Reflections of My Travel

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Long day. We got up at 04:00 eastern time, took a last look around the house to make sure we had packed everything we needed and that everything was shut off that needed to be. We headed over to Beth’s and she was kind enough to drive us down to the MARTA station so that we didn’t have to pay for parking. I think we both slept most of the way to Salt Lake City where we had a 1.5 hour layover. We stayed awake for the flight to AK. We flew over Mt Ranier and Mt St Helens and some huge glaciers when we got closer to AK. Great time to have window seats. We landed in Anchorage about 14:30 local time (18:30 eastern) and picked up our Ford Freestar. It was a pretty easy afternoon, we basically drove around Anchorage to see what all was there. We stopped at WalMart to get some final camping and food supplies. The length of the day started hitting us around 19:30 so we pulled over in an abandoned Sam’s parking lot (which was nothing more than a huge campground) and started setting up our accommodations. The Freestar has that nifty rear seat which folds down into a compartment to go completely flat. We pulled out the middle seats and set them up on their sides against the back of the front seats and stacked our luggage on them. We then filled our full-size air mattress, which fit perfectly, and laid out our queen-size sleeping bag and pillows. Voila, instant travel-bed. We hung our little fan over our heads and opened the rear vent windows (I guess they spray for mosquitos in the city). Oh, during all this setup, we also affixed our “just married” signs with which Rach decorated our Xterra. We were all set to go and were probably asleep by 20:00. I wrapped my blankie around my head to block the sun from my eyes, but I was surprised by how little the sun bothered me. I guess I was pretty darned tired.

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We woke up a 03:30 to a blazing, bright sun!! We decided to call home in order to share this insanity with our family and friends. Being good and awake, we figured we’d go ahead and get an early start on our journey. It was strange that, although the sun was bright as noontime, no stores were open yet. We headed north out of Anchorage and set our destination for Denali (better known by the name Mt McKinley which stole it’s true identity at some point in time, but the locals still refer to it as Denali). Along the way, we stopped at Talkeetna because we had heard so much raving about it. I guess we just didn’t get it. It was a very tiny tourist town that seemed to be nothing more than a launch-pad for flights to Denali or fishing cruises. We drove through it and got back on the main road pretty quickly. We got to Denali State Park at around 09:30. The view was spectacular. I should mention that Denali is sometimes referred to as “Ghost Mountain” because it is completely shrouded in clouds about 70% of the time. From the visitor station at the state park, we could see the whole mountain with only a few floating clouds moving around it. We talked with the ranger to find out what the state park had to offer and decided to camp out there for the night. We got to the campground and pulled into our spot around 10:30, which, coincidentally, is about the same time that waking up at 03:30 in the morning caught up with us. We climbed back to our bed and took a great 1.5 hour nap (open-window-luxury was no longer available now that we were outside the big city of Anchorage, but it was shady and we had our fan on). We woke up wonderfully refreshed and set out on a nice little 6.5 mile hike. It was a 4.8 mile loop trail around Byers Lake but we also hiked about 2 miles above the lake to see the waterfall and get a better view of Denali. It was a beautiful hike. Thoroughly enjoyable. While sitting up on the ridge, enjoying the view, we met and talked with a couple of backpackers who had hiked the whole ridge. They were a nice couple and I was very impressed with the size of the pack that the woman was carrying, combined of course with the distance they’d hiked. Here I was getting a stiff neck over my little 2 liter hydration pack and food supplies. I’m such a wimp. I need to build up to being able to do some real backpacking. I digress. The view of Denali was virtually unobstructed while we were up there. It was beautiful. Very impressive. We hiked back down to the lake and finished the trail around it, stopping to observe the swans and cignets and to arm ourselves with mosquito-netting. When we got back to the car, we decided to drive 20 miles to the nearest eating place. I don’t remember the name of it, some local place that the park ranger had highly recommended, but we got there to have them slam the door in our face because they closed in 15 minutes. Schmucks. So we drove another few miles to the Princess Lodge where we had a very yummy dinner and a nice wet-wipe/sink bath in the bathrooms. We went back to the state park campground and were asleep by 21:30.

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We woke up about 04:30 this morning. Tried to lay around a little longer, but that’s not very easy to do when it’s bright as noon out. We pulled out of the campground and started heading toward Denali again. We stopped for gas about 20 miles south of Denali NP and paid $2.43/gal! Just a few miles before we got to the park, we came upon two large moose cows in a pond on the side of the road. We enjoyed watching them for a little while. When we got to the NP, we briefly wondered the visitor center and scoped out bus/campground availability in order to decide how to plan our time there. We definitely wanted to camp at least one night at Wonder Lake, but it was booked for tonight and the night after tomorrow, so one night is all we’re getting. We decided to stay at the Riley Creek Campground at the park entrance tonight and we booked two seats on the first camper bus (06:30) into Wonder Lake for the morning. We went to Riley Creek campground to pick our spot for the night and then drove into the park as far as we could (private vehicles can only go as far as Savage River – 15 miles in – to go further than that, you have to ride one of their old school buses). There is a 2 mile loop trail at Savage River that takes you along one side of the river, has a footbridge to cross and comes back along the other side. Along the way, we saw a family of ptarmigans (the other state bird – after the mosquito, of course) and a happy ground squirrel. When we got to the bridge, we decided to hike on up the mountain a bit. It was beautiful. The further we went, the more we wanted to keep going (yes, even after all the bear tracks we saw in the trail). I’d say we probably went another 2 miles out to a point before we decided to turn back. Of course, we sat out on the point for a good while, relaxing in the cold breeze and soaking in all the beauty around us. It was amazing. On the way back, we saw a big, fluffy marmot, more ptarmigans, and more ground squirrels. It was such a pleasant, refreshing, and relaxing hike. On the way back to the car, there was a large group of people looking over the bridge at a moose, but i think they were seeing things. By the time we got back to the car, it was decided that it was shower time. We went back to Riley Creek campground and bought a couple of $4 showers from the mercantile. That was a great shower. All nice and clean, we decided to go out of the park to grab some dinner and look through some of the shops. We went to bed around 22:30.