Denali National Park to Cantwell

We left Teklanika Campground this morning at 9:30 after stopping to take a photo by the entrance to the campground.

From Denali National Park

Mike took photos of the camp host's RV to show their solar panels on the roof of their 5th wheel. They have the solar panels raised and rotate the panels toward the sun as it moves during the day.

From Denali National Park

We passed these shuttle buses on their way west into the park

From Denali National Park

and crossed over the Teklanika River.

From Denali National Park

We stopped at a turnout to walk Tinker.

From Denali National Park

We don't know what animal had marked it's spot, but Tinker was REALLY interested in this large rock.

From Denali National Park

We reached the Savage River Station at 10:20 and were once again driving on pavement.

An hour later we arrived at the Denali Visitor Center where we had left the car parked. We found a place to park the RV where we could hitch up the Vue. We didn't go into the Denali Visitor Center when we left the car here, so we went in to see the wildlife displays.

From Denali National Park

We returned to the RV to fix lunch before leaving. We had just finished eating lunch when we saw a familiar truck & 5th wheel pull into the parking lot at the visitor center. It was our friends Ron & Cindi that we first met in Glacier National Park. It was great to see them and catch up on each other's travels.

From Denali National Park

After saying goodbye to Ron & Cindi, we hitched the car to the RV and left the national park at 1:30. We stopped 1 more time to take a photo and Tinker had to bring his favorite toy, Bear, along. I guess he thought Bear needed to be included in the photo.

From Denali National Park

It was only 27 miles from the entrance to Denali National Park to Cantwell RV Park where we're spending the night. Our total driving distance today was 56 miles.

We arrived at Cantwell RV Park at 2:15. While Mike checked in at the office, I went inside to check out the laundry. We stopped early today so I could catch up on laundry. Our campsite is costing us $25.93 after our Escapees discount.

After getting the RV set up on our site, Mike helped me carry the laundry up to the laundromat which is in the same building as the office & showers. While our clothes were in the washers, Mike & I each took a shower. It was nice to see that the showers were cleaned after each person's shower and not just once a day.

From Denali National Park to Cantwell

Since we needed to empty our black & gray water tanks, we stopped at the dump station before going on to our campsite. We are in site #69, a pull-through, with water & 30 amp electric. The rv park is a large gravel parking lot with rv hook-ups.

From Denali National Park to Cantwell

The campground has wi-fi, but the signal is weak. I tried using our Verizon broadband, but the connection is so slow I'm not able to update our blog or upload our photos. I'll just have to catch up when our connection is better.

Teklanika Campground

It was raining when we got up this morning and it continued off and on all day today. Fortunately for our bus ride out to Eielson Visitor Center  yesterday the weather was sunny, so we chose a good day for our tour.

When we made our reservation for Teklanika Campground we were told that most people buy a Tek Pass for their first full day in the park. In order to limit the traffic of private vehicles in the park, we were required to make at least a 3-day reservation for staying in Teklanika Campground. Our road pass only allows us to drive the RV in on our arrival day and back out on our departure date.

We could have ridden on one of the shuttle buses out to Toklat River Rest Area today with our Tek Pass. We wouldn't have a guaranteed seat on a bus like we did yesterday and would have to wait for a bus that had 2 seats available. We can't use our Tek Pass to back east through the park.
We walked up to the camp host's this morning and she told us that it was supposed to rain most of today. Since there was little chance of seeing Mt. McKinley, we decide. just to stay in today.

We haven't had cell phone or broadband internet service since we got about 10 miles west of the Denali Visitor Center. So I'm not able to post on our blog everyday or upload photos to our web album. I use Windows Live Writer (a desk-top blog-publishing software) that allows me to write my narrative for the blog and then I can upload it to our blog once I have internet access again.

I spent the day writing about our activities and worked on organizing the photos we've taken since we've been here in Denali and deciding which ones I'm going to put in our web albums.

Tinker seems glad that we've stayed home today with him, but he seems kind of mopey. I think he wishes we would go back out to the Teklanika River and let him run around in the mud again. Sorry, Tinker - not happening.

Shuttle Bus Ride in Denali National Park

It was cloudy and cool, mid-50's, when we got up this morning. We had tickets for the shuttle bus out to the Toklat River Rest Stop which was stopping at the campground at 10:40. We had decided to only go as far as the Toklat River instead of all the way out to Wonder Lake which would have been about a 9 hour round trip. We didn't want to have to leave Tinker in his crate for that long of a time.


We packed a backpack with some bottles of water and food bars, since no food or drinks are available out in the park. We packed a few bottles of water and some food bars in my backpack to have on our bus trip. We put on a couple layers of shirts and wore our windbreakers since it was so cool this morning.


After feeding Tinker an early lunch and putting him in his crate for a "nap", we walked up to the bus stop at the campground entrance to wait for our bus. Our "Tek Pass" for today guarantees that we would have seats on the bus.


According to the information on the National Park website, shuttle bus drivers aren't tour guides and may or may not comment on things in the park. Our driver was great and she talked about the history of the park and the wildlife what we might see today.


After riding for about 40 minutes our bus driver stopped to point out some Dall Sheep high up on the hillsides and gave everyone time to take photos. The Dall Sheep were so high up, they looked like white specks.

From Denali Shuttle Bus Ride

Shortly after that a passenger on the bus spotted 3 grizzly bears - a mother and her 2 cubs that are about 2 years old. We stopped again for everyone to take photos.

From Denali Shuttle Bus Ride

A few minutes after taking that photo, we saw a female moose (cow) and her calf. Our driver even turned off the bus engine so it wouldn't spook them. The moose kept an eye on the bus as she led her calf through the brush and away from the road. Besides getting some photos of them, Mike even shot a short movie of them.

From Denali Shuttle Bus Ride

The Park Road winds through the mountains and valleys with great views almost around every turn

From Denali Shuttle Bus Ride

and there are no guard rails on the outside edge of the road.

From Denali Shuttle Bus Ride

Our next stop was at Polychrome Pass and it was quite windy.

From Denali Shuttle Bus Ride

We stopped next at the Toklat River Rest Area which was the turnaround point of our trip. Our driver said if anyone wanted to continue on to the Eielson Visitor Center on another bus, they could upgrade their ticket for $7. We checked the bus schedule to see what time we would get back to the campground (4:30) and decided to go on. Our driver checked with the bus driver who was going on to Eielson to be sure there were seats available for us. We didn't get to spend anytime at the rest area, since the bus to Eielson was leaving right then. Our bus driver on this portion of the drive didn't make any comments on the drive, so different from our first bus driver.


On our way out to the visitor center we drove by the Stony Point Lookout and Mike was able to get a photo of Mt. McKinley (Denali) which was partially covered by clouds.

From Denali Shuttle Bus Ride

We arrived at the Eielson Visitor Center a little before 1:30 and we were only able to see part of Mt. McKinley because of the clouds.

From Denali Shuttle Bus Ride

We saw these 2 bull moose skulls with their antlers that had locked together in battle were unable to free themselves. Their skulls were found out on the tundra.

From Denali Shuttle Bus Ride

While we were there the clouds started to cover up more of Mt. McKinley.

From Denali Shuttle Bus Ride

We left the Visitor Center at 2:00 to head back east through the park. On our return trip we saw this red fox running on the road

From Denali Shuttle Bus Ride

and he ran alongside the bus for a little bit before he got off the road. Everyone was taking photos of him and he stopped just off the road and "posed" for the cameras for a few minutes, or so it seemed. Or maybe he was just catching his breath.

From Denali Shuttle Bus Ride

On our return trip the bus driver stopped a couple of times to pick up people who had been hiking in the park and to let some off who wanted to walk. We saw this speck way up on the road and when we got closer, we could see that it was a woman walking on the road. The driver stopped and we picked her up. You can get off and on the shuttle buses to go walking or hiking and just catch a ride on any shuttle as long as there is a vacant seat.

We arrived back at the campground a little after 4:30 and we had been gone about 6 hours. Tinker was happy to see us and I think he forgot he had had an early lunch. Because after we fed him dinner, he kept acting like he should have another meal coming.

We had a great day today and enjoyed seeing the Dall Sheep, moose, red fox and especially the grizzly bears. We didn't see any of the wolf pack or any caribou, but we were happy with the wildlife we did see.

Fairbanks to Denali National Park

We left River's Edge RV Park at 9:15 and stopped at the Safeway gas station to get gas in the RV. The price was $4.039 for regular and we had earned a 10¢ a gallon discount a couple of days ago when we bought groceries at Safeway, so our price was $3.939 a gallon.

I made a quick trip into the Safeway store to get a few grocery items I had forgotten the other day when I shopped there. We left Safeway at 10:20 and headed west on Alaska 3 (Parks Highway) to Denali National Park.

We stopped for lunch at 11:30 just before we crossed the Nenana River. Forty minutes later we saw this gas station near Healy with unleaded gas at $4.349 - 31¢ higher than in Fairbanks.

From Fairbanks to Denali National Park

We passed by this RV park near Healy and saw this 5th wheel that had been staying at River's Edge RV Park and had left there this morning.

From Fairbanks to Denali National Park

A little later we drove past the lodges and businesses that are just north of the entrance to Denali National Park.

From Fairbanks to Denali National Park

We arrived at the entrance to Denali National Park at 1:30 and parked the RV long enough for us to get out, set up the camera & tripod and take a photo.

From Denali National Park

From Denali National Park

Our first stop inside the park was at the Riley Creek Mercantile where we checked in for the Teklanika campground and picked up our Tek Passes for the shuttle buses inside the park. Normally private vehicles are only allowed to drive 15 miles inside the park as far as Savage Station, but because we are staying at Teklanika campground we are allowed to drive the motorhome in, but not the car. We were told to park our car at the Denali Visitor Center a little farther inside the park.

At the Denali Visitor Center we pulled into a RV parking lane and disconnected the Vue and parked it in one of the overnight parking spaces for cars. It was 2:30 when we left the Visitor Center and west on the Park Road.

We had been driving for several miles when I heard Mike make a strange noise and he said he had just looked at the monitor for the rear view camera and the car wasn't there anymore! We are so used to seeing the car behind the RV, it took a second or two before Mike remembered we had left the car parked back at the Visitor Center.

We arrived at Savage Station a little before 3 p.m. where a Ranger checked our park pass and then we were on our way to the campground.

From Denali National Park

The paved road ends just beyond Savage Station and the rest of way out to Teklanika Campground is 14 miles of winding dirt road.

From Denali National Park

From Denali National Park

I was taking pictures as we were driving on the Park Road and tonight when I looked at the photos, I realized that I had gotten a photo of Mt. McKinley, or Denali "the High One" as the native Athabascan people named the mountain.

From Denali National Park

We arrived at Teklanika "Tek" Campground at 3:45 and stopped to check in with the camp host and had 2 other RVs pull in right behind us. Mike was told when he called to make our reservation here that there were 2 campsites left that our motorhome would fit into. The camp host told us to just pick a vacant campsite and park there. We drove around both loops in the campground and settled on site #6 in the first loop.

From Denali National Park

We took Tinker for a walk around the campground after dinner and found a path that led out to the Teklanika River. Teklanika is Athabascan for "big river, little water" and it is so true. We decided to walk out to where there was actually water in the river and found these caribou tracks.

From Denali National Park

Tinker always likes to go "hiking" and really enjoyed exploring the river - so much so, that he decided to do the "Bichon Buzz" in the mud. We made a movie of Tinker playing in the mud and included it in our web album. We now have a new nickname for Tinker, "Mud Puppy".

From Denali National Park

On the way back to the RV we discussed how we were going to get Tinker clean. Our motorhome has water connections for a washer even though we don't have one installed. So we decided to connect a water hose to the cold water faucet (the water from the hot water faucet was too hot) and run the hose out the door in order to clean the river mud off of Tinker.

From Denali National Park

After getting Tinker clean we sat outside by our Little Red Campfire (portable propane campfire with ceramic logs) and enjoyed the cool weather. We had to use our folding table to block the wind from our campfire.

From Denali National Park

Tomorrow we are riding out into the park on one of the shuttle buses and hopefully see a lot of wildlife and Mt. McKinley.

Last day in Fairbanks

Tomorrow we're leaving Fairbanks and driving 150 miles south to Denali National Park. We will be there for 3 days and the campground where we're staying doesn't have any hook-ups.

We had thought about doing some sightseeing in Fairbanks today, but this morning we decided to just stay in and work around here.
 
I spent the day catching up on bookkeeping and working on catching up our blog and web photo albums (I got behind in my posting with the sporadic internet access in Canada).

This afternoon Mike dumped our black & gray water tanks and filled up our fresh water tank. Then he checked the air in the RV's tires and found that a few tires were low, so he used our air compressor to pump them up.

It wasn't a very exciting day, but we got a lot accomplished.

Photos of campground & visit to Great Alaskan Bowl Company

This morning we went grocery shopping at Safeway and stopped at the post office near the campground to buy more postcard stamps and to mail our postcards.

This afternoon we drove over to the Great Alaskan Bowl Company near the campground. They make bowls from birch trees and we've seen their commercials on cable TV here. We were able to watch the bowls being made and learned about their drying process. We even sampled some of their reindeer sausage.

From Fairbanks

From Fairbanks

We would have liked to have a set of their Family Tree Bowls which are made from the same block of wood, but they are expensive. The 3 bowl set was $199 and the number of bowls in a set goes up and so does the price.

From Fairbanks

From Fairbanks

This afternoon Mike took photos of our campsite. As you can see the sites are close together and the campground has been pretty full most of the time.

From Fairbanks

 There are 2 5th wheels next to us that are parked so that their doors are facing each other. They have fenced off the area between the RVs to give their children a large area to play in. We've enjoyed watching the kids playing and have really enjoyed the mothers trying to get all the kids into a van to go somewhere. No sooner do the mothers get a few of the kids in the van and go to get the smaller children than the kids in the van get out and the mothers have to start over! It's been really hilarious to watch (I'm not sure the mothers were as amused as we were).

Mike manage to get a photo of some of the kids and there are at least 2 infants and a couple more children that aren't in the photo.

From Fairbanks

The campground is next to the Chena River. It would have been nice to have one of the campsites with a view of the river which are $3 more than the full hook-up sites, but I'm sure those are taken first.

From Fairbanks

There are a lot of cottonwood trees in the campground and the ground is littered with their seeds. There is always some white "puffs" from the cottonwoods floating through the air.

From Fairbanks

Museum of the North

I did laundry this morning and I had quite a lot of clothes to do since it's been 10 days from the last time I did laundry. I also washed the beach towels that we used to protect the windshield & front of the Vue from dirt and rocks when we're towing it.

The laundry here at the campground has about a dozen washers and even more dryers and is very busy. There are over 170 campsites here and everyone seems to be trying to catch up on their washing. By the time I finished with my 8 loads of clothes & linens, I had spent $26.

After lunch we drove over to the University of Alaska campus to visit the Museum of the North. We paid $2 to park at the museum and $18 for 2 senior admission tickets.

From Museum of the North

The first thing we saw when we entered the Gallery of Alaska was Otto, a 8'9" tall brown bear.

From Museum of the North

We saw exhibits of some of the early animal inhabitants

From Museum of the North

including Blue Babe, a mummified steppe bison, who died 36,000 years ago near Fairbanks.

From Museum of the North

We also saw exhibits of the current animal inhabitants.

From Museum of the North

From Museum of the North

There were displays of tools used by men and women

From Museum of the North

From Museum of the North

and carvings made from tusks, antlers and teeth.

From Museum of the North

We saw examples of clothing and woven baskets

From Museum of the North

and this beaded collar.

From Museum of the North

Before leaving the museum we stopped at the Museum Cafe for some coffee and then bought postcards at the Museum Gift Shop.

We really enjoyed our visit today at the Museum of the North where we traveled from prehistoric times to today. We learned about the lives of the different Alaska Native cultures and the development of Alaska through time.

It dawned on us tonight that we still haven't taken any photos here at the campground! Tomorrow for sure we will take photos.