Month: June 2017

Our trip down from Fairbanks was short – just about 2 hours and not a lot of places to stop and explore. Denali is a National Park that is celebrating 100 years this year. It got its name from the natives who called it Denali or the great one, the big one…. It is the tallest mountain in North America at just over 20,000 feet. People come from all over to climb it – about 1200/year. Less than half make it.

Our arrival at Denali and check in at the campground was not an efficient time to say the least. The staff checking in the campers was having problems with the computer. She not only was checking in for the campground, but was also printing off any of the tour tickets they had ordered. After close to an hour and a half of waiting, we finally had our turn (there were only about 4 parties in front of us). We were able to book a bus excursion for Monday – it goes 66 miles into Denali to the second visitor centre. It will be a 7-8 hour trip and we hope to see some wildlife. Our campsite is nice here – no hook ups so we’ll be running the generator to keep our batteries charged. Also, there don’t seem to be many mosquitoes here so maybe we can have a campfire or two! The campsites are small – you are either less than 30 feet or 30-40 feet. Although we are under 30 feet, we didn’t have a lot of sites to chose from – many of them might go to 30 feet, but then there wouldn’t be room to park the truck.

Monday morning we woke to clear, sunny skies for our bus excursion – the forecast was right 🙂 We were amongst the 20-30% of people who actually get to see Denali! Most of the time it is covered by clouds. We drove out after we had set up our tent and saw just a faint line of where the peak was through the clouds – the mountain tends to make it’s own weather. However, we were treated to many views of Denali – it did get hidden by some clouds at the end of our bus trip, but on our return route back, when it came back into view, the clouds were gone and we could once again see it.

Along the excursion, our bus driver who was also our naturalist guide gave us lots of information, not only about the park, but about the wildlife. We saw a very large herd of caribou high up in a valley, along with a number of single ones, some Dall sheep, several grizzly bears including a mother and her two cubs (they were quite a ways away), and just as we were almost our trip, a wolf ran along the side of the road for a few yards before disappearing into the bush. All in all it was a great day – the bus was quite comfortable, even though it was more like a school bus but with better seats. The park only lets private cars drive in the first 15 miles unless they have campground reservations in which case they are restricted on how much they can drive and they can’t go in and out every day, just the in the day they arrive and out when their reservation is done. They have shuttle buses that go back and forth and you buy a bus ticket to where you want to go on the 90 mile road. Our bus was different since it was an actual excursion which meant it was a guided trip.

Moose cow with two calves near our campground

Caribou grazing in the snow!

Tuesday we laid low for the morning and then took a 7+ km. hike to the entrance visitor centre and came back a round-about way. The weather was overcast much more and it certainly wouldn’t have been as nice to do the bus excursion as the day before! The weather has been pleasant still with temperatures around 20C and lows at night 8-10C. The park has been quite full so far – they had no available campsites when we arrived so it was good we had reservations!

Stay tuned for more Denali adventures!

The first two nights in Fairbanks were spent in a recreation area, but without services and without drinking water. We have come to expect many of the government owned parks do not have drinking water available. Most taps or pumps have signs that say the water must be boiled anywhere from 1 to 10 minutes before drinking – quite a range! However, we weren’t prepared at this park and there was no notice at the entrance. It was only when we couldn’t find potable water when we dumped our tanks that we found out the water wasn’t safe for drinking. After the first night, we drove into town to scope out the full service campgrounds in the area. We figure we need to get our trailer batteries well charged before we head to Denali since we will be there 6 days without hydro hook ups. The generator will charge them, but it needs to run a fair bit and if we have a good charge base, it will be easier to maintain them for the 6 days.

Just before arriving in Fairbanks we had a visit to the North Pole (Alaska) where Santa and his reindeer are in residence.

Fairbanks also provided us an opportunity to do laundry – but it was the most expensive here so far – $3.00 for a regular load of wash and the same amount for the dryer (at least it runs for 60 min.). It is very convenient at this park and open 24 hours a day. Joyce also noted as we arrived the large number of rhubarb plants at the entrance, some of which were going to seed. Upon inquiring, they were happy to let us pick what we wanted since no one at the park seemed to want it. So, another rhubarb pie, rhubarb muffins, stewed rhubarb…. maybe even a rhubarb crisp to come! At the price of fruit here, free is great!

We had a couple of nice day trips while in Fairbanks. The first was to the Chena Hot Springs. A nice paved road, taking an hour to drive took us to an interesting location with hot springs pools. Before we visited the pool, we took a tour of their geothermal operations. When the current owners purchased the property, they decided to invest money to utilize the hot springs for more than recreation. They have a very large geothermal operation, now at the point where it will be able to supply all the electricity for the resort year-round. Most of their buildings have in-floor heating from the geothermal supply. They operate a number of huge greenhouses where they are producing huge numbers of vegetables each year. In 2016 they harvested over 9,000 pounds of tomatoes alone, in addition to such vegetables as potatoes, cucumbers, zucchini, celery, carrots, lettuce, as well as many others. They also are raising reindeer, goats and chickens with the eventual hope to have reindeer meat, goat milk and cheese and eggs and chicken for meat. They are working to have a fully self-sustaining resort for the guests in their 80 lodge rooms and 75 staff. Summer is their slow season – in the winter people come to view the northern lights and sit outside in the hot spring pool. We took our lunch and enjoyed a trip to the pool after our geothermal tour which included a view of their power plant and green houses.

A highlight of our time in Fairbanks was the morning we spent on the Riverboat Discovery, a stern wheeler boat and family-owned business that has been in operation since the 1950s. With a trip on the Chena River, we saw a bush pilot take off from the water and heard his talk about his life, saw a famous sled dog operation from a former Iditarod champion, Susan Butcher who has since passed away and is now being run by her husband, and had a chance to walk through a replica of a native Indian village.

It was a most informative and interesting morning, well run and with excellent staff participating in the morning. Then in the afternoon, the same family operates a tour of the Gold Dredge No. 8 which we visited. First off was a talk and viewing of the Alaska Pipeline and then we boarded a narrow gauge railway up to the dredge. Along the way we heard lots of history of the gold in Fairbanks, how the dredge operated and the amount of gold in the area. We each got a small bag of “pay dirt” at the dredge and then had a chance to pan for gold with it. Between Paul and Joyce we netted about $30 worth of gold flakes which we had made into a necklace.

learning how to pan

now we do it….

We finished the day off with a trip to the Pioneer Village and the Alaska Salmon Bake. Fresh, barbequed over a wood fire-salmon, beer-battered cod from the Bering Sea, and prime rib at an all-you-can-eat gave us an authentic Alaskan meal.

Fairbanks also provided a bit of down time for us. We’ve been travelling pretty constant for over a month now and we needed a chance to slow down a bit and not have to go somewhere for a day. We also experienced summer solstice here – the sun goes down at 1247 and rises at 2:59 without real darkness in between. We’ve been surprised that we have managed to sleep as well when it hasn’t been dark for 6+ hours at a time. It is also easy to get into the habit of staying up late because you don’t realize how late it has gotten until you check the clock! We need to change that around and get to bed BEFORE midnight!

Our next stop will be the grand national park of Denali. Stay tuned for what’s up there…. We do expect a bigger wildlife population from what we’ve read.