Jul 21, 2010 - Denali Wildlife Tour

It rained overnight and was still raining, about 49 degrees as we headed to the Wilderness Access Center to join our tour. You are permitted to drive your own vehicle into the park only 15 miles, as far as we went yesterday. This drive on a school bus goes out to the Eielson Visitor Center, at mile 66. The tour started at 8:00. The driver provided “color commentary”; for the first hour and a half there were no animal sightings but we learned about the topography and climate zone transitions. The drive had multiple elevation changes, from...

Jul 20, 2010 - Into Denali National Park

It rained overnight; the forecast is for 60 degrees and 60% chance of rain for the forseeable future. After lunch we headed to the Visitor Center and watched "Heartbeat of Denali." You may only drive 15 miles into the park; we did that, and at mile 11 we were able to see the top of the mountain! We are in the 30% club. We stayed quite a while at that turnout, using binoculars and letting folks look through Joe's spotting scope. There's a photo; it's very hard to distinguish among the clouds, the glaciers, snow, and the mountain itself....

Jul 20, 2010 - Summer 2010/Alaska Caravan - Tour (Denali NP)

Our tour group drove to Anchorage, AK today. Since we had been to Anchorage before, we made reservations at the Riley Creek Campground inside Denali National Park to stay an extra day. We will miss some of the things we have already experienced in Anchorage when we drive in a day late. Check-in time at the Riley Creek Campground was 11:00 AM. We had plenty of time to sleep-in and still travel the nine miles to the park. Check-in was easy except there was a senior citizen in front of us who took 25 minutes to get registered – he must have...

Jul 19, 2010 - On the (George) Parks Highway

We headed SW on the Parks Highway. At the turnout for the George Parks monument, there is a view of the Willow Creek area, where a wildfire is burning. Daily statuses are posted. 6,180 acres have burned; seems they are maintaing the perimeter, but not trying to put it out. There are several species of trees that need the extreme heat to release their seeds. We crossed the Tenana River via the Native Veterans Memorial Bridge, had lunch at Rose's Cafe, and arrived at Denali Motel and RV Park. It's not much to look at, but all the RV parks in...

Jul 19, 2010 - Summer 2010/Alaska Caravan - Tour (Denali NP)

Today is our day to tour Denali National Park. We catch a special bus at 5:45 AM and have an eight-hour guided bus tour. We did this same tour 17 years ago and did not see many animals – afternoon tour at that time and a September timeframe. Although Denali National Park is very large, most of it accessed only by hiking – private vehicles may drive on only the first 15 miles of the main park road. Special tour buses can travel the whole park road as can park shuttle busses. This time the tour was very good. Before we were on the road 15...

Jul 18, 2010 - Summer 2010/Alaska Caravan - Travel (Denali, AK)

Today we travel to an RV Park just outside Denali National Park - a part of the trip we both look anticipated. It will be different than most of our National Park visits, however, as we usually dry-camp inside the park. The trip took only a little over two hours. Since we could not check-in before 12:00 noon, there was little sense to get on the road before 10:00 AM – time to sleet-in again! Although rain was forecasted, it only sprinkled in a few short sections of the trip. About 70 miles from Fairbanks, AK we noticed several RVs and cars...

Jul 17, 2010 - Denali National Park

Denali had to be one of my favorite stops in Alaska, but then every stop was a favorite in Alaska. The Denali National Park is huge and unlike so many of the other parks does not have thick trees lining the roads. Instead the landscape is more rolling plains with mountains in the distance. This isn't because of a high altitude but rather the short growing season and severe winters. It was because Denali did not have a haze or smog that I was able to get such clear and colorful photographs. We saw caribou (or cariboo as the Canadians spell...

Jul 6, 2010 - Healy,AK

We spent a few days in Healy waiting to get into Denali Nat'l Park. We went on an "ATV Tour" that takes you into the back country. I wanted Jim to drive so I could take pictures (if I drove I'd have to pay attention to where I was going, so I left the driving up to him) We had a great time seeing the views and braving the rugged trail!!!! Tomorrow (July 8) we finally go into Denali -----

Jun 24, 2010 - Healy, AK

Campground: Denali Motel & RV Park After a late start we arrived at the rv park in early afternoon. After setting up we went to the Visitors Center and watched a movie. We went to the Wildlife Activities Center and got our passes for Teklanika Campground and watched another movie there. We saw the Alaska Railroad that goes from Anchorage to Fairbanks and passes right through Denali National Park. The railroad was built in the 1920’s. Finally it was home to happy hour. Jim and Liz are here and they joined us.

Jun 23, 2010 - Healy, Alaska

We got a late start out of Fairbanks this morning. Milton and Letha ran into Fairbanks to get a prescription and to wash the truck. They noticed one of the trailer tires was wearing funny; so, Milton decided to change it. He discovered that the steel belt was showing through it. It probably would have blown on the way to Denali. He didn't want to leave without a spare. And that chore took a while to complete since only one place carried trailer tires. And, he had to find that one place first. Fortunately, we didn't have far to travel to get...

Jul 8, 2009 - Seeing Nenana

Wednesday, July 8, 2009. McKinley RV Park & Hotel, Healy, Alaska Seeing Nenana We drove over by the Visitor Center when Tom was finished with work and looked around the area. They had a small store with several shops behind it. There was a working fish wheel on display and several moose antlers and wood carvings. The Visitor Center had tickets for the Nenana Ice Classic for sale so we bought a few of those. The Ice Classic is one of the things Nenana is known for. Below is a little write up they put in a travel magazine for the area that...

Jul 7, 2009 - Byers Lake

We were headed just a short way south of Denali National Park so I didn't mark it on the map. We only traveled less than 100 miles today to an Alaskan State Park at Byers Lake. It is dry camping in the forest next to Byers Lake, so Bob wanted to fish. We got to see a hazy Mt. McKinley from our highway to the south east of Denali National Park. We were told that the smoke will be clearing, especially from the south, so we might be able to see it from our new spot. We passed through an area called Broad Pass. It was a mountain valley, bare in...