First Explorations - The Conclusion

Once we finally got up and motivated, we re-packed the car and headed north to Denali National Park, home of Mt. McKinley, the highest peak in North America. Despite the rain, it was a gorgeous drive north...all 4 hours of it. Despite alot of rain this past summer, the days were still pretty because it made everything so lush and bright bright green.

We stopped off in Talkeetna to grab a bite to eat at the Denali Brewhouse. Talkeetna has a population of roughly 500 during the winter and 1000 during the summer. It was the inspiration for the TV show Northern Exposure. The town was established in the early 1900's as part of the railroad effort. Now it serves as a base for things like summiting Denali, salmon fishing, river rafting, camping, etc. Hearty folks attempting to summit Denali come here and wait out the weather. When it's a good day they board a bush plane that takes them up to the Great Gorge where they set up base camp for their long and dangerous ascent. We actually had lunch next to 4 Irishmen waiting for the weather to clear so they could head out. They had been waiting the better part of a week for a break in the weather. Talkeetna is truly a very small town. The road through town is dirt and the entire place is on the Historic Register. We had halibut nuggets and caribou burgers for lunch. Krissy also sampled the Ice Axe Ale...an IPA that is apparently so strong they will only serve you 2 before they cut you off.

We walked around a bit, then headed out toward Denali. There is 1 road into the park. It's 92 miles long and you can only drive private vehicles on it to get to your campsite. The farthest they'll let you drive on your own is about 15 miles in. If you want to see the rest you must take a park bus. We got our tent set up and bedded down for the night. We were much more prepared for the cold and light this time! Both of us were heavily layered including gloves and we had eye masks. We also had 1 more thing: bear spray. Alaska is truly the great outdoors and seeing things like moose and bear are common place. Denali is remote and thickly wooded, therefore bears are everywhere. They have classes you can take to be more "bear aware." It just made me "bearanoid." Notice the easy accessibility of the bear spray...

We woke up the next morning bright and early as we had signed up for the entire 12 hour tour all the way down the park road. The park was established in 1917 and is 6.25 million acres. It is the 5th largest park in the world. It is patrolled by rangers in the winter by dog-sled. Along the bus ride we saw EVERYTHING! Brown bears, dall sheep, caribou, elk, golden eagles, moose, snowshoe hares and a pack of wolves with their pups sunning by the river. The following are some of the 4 million pictures that we took. Apologies for the wolf pics not being incredibly clear, I didn't have the best camera at the time.

That night we stayed at the lodge. Krissy had the hook-up through Aramark. She is a dietitian for them and they run ALOT of facilities at national parks. She got us a great deal on an adorable cabin room, a great dinner and white water rafting the following day! We rafted the Nenana River, class III & IV's. It's a glacier fed river that was FREEZING! The water is 12 hours as it comes from 2 glaciers one 14 miles away and one 17 miles away. Once we were through the rapids our guide told us we could dip in if we wanted too. We had on drysuits but despite them it was so cold that it too your breath away! We headed back to Anchorage that night with 1 more adventure to have before Krissy's departure: halibut fishing!

The next morning we drove down to Whittier for our halibut charter. There are 2 things that happen in Whittier, fishing charters and glacier viewing cruises. There were 5 total people on our tiny charter boat. Krissy and I ended up doing OK...she caught a 45lb halibut and I caught a monstrous 20lb cod. Another interesting bit of trivia: when halibut are brought on the boat you have to CLUB them in the head to kill them otherwise they can flop around and knock you over/off the boat. The other interesting tidbit is that sometimes they are so big (hundreds of pounds) they have to be shot with a shotgun in the head to kill them. Now that's some crazy fishing...

Had a FANTASTIC time while Krissy was here and I'm so glad I got to experience so much in my new home with one of my best friends!