Reflections of My Travel

click for pix
This morning, we set the alarm for 05:30 so that we would be packed and ready to get on the camper bus at 06:30. We boarded the bus with six serious backpackers who were headed to the back country. Their gear was impressive. We made one other stop at the visitor’s center to pick up no more than ten others. Then we were on our way. The original six with whom we boarded at Riley Creek turned out to be a very pleasant and conversive group. One of them has lived in AK for about 9 months, working as a physical therapist. The other five were a group of friends who have a history of wonderful, male-bonding travel adventures together. This was to be their last hurrah since one of them is going to be having a baby in October. About three hours in, we saw our first big animal. It was a pretty blonde grizzly just grazing around the tundra. The bus pulled over and we watched her for a while from above and then the bus drove down the road a bit and pulled over closer to her for us to watch some more. She was probably about 300 pounds. We continued on our way, making occasional stops to either take a short travel break or to let backpackers off in the middle of nowhere. Along the way, the bus driver told us that we could ride with him all the way to the end of the road, past Kantishna, which happens to be the most western-point of the continent that can be driven to. We’re all for gathering superlatives on our trips, so we had to go. He said that he would drop us off at the Reflection Pond on the way back and we could hike from there back to Wonder Lake. So when we got to Wonder Lake, we hopped off the bus, gathered our gear, walked around and found a campsite that was directly across from McKinley (beautiful view really), set up the tent and such, and headed back to the bus. We were pretty pleased with our decision to ride instead of staying at the campground since all the sites were in the sun and it was pushing 90 and getting kind of miserable. Riding the bus a bit more gave us shade and the breeze of wind coming through all the open windows. On the way back, we came across the end of a wedding and the officiant and witness flagged us down for a ride. The bus driver tried to get the bride and groom on the bus for a picture since he had never had a bride and groom on his bus. No luck. He then dropped us at Reflection Pond, as agreed upon. Reflection Pond is where all the pictures of McKinley with water reflecting it are taken. Unfortunately, it turns out that it’s pretty rare to get that picture since the very least amount of wind can ripple the water and destroy all hopes of reflection. So it goes. Not that it would have made any real difference since the smoke from all the wild fires had moved in to obstruct the mountain completely. We started the mile and a half hike back to Wonder Lake in the 90-degree heat with no shade and only the slightest breeze. I think that’s when it really started getting miserable. By the time we got back to our tent, we thought that perhaps a nap would help our moods. We turned on the fan and stripped down to our coolest layers and attempted to nap in the very hot tent. One of us succeeded, but unfortunately it wasn’t me. I decided to get out and go sit under the food pavilion for shade and whatever breeze I could get. I’m not sure how long I sat there, fighting away vicious mosquitoes, until Randal came out. We both sat for a little while and snacked on some peanuts and breakfast bars and water. We then decided to walk down to the lake. Luckily, it was only about a quarter-mile, and surprisingly mosquito-free. We spent most of the day there, socializing with other heat- and mosquito-escapees, and even took a brief dip in the water to cool off. About 23:00, when the sun was slightly less bright, we decided it was cool enough to go back to the tent and try to get some rest. it was much cooler in the tent, unfortunately we had gotten some very rowdy neighbors while we were at the lake and i stayed awake for several hours listening to them screaming and running around and making all kinds of noise. finally got some rest though.

click for pix
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.

click for pix
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.