Getting A Handle on Denali National Park's Vast Expanses

We're back as of Sunday afternoon.  Our upstairs ceiling popcorn is gone and a new ceiling in place.  Everything is still shoved into spaces to allow for painting the ceiling and walls.

Saturday at Denali was Denaliesque.  I recently saw a Mongolian movie and thought, wow, those huge vistas remind me of Denali National Park.  The sun was out most of the time, the clouds here and there not threatening rain or snow.  The (still) white vistas - humans generally just don't experience stuff like this.  You see for miles and miles unpopulated land surrounded by mountains.  With the late snow everywhere it was almost too much.  After you enter the park, about four miles in, you're past all the park buildings - visitor center, camping and touring building, education center, housing for workers, sled dog kennels, and then there's just one road that goes for 90 miles.

Only 30 miles are open now (until buses start May 20), so what we saw is that part of the land you can see from the road in the first 30 miles.  There are a few structures inside the park - at campgrounds basically and lots of restrooms at the bus stops.  After May 20, you get past the first 3 miles or so only on the buses.  Or if you have a camping spot at Teklanika.  All the other camping spots are tent only and you get there by bus.  And there's a big visitor center at about mile 60.

The picture above is the road into the park (though we were driving back to the campgrounds at the entrance when I took this.)  You can tell we're still within the first 15 miles of the road because it's paved.  We're looking east.

And here's a panorama view - I've photoshopped three pictures together.  You see about 20-30 miles into the distance and probably 30 or so miles across from left to right.  If you click on the picture you can see it bigger. (Large vertical images work great here, but horizontal ones don't.)

Just think about what a 25 by 30 mile area in your city would encompass.   In LA that would be approximately from Santa Monica to East LA and from Beverly Hills to Palos Verdes.   It's most of the LA basin with one road and for 85 miles of that road just a few structures and outhouses.   Get a map online of your location.  Seeing such vast distances with nothing but one road and just a few structures stretched out of 90 miles on the road is always mind-boggling, even after 40 years.

And here's a map of Denali National Park and Preserve to get all this into even more perspective.

Original map from National Parks Maps  - This map is fairly large, but at the link it's much bigger

The entrance to the park is to the east where the little black rectangle is to the right of the red line. The first part of the road - brown on the original map here - is the 12 paved miles.  It ends at the red #1 on the map.  (I added the red because the yellow line is harder to see and to show you how far the road was open.)  #1 is where Savage River is, where we snowshoed on Thursday.  I didn't mention it in that post, but it was two years ago when we were there at the same time a young summer Park employee, Michael Purdy, had fallen and died and had not yet been found.  I wrote about that here.  A Park employee told me that his sister was in the park a week or two ago for the anniversary.  You can also see how different the trail looked in late April 2016 compared to early May 2018.
#2 is about where I took the panorama above from.
The Black Bear Paw is Teklanika Campground - the road is closed about a mile past there for now, though beyond it you can walk or bike.
#3 is Eilson Visitor Center (above the 3) - about 60 miles into the park with good views of Denali on clear days.
#4 is Wonder Lake campground, the end of the 90 mile road into the park.
#5 is the North Peak of Denali - the tallest mountain in North America at 20,310 feet (6,140m)

So what we saw last week is only 1/3 of the road in the park.  The panorama is of just one tiny part of the park.  The vast majority of the park has no structures at all.  And the views further in are even more expansive.  Even if you don't see any animals (not likely) or the mountain itself (much more likely), the landscape itself is worth the trip.

Looking through the trees across to a small mountain off in the distance.

Here you can see the slope of the land.  I took this from the road.  J is walking up the road in her red coat.  Since walking on the snow, even with snowshoes, is a challenge, we took turns walking along the road with the other waiting up ahead in the car.  You see much more on foot than in the car.

Here's an area where the snow had an icy glaze.  But if you tried to walk on it, you break right through the ice.

This is just past the gate that closes off the road at the Teklanika rest area.  I'm looking down at the Teklanika River, which at this point is mostly covered with snow still, just those few squiggly pieces of open water.  If you look closely you can see the bridge in the lower right corner.

And below you can see some of those squiggly spans of water from the bridge.

It was a beautiful day - I know that's relative.  The sun was out and the sky was mostly blue.  The temperature was in the 40's but there was a brisk wind in most places and especially on this bridge.    It was also a Saturday so there were a fair number of people who driven to the Park for the weekend from Anchorage and Fairbanks.

This post has taken a direction of its own - the vastness of the park - so I'll save some of the people   and critters we encountered for another post.

Moose's Teeth and Denali Patterns

I read in my cloud  spotter's guide yesterday that Alfred Stieglitz was the first professional photographer to take pictures of clouds, not just as part of a landscape, but as abstract art.  I guess that encouraged me to follow my druthers as we drove through the park today.  Today's clouds, for the most part, were one mass of grayish haze that the sun tried to burn through now and then, but that also included intermittent rain and snow.   This first one is the mountain above Savage River.

Another snowy landscape.

Snow/Ice on the side of the road.

More formations in ice and snow and dirt as the plowed snow on the side of the road melts and sublimates.

Rocks below the ripples of Sanctuary River from the bridge.

OK, time to get more representational.

A view from the road.

Another view from the road, in an area that had less snow cover.

A magpie flies across Sanctuary River.  At this point a car stopped and a woman asked if anything was moving.  I said, "Just a magpie and the water."  She said, "I love the magpies."  I said, "I see them at home everyday so they aren't that special."  She said she was from North Carolina so she never sees them."  "You're right," I said.  "They are really beautiful birds."  And they are with their striking black and white patterns and their dark colors that turn green and blue in the right light.

But here are much better magpie pics from  my front steps and here in my back yard.  The magpie made it across the river.  A number of years ago my daughter and I watched, at this same spot, a mother moose with a very young calf cross the river.  But the calf couldn't make it up the snow bank on the other side.  The mom tried to push it up, but after a while it got tired and the current carried if off down the river.  It was real life nature.  The mom climbed the bank and wandered off.  No one to to comfort her and I know she had to have feelings about this.  But someone down the river was in for a tasty treat.  The natural world is harsh, which  is why civilization, in its best meaning, is important and worth striving to keep alive and improving.


And while I was hoping to see some caribou today, again we only saw moose, which we can see in our on front yard.   But again, they are still magnificent and fascinating to watch.  Here's last year's calf (I think).

And her mom.  I've labeled this picture "Moose's Teeth" which has a little more meaning for Anchorage visitors.  Moose's Tooth is the most popular place for pizza and beer in Anchorage and also the name of a  peak in the Alaska Range.  She was with the calf eating on the side of the road just a mile or two from the visitor's center.  The elevation is lower here and there isn't as much snow and the vegetation is a little closer to greening.

Quick Denali Pics

I'm sitting outside the closed visitor center at about 8pm to get the wifi.  It's in the 30s so I'm just going to put up some pictures without much conversation.  But I will say there's more snow than we've ever seen here, but the roads are great and we borrowed some snow shoes at the visitors center and I hiked a very windy mile with the snowshoes along Savage River and back.  Lots of rugged fun.

This was still about 40 miles from Denali National Park.

Here's the trail.  Well it's covered with snow, but you can faintly see some snow shoe tracks of the last person, but they're being covered quickly.

Snow shoes aren't the tennis racket kind of things of yesteryear.  These worked well, but you use different muscles and the wind was pushing really hard the whole way.  In my face on the way back.

 Much of Savage River along the trail is still covered with snow, but parts were showing.

Here are my tracks, just after I walked there, but on the way back they were barely visible.  The wind was blowing the snow as you can sort of see in the pic below.

The brown across the snowed over river near the top left is the bridge.

Here's the trail going back.  You can sort of see my old tracks.

Not sure whose tracks these are.  Rabbit?

I'll check tomorrow.

Here's some glaciation on the other side of the river.

Here's a view looking toward the west and the mountain, except the clouds are hiding the mountain.

And this is where we parked, popped up the top, and cooked some dinner - why our VW camper has been such an important part of our lives all these years.  Where else can you get dinner with a view like this?

We didn't see a lot of wild life.  A bald eagle flew alongside the road on the way to the park, just above the trees.  I saw a small flock (10-15 birds) take off on the side of the road.  They were white and 'snow bunting' popped into my head, but I have to check.  I did see snow bunting in Wales, Alaska once.  Also three ptarmigan - all white.  I don't remember seeing them like that before.  Usually, they are shifting to their summer plumage so they are half white and half brown.  Or in the summer all brown.  And then this moose.

My fingers are getting cold, so good night to you all.

Stopover In Talkeetna

It was sunny and warm, though windy when we left Anchorage.  The workers already had plastic on the floor, a couple of daffodils were close to opening,  buds on the birch trees were greening.  After reading about yesterday's "heavy snow" in Denali, along with the road being open only to mile 3, and temperatures dipping to the low 20s, I booked a room in Talkeetna for the night.








We got here and napped - catching up on some sleep we needed - then walked on the back streets which got us this view of a creek that I'm assuming empties into the Susitna nearby.

There's still a lot more winter here than in Anchorage.







We wandered back and took the trail through the woods into town.

Our first glimpse of downtown:

There's one main street, several blocks long.  Talkeetna's about 110 miles north of Anchorage.  Denali National Park is about 235 miles north so this seemed a good stop and we haven't really been here for quite a while.  It's about ten miles off the main road, so we tend to pass it by.  It's the jumping off point for Denali climbers.  In summer climbers from around the world are here (well they're here already) to fly to a Denali base camp in hopes of getting to the peak.  We were told that people had been stuck on the mountain due to the recent storms and a plane was able to get folks back yesterday.

We stayed a night in the Fairview Inn one winter many, many years ago.  It was a long noisy night as the bar is downstairs and they have frequent concerts.

The Fairview Inn was built in 1923 and soon after President Harding, on a long visit to Alaska, was there for lunch.  He died shortly after, though I don't think there's a cause and effect relationship.  It's registered as an historical monument.

If you're paying attention, you'll see it has a for sale sign.  An ADN article from 2014 said that attorney Phillip Wiedener had it up for sale at that time for $1.8 million.  I checked today and the price is only $1.2 million.   For people seeing prices like that for little homes in California, it might seem a steal.





We passed the cannabis shop, but it wasn't open.









And then on down to the Susitna River.

Further north, the Nenena Ice Classic ended yesterday when the tripod on the ice moved the required distance down the river giving someone a $225,000 jackpot for being the closest to the exact time the tripod was tripped.   And some ice passed by while I was watching.



Looking up the river, we could see the Alaska range, at least the foothills below Denali which would have been off the picture to the right if the clouds were gone.

We had pizza for dinner at the Wildflower Cafe,which was surprisingly good and not very expensive.  But the highlight was the amazingly illustrated bathroom.  (A bit distorted as I tried to photoshop two pictures together)


Denali's supposed to have a high of 37˚ F tomorrow, with a partly cloudy forecast for the morning and early afternoon, and then the days get warmer through the weekend (into the 40˚s) with some chance of rain and snow each day.   But the park is a large area and the entrance is fairly low elevation, so I think we'll take our chances.  Being outside walking around today was great, and we've been in the campgrounds with snow before.  Though the Park's website has conflicting info - the Alert says the road is open to mile 3 but the map (now) shows it open to mile 30.

Here's a webcam of the Alaska RR depot in the Park.  There's plenty of snow.  And this one from Mt. Healy suggests the Alert is more accurate than the map.  I guess we'll explore near the park entrance.  Or we'll cuddle up in the van and read a lot.

Tried Out My Bike Today - Conditions Were Better Than Expected And It Felt Great

It was brilliantly sunny, though the temps are back closer to normal.  Warm enough in the afternoon that there was water from melting snow and ice.  I wasn't sure how far the conditions would be ice-free and deep-puddle free, but I thought I go exploring.

Soon I found myself out on Dowling looking at the Chugach.

Then coming back on Elmore, I had a view from the first bridge of the dog mushing trail.

A little further and I was over the southern fork (I think) of Campbell Creek.

The next bridge gave me a view of my second moose since we got back to Anchorage last week.

As I said, for the most part the trail was ice free.  There'd been one spot where a thick chunk was floating over a puddle, but there was a bit of room to go around it.  But then, almost home, I got to this hard packed ice near Providence.

I know, there are people who ride all winter and deal with this sort of thing all the time.  But I was away a lot of the winter and didn't get studs for my tires.  And a couple of years ago around this time I found myself flat on my face, hard, after hitting a small patch of ice I didn't even see.  So I navigate this stuff carefully.

It wasn't a long ride - maybe three miles - and I didn't go fast - I have a back fender but not a front one and didn't want to get too wet.  But it felt great.  And I'm guessing those hilly rides on Bainbridge made a difference.  The much more modest hills today seemed like nothing.

Then it was back to filling out tax information.  Really, I'd vote for a candidate who pushed for a much simplified tax code, one that didn't require people to hire someone to do their taxes for them.  A progressive tax with no deductions - except maybe for folks on the poor end who'd had a catastrophic event.  The tax rate could be modest then because people would actually pay that rate, especially those with much higher incomes.

I have to admit that these pictures make it look like I live in the wilderness.  We have lots of urban wilderness of sorts, but I didn't take pictures of the more urban parts I passed.  Maybe next time.  I even passed a Walgreens and a YMCA.

Settling Back In At Home

Chopping ice, the violin concert, taxes, sorting old mail, getting the car tuned, arranging some home repairs, have all kept us busy.  We only made it to the Thai Kitchen tonight for the first time, and only now saw our first moose since we got back last week.  But the light has been spectacular.

Here's a view from in front of our house last night as the sun was setting behind me.  I never get tired of this.  

And walking through the Helen Louise McDowell sanctuary on the way back from dropping off my car.  

Anchorage's first mail only election ends April 3.  Waiting for my granddaughter to arrive so she can help me fill in the ballot and take it to one of the drop off centers (an option if you don't want to mail it.)  At five she's a sponge, absorbing everything she touches, so I'm trying to give her as much to experience as I can.  Need to find some little cross-country skis cause that's what she was most enthusiastic about when I asked what she wants to do here.  

Anchorage to Seattle: A Couple of Shots

Starting out a little early for a family Thanksgiving gathering.  Already got a couple of serious hugs from one grandchild and a couple of more coming soon.   I'll slide by with some pictures of our transition from sunny and cold to cloudy and wet.

The mudflats of the inlet on the right and the land of Matsu on the left.

Blowing snow on the peaks as we fly over the Chugach toward Prince William Sound on our way south.

A little bubble of cloud in a mass of clouds over Seattle.

Cloudscape over Seattle.



It was windy and wet as we got off the plane.  Had a nice, if short chat, waiting for baggage with a former student who lives here now.  Then train and ferry to my daughter.