DENALI NATIONAL PARK

Yeah, we're here

Today's post will include yesterday and today's adventures.  Yesterday we arrived at Denali National Park and went directly to the Wilderness Access Center.  They printed our bus tickets for tomorrow's eight hour drive to Mile 66 Eielson Visitor Center.  The tickets set us back about $70 but it's the only way to get that far into the park since no cars are allowed more than 12 miles into the park.  We also wanted find out if they had any open sites at Riley Creek Campground.  As we suspected, the answer was a big fat "no".  That's okay because they get $25 per night with no hookups and we noticed a nice scenic turnout about seven miles away from the entrance with phone and internet capability.

We parked at the visitor's center for the day and got ourselves acclimated, watched a movie, listened to a ranger program, stamped our passport, took a nature trail walk and checked out the gift store. Then we went back to our turnout for the night.  I set the alarm for 5:30.

It's very strange to wake up to an alarm but it did the trick and we got to the Wilderness Access Center in plenty of time for coffee, toast and a banana before we needed to get in line for the bus. We were, literally, loaded for bear with our hiking gear, backpacks, binoculars, cameras, food and water. 

Our bus for eight hours

We finally saw grizzly bears, seven of them in all.  We needed binoculars to see most of them but a few were close enough to see without them.  We also got to see quite a few caribou, some were bulls, and a red fox.  It's so exciting to see these animals in the wild and everyone in the bus goes crazy taking pictures.  The bus driver stops whenever someone shouts "stop" then everyone says what? where? do you see it? which side? then it gets quiet because we don't want to scare the animal away. It's way too cool!

Arctic Squirrel

The backside of a red fox

Bull Caribou

Our best photo of a Grizzly Bear

Colorful caterpillar

Caribou traffic jam

State bird of Alaska - Ptarmigan

Dall Sheep are high up on the ridges and look like white spots without binoculars

When we got to Eielson Visitors Center, we had planned on taking the ranger-led hike along the Thorofare Ridge Trail but decided to just go on our own.  It was a 2-mile hike which is usually a piece of cake but a climb of 1,000 feet in elevation on steep hard-packed gravel switchbacks made it a thigh burner. It's a 40-60 minute hike one way.  The view of Denali and the Alaska Range were incredible from the top.

Our view from the top of our climb

Isn't this beautiful?

It was a long day but not as long as those people who took the bus to Mile 85 Wonder Lake, a 11- hour round trip or Mile 90 Kantishna, a 12-hour round trip.  

We could hardly wait to get back to our turnout and look at all the pictures we took.  

That's all folks!  Thanks for stopping in.

RAINY DAY AT GLACIER

St. Mary's at Glacier - Heavy T-Storm, damaging winds, large hail and possible tornado - H70 Low 46

I was sitting at my computer which faces the front window and noticed something moving out of the corner of my eye.  Running at full speed from behind the bathrooms was a fox.  He ran toward us, stopped and posed long enough for us to grab the camera and snap a few pictures.  I get so excited when something like that happens.

Welcome

He's soaked from the rain - is it a red fox?

The weather didn't stop us from taking an afternoon drive along Going-to-the-Sun Road to Logan Pass.  Unfortunately, due to heavy fog and rain it was virtually impossible to see the tops of the mountains.  We stopped at St. Mary's Visitor Center and got our passport stamped.  We watched two movies.  One was about the renovations and millions of dollars being spent on the Going-to-the-Sun Road and what a vast undertaking it is.  The other movie was about how the glaciers, lakes and mountains were formed in this area.  Scientists believe that by the year 2030 all the glaciers will have melted.  At one time these glaciers were 5,000 feet thick.

This was pretty with the water running beneath the ice

This was our view of fog and rain through the windshield

I watched this mini-avalanche

Even in the rain, the Beargrass was very pretty

I'm feeling much better today although it doesn't take much to fill my tummy.  Tonight I'm making my first attempt at German red cabbage.  Denis just said, "what is that smell? it smells like that stuff you put on ham".  I said "does it smell good?" and he replies "I don't know, it smells strong".  Well, I like the smell of cloves, butter, apples, cider vinegar, sugar and red cabbage.... hope it tastes good.  

That's all folks - thanks for stopping in