Palmer Area Day 2

Day 46, Sunday, 8/2: Another beautiful sunny day in the 60’s. Have spent most of the day just relaxing, on the computer and reading. Still enjoying my Amazon Kindle very much!!

They are having an ice cream social here at the park tonight from 6:30 to 7:30. Not sure if we will attend…. Took the opportunity to put a small roast in the little crock pot I brought since we aren’t traveling and have electricity! Plan to leave in the morning and head to Anchorage, then on to the Kenai Peninsula for about a week. Probably won’t have WiFi since we will be staying mostly in forest service campgrounds there.

Posting some pictures taken at Denali! Mt. McKinley (Denali) and the sled dog demonstration area.... Note to Bell: Bob did not give any attention to the dogs, he is remaining true to you!

Palmer area

Day 45, Saturday, August 1: Slept in this morning, had a bite of breakfast and then went on down the road. The closer you get to Wasilla the more traffic you encounter and it is Saturday so lots of people out and about. Nice drive and a warm sunny day.
Arrived in Wasilla about noon and found a Wal-Mart to do some shopping. It is a recently remodeled superstore and looks nice, not a big box like most of their stores. It was crowded though, the parking lot almost full. Bought groceries and grabbed a bit of lunch. A few miles past Wasilla is the junction with the road to Palmer which we took and a few miles ahead found a very nice RV park called Homestead. It was listed in the Milepost and is one of the best ones we have stayed in. I would describe it as quaint! Nothing fancy about it but very clean and a friendly couple that run it. We did 4 loads of laundry first thing since it had been awhile… Put our groceries away, sorted some cupboards and we are good to go. Plan to stay here two nights because we don’t want to be in Anchorage before Monday when we need to pick up the part for the jack. WiFi is great here so we can get our internet fix before going off to remote places again! Plan to grill some steaks tonight.

Our granddaughter Cassie flies home from Maui this evening, getting into Portland about 11:30. She has been gone over a month, visiting her other grandparents there. Imagine this will turn into an annual event cause I’m sure she had an awesome time! We miss her!

Trapper Creek

Day 44, Friday, 7/31: Can’t believe it is the last day of July already! The time is going by fast. Left Healy and headed for the little shopping village outside Denali. Saw a shop that I had to visit as we passed through yesterday. It is a fabric and craft shop! Bob was grumbling about not being able to find a place to park but we managed!!!!! The one and only rv spot….
Spent about 45 minutes in the shop and could have spent a lot of money but didn’t. Just a few items…. On down the road toward Anchorage. It started out to be a nice sunny day but the clouds moved in and it is a bit chilly with the wind. Beautiful scenery, lots of mountains, Fireweed, etc. We haven’t had WiFi since North Pole so we are hoping to find a park that has it. The last place it didn’t work…. Came to a town called Trappers Creek and found a nice park and it is a popular ATV area. Tried to hook into their WiFi but realized there is something wrong with our connection so Bob re-installed the program. In the meantime he unloaded the RZR and we took a 50+ mile ride on Petersville Road. It goes in about 40 miles to some cabins but about 18 miles in there is a place called Forks Roadhouse. It has been there since the ‘30’s and used to supply food, drink and lodging to miners in the area. It is still in operation today so on our way back from exploring we stopped in and had a pint of beer (or two). Very rustic with some big friendly dogs greeting us at the door. Visited with the folks there and bought 2 pieces of homemade pie to bring back with us. Evidently their busiest time is in the winter when there are thousands of snowmobilers who frequent the area. They must have enough business in the summer too because the guy who made the pies said he had made a dozen or more today! They serve burgers and such too. Rode back to our campsite and fixed some dinner. Bob played around with the computer and was up at 2:00 in the morning on the internet!!! Guess we are addicted to it somewhat and when it is not working we are lost. Talked to Jim on the cell phone earlier in the evening and it was good to hear about their trip to Georgia.

Denali to Healy

Day 43, Thursday, 7/30: Up early and on our way back to the park entrance. Passed about a dozen buses coming in as we were going out! No critter sightings today…. We did stop at the park headquarters and attended another dog sled demonstration. Gog a good seat this time and hopefully some better pictures. It is very cloudy/smoky today. Stopped at the dump station and then on to the long term parking area to hook up the cargo trailer. Everything was just as we had left it. Drove to Healy, a small town about 20 miles north of the park, and we are staying in an RV park here. There is a Polaris dealer next door and Bob checked it out with the thought we might take a ride. This RV park is probably the worst we have stayed in and you couldn’t tell at first because the sights are down a hill from the main area. Decided we would just spend the night, forget the ride and head out first thing in the morning

Denali Day 6

Day 42, Wednesday, 7/29: This is a windy place…. All night it was gusty and we are thankful for our RV. There are quite a few tent campers here. Slept in this morning.
Spent most of the day just relaxing and we did take several long walks along the river bed. Played some cribbage and did some reading. The wind died down enough to have a campfire in the evening.

Denali Day 5

Day 41, Tuesday, 7/28: Up early to catch the bus which was about 15 minutes late. About 10 of us waiting and we met a nice young couple from Switzerland. The bus made quite a few stops along the way (a visitor’s center about half way and a couple of rest areas). The driver was on the alert for critters and he could really spot them. He would try to stop so everyone could get a picture. We saw 9 grizzly’s, several moose, some wolves, caribou and some falcons nesting in a tree right along side the road. The campground we are staying in is at mile 29 and the end of the bus trip is Wonder Lake at mile 85. Fortunately for us, Mt. McKinley (Denali) was clear and we had a beautiful view. They say you can only get a good view about 20% of the time!! Lots and lots of buses!!! We were the first bus in but coming out there were dozens of them and the road is quite narrow, steep and winding most of the way. There was just enough room for them to pass each other and scary if you were on the outside looking down! The buses are not plush tour buses but more like school buses so it could get quite bumpy. We arrived back at our campground at 3:30, making for a long day but well worth the trip. Think we got some good pictures and met some interesting people too. We did have wind again today but the sun is out and it is warm (60’s). I think the wind is quite normal here and we don’t mind since it blows the mosquitoes away!

Denali Day 4

Day 40, Monday, 7/27: Broke camp, took the trailer to the parking area, headed to the Mercantile for firewood and ice and then off to Teklanika. It is a nice drive and soon after the Savage Creek Campground you enter the tundra. Didn’t see any critters today but hope to see some on the bus ride tomorrow. The campground is remote but nice sites and we did see a few big rigs here. It has been windy and the mosquitoes are out (unlike Riley Creek where we didn’t have a problem with them). Partly cloudy with some sun breaks. We took a walk around both loops of the campground and found the bus stop for tomorrow’s excursion. Need to be there by 6:30 AM…. so we will need to set an alarm. Also hiked out in the river bed. It is a very wide bed with streams flowing through it. Someone said they had seen a moose on the hillside but we didn’t see it.

Denali Day 3

Day 39, Sunday, 7/26: Woke up around 2:30 this morning and it was actually dark outside!!! First time in quite a while…. We are further south now and days are getting shorter too.

Bob is fixing breakfast outside on the camp stove this morning. It is nice not to have bugs and the wind has died down. The plan today is to take the shuttle to Savage Creek campground and look around there. We will decide after that if we want to buy tickets to go further into the park.

We took the shuttle bus over to the Wilderness Access Center intending to go to Savage Creek. Asked the bus driver how far into the park we should go and he said to Eielson which is the 8 hour tour. He said we could also camp at Teklanika Campground which is 30 miles into the park and then catch the shuttle bus there, making the trip 6 hours instead of 8. The deal is you have to stay 3 nights there and only make one trip in and one trip out. They like to limit the traffic on the park road. So, we decided to make a reservation. At first we were told it was full but we checked with someone else and they said we could go tomorrow. Once again they gave us a refund for Riley Creek and we are set to go to Teklanika for 3 nights starting tomorrow. It is now only $8 a night. The shuttle ticket to go all the way to the end of the road is $31 each. The first day you have a reserved seat, and after that you can go on a stand-by basis. You aren’t allowed to tow anything to Teklanika so we are leaving the trailer at the long term parking here. Had to do a little shuffling to make room for things we might need that are normally in the trailer. Price of a small loaf of bread at the store…. $5.99… ouch…
Decided we don’t need bread that bad!

We did hike from the Visitor’s Center back to camp today and that was a nice jaunt. They have lots of trails around here and it was good exercise. It has been cloudy today and in the high 60’s.

Denali Day 2

Day 38, Saturday, 7/25: The campsite we chose is really sloped and we had to use quite a few blocks to level out the camper. The people next door are leaving today so we decided to see if we can move there since it is fairly level and then we can just unhook the trailer. We are in an ‘A’ site and it is a ‘B’ site so will have to make arrangements with the registration people.

After breakfast we walked to the Mercantile where the camp registration is located and they were fine with us moving but had to change everything in the computer. Since a ‘B’ site is cheaper she had to give us a refund and then we paid for an additional 2 nights, making it 5 nights here. Ended up costing $11 a night for the ‘B’ site. They mark them according to length, ‘A’ being longer for bigger rigs. We unhooked the trailer so now we can use the truck/camper if we want to drive around. In fact, we did drive to the Visitor’s Center to check things out. It is really different than we expected. Unless you are hiking or backpacking, you have to take shuttles or buses into the park because they don’t allow personal vehicles. There is one campground about 16 miles in but once there you have to use the shuttles to go anywhere.

We decided to catch the shuttle to see a sled dog demonstration and the line was so long it took 3 shuttle buses to fit everyone in!!! The demonstration was at the Park Headquarters, about a 5 minute drive from the visitor’s center. They have 25 to 30 dogs each in their own pens with neat log dog houses with their names on them. Some were sleeping and others wanted to be petted. The park ranger gave a talk and the dogs started howling and barking, knowing that some of them would be chosen to pull the sled! They picked 5 dogs, 2 in the back (power), 1 in the middle (turn dog), and 2 in the front (lead). He drove them around a circle walkway and boy were they fast! 17 to 20 miles an hour. It was fun to watch and the dogs were so excited. It is the only sled dog group in any of the National Parks and you could tell the dogs were well taken care of. They have one or two paid park employees and the rest are volunteers.

After we got back to the visitor’s center we decided to get an ice cream cone since we had seen lots of people walking around with them. Then we drove to the Wilderness Access Center where you can purchase tickets for the shuttles and bus tours. We haven’t decided what we want to do yet.

Came back to camp and enjoyed a campfire. It isn’t as windy this evening and a bit warmer too

Wal-Mart to Denali

Day 37, Friday, 7/24: This morning we decided not to make coffee and just walked to a Carl’s Jr. for breakfast. Wanted to be at the Polaris dealer by 9:00 when they open. Got there a bit early so we played another couple of games of cribbage. No problem returning the item and off we went. A guy that works there told us about a place to ride the RZR so we located it but decided to head on down the highway toward Denali Park. Bob put more coolant in the truck as the light came on again. Not sure why it is doing that….

Nice uneventful drive with some pretty awesome scenery the closer we got to the park. Drove through the Denali Village (outside the park) where there are tons of tourist/gift shop type places/people and we just kept going! The first campground is called Riley Creek and it is quite nice with lots of room between sites. We had heard several different stories about how you have to make reservations a year ahead or no you just go and won’t have a problem. Luckily it was the latter. For a Friday afternoon we were surprised that we had a half dozen or so sites to choose from. Found one that is right on a river (well, down an incline a bit) and you can hear it from the camp and actually see it too if you look through the trees. It’s on the edge of a loop and we don’t have anyone really close to us. We paid for 3 nights but might stay longer. Fortunately Bob has a Golden Access Passport that gets us in the park free and we only paid half price for the camping which made it $14 a night. Of course, no hook-ups but that isn’t a big deal as we are self-sufficient and there is a dump station and water if we need it. It is a little windy and chilly this evening (need a sweatshirt) and we plan to have a campfire, a glass of wine and BBQ some brauts. Tomorrow we will investigate the park. They have a bus stop here in the campground for the shuttle buses that take you into the park so we will probably take advantage of that. We could also walk or ride our bikes. Will see how far it is and what kind of terrain. They do discourage people from driving in the park as parking is very limited.