Denali

Thursday, July 1
Denali Park, AK

We thought Spence would appreciate seeing one of Batman's old trade-ins.

Drove up to Denali park for what turned out to be a rather brief visit.

We got there about 2 or 3 in the afternoon and the shortest tour is 5 hours long. We saw a caribou with a huge rack and more mountains. Actually we've seen a lot of mountains by now so we kind of take them for granted by now. Here I'm using my spotter scope with a little help from a friend.

I didn't catch his name.

I got into a conversation with the owner of this vehicle. He's the one with the huge white beard in the background. He retired at forty, lived on a sail boat for 28 years, and now lives in 2 motor homes. This is the 12th one he has built.

I was fascinated by this thing as you might guess. It may look a bit crude, but it is really cool. 4 wheel drive, a solar collector on the roof and a solar water heater on the opposite roof.

I'll have to start on mine when I get home.
I got talking to him and when I got back to the van Kern advised me I had been gone for an hour and a half. Of course she was cool with that ;-)








More scenery from inside the park:

We were lucky to catch a couple of good looks at the big peak. It makes it's own weather, and often the summit is enshrouded in clouds. Here the peak is just above the clouds. Here it is 43 miles away. It is 20 some thousand feet above sea level, with the area where we were at about 1 to 2 thousand.

On the way to our room we had a great moose sighting. a big dark colored bull. We actually got a couple of pictures. This makes moose sighting number 4 and a half.

Another great find on the road into Talkeetna. But no Yoder's in the phone book.












And finally we caught a great sunset from our rear balcony. This was right about at midnight. At this time of year the sun comes up in the north, gets to about 30 degrees above the horizon, circles around the clock to the south west and glides below the horizon for a few hours for the "night". it doesn't get much darker than this.