least every hour. Tomorrow we will take the shuttle to Wonder Lake in hopes of catching a view of Mt Kinley at 20,320 feet, the tallest in North America. During our stay in Teklanika we can use that bus as transportation to any location and get on off just by telling the driver.
Our day 37 adventure started at 0745 hrs and took 7 1/2 hrs and traveled 110 miles was to Wonder Lake. The driver was a woman with 8 years of driving in this park. She has a microphone on and will comment on the park features and the many animals that we see along the way. The road is gravel and very narrow in spots. Denali offers new and different beauty that Barbara and I have never seen before. The braided rivers, the glaciers, the lakes, the mountains with their many different looks offer a 360 view that keeps one entertained for the whole trip. Our turn around point was the Wonder Lake campground on the bank of the lake. Jay camped in the number 7 spot last year, so we decided to get our picture made in that same location. Phylis, the camp ground host joined us in the picture with Mt. McKinley in the background. She has been hosting in this location for 20 years and I would guess that she is nearing her 80's. She is a very delightful to speak with. Jay had told us about her and to look her up if we got to Wonder Lake. Yesterday was a day just to ride the bus and plan for the days to come. We had purchased a back pack at the Canadian Tire store in Dawson Creek for ~$8 (good buy), so we packed it with sandwiches and snacks along with water and bear spray, so we were set for the day. This backpack has a very loud shrill audible device built into it that will scare any animal away. Have not needed it yet, but first person reports confirm that bears are in many places. We also carry bear spray with us at all times. We have seen many bears at a distance on our trips on the bus.
On Saturday the 8th we did some housekeeping, hiked some of the trails at this campground and planned for the next day. Had a nice evening around the campfire with some fellow travelers from BC.
Sunday the 9th was a rain out. It started raining in the early morning hours and continued off and on most of the day. We watched DVD movies for part of the day, than around 7 PM the sky cleared and the sun came out. The very long days of sun are now becoming shorter and by midnight, it is only the moon.
Monday, Aug 10th, morning temps dropped down into the lower 20s degrees. That gave the windows a good coating of frost, but, by 0800 the temp is already 36 degrees with clear skys. I get to watch the sun come up over the mountain and it looks like another beautiful day in store and we are getting ready for a Denali adventure. The bus stop is about 1/8 mile away.
We are fortunate to have a warm trailer with the cold weather package. We turn down the heat at night and the heater comes some on to keep it at the set point. Power and battery management come into play everyday, as there is only two times a day that generators can be used. We have been unhooked from the grid now for 41 days and so far no problems.
We boarded the shuttle bus to the Eielson Visitor Center and very soon we started to seen the bears, caribou, and a big moose. This was a special day because the driver spotted a big grizzly along side the road, about 100 yards to our right. The bear was moving toward us and would be crossing in front, therefore we advanced very slowly and would stop once in a while to observe. The bear stopped at a stream and just laid down in the stream for about 5 minutes, got up shaking the water off, and then crossed directly in front of us. He would look at us, but seemed undisturbed.
We ate our picnic lunch at the Eielson, looked at all the exhibits, and did a short hike on one of the trails. This is a 12 million dollar visitor center and is very politically and architecturally correct, I think it may be a indoctrination center to shape the young minds. One note, this building was awarded the highest honor for being self sufficient (off the grid as there are no power lines in the park, beyond the entrance) as far as the electrical needs. It has a 5KW hydro on a small creek, 2.5 KW of solar panels, and a propane powered generator of some kind. Guess what, they have a 12.5 KW trailer mounted Kohler running the place. One of the displays in the visitor is a computer screen that shows the different power sources and how each one is working. The ranger in charge told me that it has not worked for the summer season and that the solar panel system inverters are a big problem (the company that installed them is not supporting them) and on top of that the propane generator is not working and the hydro is also off line (lack of water in the creek). He told me that they are embarrassed and that is why the computer screen is off line. The power was off twice while we were there as they are switching from the very limited solar to the Kohler each time the sky gets cloudy. There is a park maintenance ranger stationed there to do this.
On the way back from Eielson, the bus had to make a quick stop for a red fox sitting in the road. The fox just sat there and looked at us. The driver moved to the right as far as possible, but the fox just sat there. Everyone got great pictures at a distance of 15-20 feet. This was a beautiful red fox that entertained us for about 10 minutes.
Not far down the road we saw a big gray wolf chasing a snow shoe hare. This happened right next to the road in front of us. Survival of the fittest played out in Denali today.
We got a 1 mile hike in as we asked the driver to let us off the bus before we got to the our campgrounds. Nice hiking weather as the temps are in the 20's at night and upper 50's during the day. We saw the first change of the foliage indicating the summer is gone and the autumn is here today. Just a note about the long hours of daylight. This is changing very quickly... 6min and 38 secs of less day light than the day before. Within the next week we will have more than 1 hour less daylight. I guess we better head south.
Another nice campfire to end the day of adventure. We watched another movie... Get Smart.
Wednesday...
Got up to another cold frosty morning with sun and about 27 degrees. We decided to pack a lunch and do a hike down the Teklanika river to the bridge. It was a nice hike of about 4 1/2 miles and 4 1/2 hours on a braided river bed of rocks and sand. At the present the river is narrow compared to the size of the river bed, so we chose to walk in the river bed. We spotted a pair of caribou on the other side from us. Lots of bear tracks and scat, but we did not see one today. My pocket GPS reported that the first leg took us 2hrs and 3 minutes and that equaled 1.05 mph. It was slow walking because of the rocks and many channels of the braided river. Sometimes we were forced to backtrack and reroute. We also saw more signs of the quickly approaching autumn with the birch leaves turning color. The cool evening and the clear skies told it was going to get cold tonight. Another campfire and a movie... Monster Mother-in-law
Thursday...
It really did get cold. We recorded a 20 degree outdoor reading about 0600 hrs. I looked at the propane level and decided we could stay for only another day before heading back to the entrance. It was easy to see the propane level as there was a nice frost ring around the tank. This coldsnap had caused us to use more propane than expected.
We caught another bus that took us back to the Eielson center. There are some trails and events that we wanted to see before we left. On the way there, we saw a young gray wolf stalking a snow shoe hare. The wolf/hare thing played out right next to the bus. This time the hare was lucky, the wolf pounced but the hare went into a hole just in time. The wolf just got a mouth full of fluff. The wolf started digging, but gave up. Lucky day for the hare.
We stopped several time to view Mt. McKinley, the skies were clear and this morning was the first time we had seen it. Very spectacular! At our first viewing we were 30 miles away and it dwarfed the mountains around it. At Eielson we were about 15 miles away. Sure looks cold up there! One of the rangers that was working at Eielson also works on the North face where most of the climbing takes place. He said that an average year 500 attempt to climb and about 40 percent succeed in making it. He also said the park maintains climbing ropes on the difficult areas. Many fly into the glacier, that would let them start about half way up. He has been to the summit many times.
We returned to the campsite around 1800 hrs and made ready for our departure tomorrow. We will camp at Reilly Creek tomorrow and the following night.
Thursday we spent the day at Reilly Creek and the visitor center. I am at the lodge and somewhat pressed for time because of a low battery on the computer, so that is it for now.
John and Barbara
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