Denali National Park Tour

Today was another "tourist" day. Our activity was the National Park Service Tundra Wildlife Tour. It was a 6 hour bus tour, 43 miles into the Denali. The road goes 92 miles into the park, but is closed because of a landslide shortly after where we turned around. It will be 2-3 years before a permanent solution to the slide (bridge) is developed and you can do the entire road.

We were fortunate to have a very experienced and knowledgable bus driver/tour guide. Once again, we had perfect weather and lucked out with the wildlife that came out to see us.

Moose eating by the side of the road on the way to the tour

The "business end" of a porcupine at the beginning of the tour

Three of the many Caribou we saw on the tour.

Mount Denali is in the background 75 miles away.  It is 20,310 feet tall.  The mountains in the foreground are 5000 feet and 10 miles away for perspective.

 As close as we got to Denali - 70 miles on an incredibly clear day.

In the circle, there are 4 Dall Sheep.  The idea for the national park (originally called Mount McKinley) was for the preservation of wildlife, especially the Dall Sheep 🐏

One of the many beautiful Tundra valley's - there is a Caribou in the foreground

The Alasaka state bird - The Willow ptarmigan

One more moose that we saw at the end of the tour

Denali National Park

We had a pleasant 2 hour drive from Fairbanks to Denali this morning.  Upon arriving, we headed for a hike.  We did the 6 mile Mount Healy Overlook hike.  With over 2000 feet of climbing, it was a significant hike.   The reward was more than worth it.

In addition to good exercise and great views of the valley, we got a glimpse of Mount Denali, approximately 80 miles away.  It is estimated that it is only visible to visitors 1/3 of the time, so we consider ourselves to be very lucky.

Our campsite is in the park and it is beautiful.  Again, we feel very fortunate to be able to experience this absolutely stunningly beautiful park.

         Quite a view from the overlook

Yes, that is Denali and North Peak from 80 miles

Our home for a couple of nights - yes, that is snow, but it is 75 degrees out

Fairbanks, Alaska

We have had a very nice weekend in Fairbanks. We started by going to the University of Alaska Museum of the North. It had a wonderful display on the history of Alaska from it’s geological start to the modern era. Also, they had a great movie on the Northern Lights. If it were not for the sun setting at 11:30 at night, I am pretty sure that the northern lights would be spectacular because of the current level of solar activity.

On Sunday, we drive 65 miles to Chena Hot Springs. We had a nice 4-mile hike along with way. We did not see much in the way of wildlife, but the views were spectacular.  There is nothing better than soaking in a natural hot spring after a long hike.

The other big event for the day was finishing our 32 hour book tape, Troubled Blood by Robert Galbraith (JK Rowling). It was the 5th of the Cormoran Strike series, which we both highly recommend if you like a good mystery. But read or listen to the others first, they are great.

From Skagway to the interior

We were on the road again on Friday.  We began the 13 hour drive from Skagway to Fairbanks, through Yukon Territories and the interior of Alaska.  We had mix of good and bad luck along the way.  The most consistent thing was absolutely beautiful scenery.

We got through the Canadian border pretty easily.  We forgot to fill out the online ArriveCan app before getting to the remote border crossing an 30 minutes into our drive.  That was kind of silly, because we did that 2 months ago when we went skiing in Canada.  Anyway, the day before, they had installed wifi  at the border, so we were able to reinstall the app and complete the form and continue.  Otherwise, we would have had to go back to Skagway.

After a quick bakery stop and drive through Whitehorse, we continued to Alaska.  The weather was variable (rain,sun,rain sun) which enhanced the views.  We saw Elk and then on a lonely stretch of the Alcan Highway, we saw what we think is a  brown (grizzly) bear right on the side of the road (note hump on his back).

As we approached the US border, we had a bit of bad luck.  The road was pretty bumpy from thawing permafrost.  All the sudden we heard a loud noise  I looked in the side mirror and say a large object fly off our camper.  After quickly stopping, we saw it was our RV awning.  It was in many pieces that had fallen off the camper.  We had a love-hate relationship with the awning.  It is (was) a little temperamental (working when it wanted too).  We have 5,000 more miles to decide if we want to replace it. 

After crossing the US border, we drove another couple of hours without any problems (on better roads) we stopped at a beautiful campground outside Tok.  It was a marvelous clear night and the sun did not go down until 11 pm.  All night it was twilight.  All in all, it was a good day.  We got to hear many hours on our 32 hour audiobook and see fabulous scenery and amazing wildlife.

Yukon - "Larger than Life" sign and van with awning

Our route for the day.  We stayed where the car is shown, about 500 miles

Shortly after entering Canada

The SS Klondike in Whitehorse

Looks like a grizzly to me

One of many beautiful views

One of many beautiful lakes

Our van, sans awning, at our campsite on Moon lake, near Tok, Alaska

The view from our campsite at 10:45 pm

Skagway, Alaska (day 2)

 Another sunshine filled day in Alaska, with lots of activity and beautiful sights.  We started the day with a hike.  Two minutes’ walk from the camper and we were headed up a steep incline to a 4.5-mile hike through a rainforest and along a mountain lake.  The further we hiked, the more we left other people behind. 

We got back to the camper in time for a quick lunch and then walked 2 blocks into town to catch the White Pass Railroad train for a 40-mile excursion.  It was a very “touristy” thing to do, but what the heck, we are tourists. 

The narrow-gauge railroad was built in 1900 to replace the Chilcott Pass hike we learned about yesterday.  We were reminded that all the prospectors were required to bring enough supplies to last a year.  That was generally thought to be about 2000 pounds, which made it necessary to go up and down the pass many times to carry it up manually.  Imagine their relief to have a railroad to transport them to Whitehorse.  Of course, then they needed to build a raft to go 500 miles down the river to Dawson after that.  These were tough folks.

The rest of our day was not so rigorous.  We enjoyed the train excursion, saw some marvelous sights and heard entertaining stories of the Klondike.  Our biggest hardship was having to wait for “happy hour” and determine what we were going to have for dinner.

That wraps up Skagway for us.  We are on the way to Whitehorse and points north tomorrow.  We are heading into the interior for a week or so.

View of Skagway

Our exercise for the day

Lower Dewey Lake, above Skagway

What a view, what a place to build a railroad

Near the summit of White Pass, just inside the Canadian border

I am not going across that bridge - look closely

Skagway, Alaska (and Inside passage)

Today was another early morning, with a 4:20 am wake up, 5:00 am ferry check in and 7:00 am departure. It is amazing how easy it is to start the day that early when there is plenty of sunshine. The 36 degrees does slow me down a bit (but it did warm up nicely during the day).

After stowing our camper on the belly of the ferry and a full breakfast, we settled in for the first half of the day. We got front row seats on the ferry for the 100 mile trip between Juneau and Skagway, via Haines. The ferry voyage is spartan in accomodations, but rich in scenery. 

Periodically, we are treated to whale spouts and fins as they cruise up the inside passage. Apparently, we are traversing the deepest and longest fijord in North America, the Lynn canal.

We are on the Leconte. It is one of the smaller ferries in the Alaska Ferry fleet and was built in Sturgeon Bay, Wisconsin.

Look at the size of the boat next to us.... huge

The view from our seats for the journey

Six hours of one beautiful view after another

There are plenty of humpback whales in the fijord.... this is not one of them.  Photo lifted from the internet

What a spot in the middle of the channel

View from the solarium on the rear of the ferry

Our voyage for the day

View of Skagway

We arrived in Skagway a little after 1 pm and jumped into a new era of history, the Klondike Gold Rush. The gold rush in Juneau began in 1880. Gold was discovered in the rivers of the Klondike in 1896.  The gold in this area was not mined, but panned out of the rivers.  This caused a huge influx of people.

We town is very quaint, but there were 4 huge cruise ships in the docks.  We decided to get away from things by going on a bike ride.  We rented bikes (e-bikes, thankfully) and headed to the town of Dyea, about 10 miles away. 

Dyea is (was) a town of 8,000-10,000 people during the height of the rush.  It is up a narrow inlet and ships could not get to the town, so the people and goods needed to be transloaded to smaller boats to get to the town.  It is the beginning of the Chilikoot trail, which went 30 miles inland.  Your probably recall this photo of the trail in history books.  Anyway, it was a very interesting ride with enough wind and elevation change to make the ebikes well worth renting.

Dinner was halibut fish and chips (for me) and a burger for Julie at the Klondike Brewing company.  Best fish and chips ever and wonderful beer.

The climb up the pass.... That is not us

Our bike route

View of where the town was located.... light green folliage across the river

Juneau, Alaska

Today was our last full day in Juneau.  Despite the rain, we decided to go for a hike on the Perseverance Trail.  The trail is very near downtown Juneau, but quickly heads into the wilderness.  It was the area in which gold was mined starting in 1880 and beginning the Alaska gold rush period.

The hike was six miles round trip and about a thousand feet of vertical ascent.  It is named Perseverance after the mine in the area (and not the difficulty of the hike).  We got very near the end, but ran into snow and turned around.  I guess we did not persevere?

Anyhow, it was a beautiful hike and fitting end to our time in the capital of Alaska.

Our hike is marked in orange

Area heavily mined and location of mining town.  We ran into pretty significant snow after this point and turned around

Abandoned mine - light folliage is new growth after mine was abandoned

 

Is there still gold in those streams?