Alaska Adventures: Day 4--June 22

Tue. June 22: 7:10 came early but we wanted to eat breakfast and had to repack the bags before 8:00. We met Ann & Shelby at the lodge and got coffee and, as we tried to make a plan for the morning, we slowly discovered that we could take the free shuttle back to the park, visit the Visitor Center, do some hiking and then walk across the street to the train station, rather than returning to the lodge and waiting in yet another bus line. We bought yogurt parfaits to save to eat before we got on the train. It turned out to be a great plan! It was a beautiful, sunny day with comfortable temperatures, approaching 70 or so. The shuttle dropped us at the Visitor Center and, right at the entrance, there was a baggage claim so Ann didn’t have to keep her small rolling bag with her all morning. We watched the center’s film called “Heartbeat of Denali” and spent quite a bit of time looking at the excellent displays. A ranger talk about the animals of Denali was beginning so we went to the theater to hear it. But it was getting later in the morning and we still wanted to do some hiking so we left before he ended. We made our way to a path that went by the train station and then through the woods for twenty minutes or so and returned us to the Visitor Center, where Ann picked up her bag, and we headed back to the train station to eat our yogurt parfaits. As we finished, we saw the Princess buses pulling up and saw Connie get off of the first one. We checked in with her and waited with the group for the train, which arrived about 45 minutes late, for some reason. We settled into our seats at a table “up top” where we could watch the beautiful scenery and were on our way. Our host, Matt, gave historical, geological, and cultural information as we went along. Despite watching like a hawk we saw only one bald eagle eating a fish by a river, and one moose running away from the train. But it was a very enjoyable way to travel for four hours.

We got off the train and the coach took us a mile or so to Talkeetna. We had the option to stay there and look around the town, which the four of us and only a few others chose to do. Talkeetna is the town on which Cecily, Alaska was based in the show Northern Exposure. Although it doesn’t really look like it, it definitely had the same “feel” with a Main Street that began and ended in about three blocks and had more pedestrian than vehicle traffic. There are several historic buildings that date from the 20s and 30s and mostly house gift shops now. We had a really good dinner at the Talkeetna Grill and Denali Brewery where we enjoyed their Red brew long with the half pound burger (Marv) and veggie burger (Peggy had her vegetarian day for the week today). Most of the shops closed at 6:00 so we just wandered down Main Street and read the historical notes on the old buildings. We caught the shuttle to the Lodge, which is an hour’s drive away and is within the Denali State Park. The Mount McKinley Princess Wilderness Lodge is very different than the Denali Lodge because it really is nestled into the wilderness of the park with nothing else near it. We were happy that we had seen Talkeetna while we were there and, with no excursions planned, we will stay at the Lodge for the whole day for a change. After a long soak in the hot tub (all but Shelby, of course, and again with a great mountain view) we went to bed about 11:00 with the sun again on the mountain tops.

Alaska Adventures: Day 3--June 21

Mon. June 21: Well, it turned out that Ann really regretted that we hadn’t gone to the Festival, too, so maybe we need to be more insistent. But today was very, very full so it may be just as well that it didn’t work out. We had to have our bags out in the hallway by 7:30 so we were up early. We had a cheese stick and a cereal bar for breakfast with our endless cup of coffee from the shop. We walked around the lodge a bit as the sun dodged in and out of the clouds, making for a nice morning. We saw 4 beaver on the Chena. The bus to Denali left about 9:30 and got to the Denali Princess Lodge around noon. It was a long ride, made a bit longer by construction on the highway, but the driver gave us a lot of information on the way, which helped pass the time. The most interesting thing we saw was a herd of 4 moose in a meadow about 200 yards from the road. Being “at Denali” was nothing like we expected—one side of the road had a couple of cruise line lodges and the other side was a touristy looking strip mall, and the lobby of the lodge was bedlam, with people arriving and leaving. The Denali Princess Lodge is made up of 10 or more buildings and has its own trolley-like shuttle that carries people around the large campus, which overlooks the Nenana (say neh-nahnah) River. Our building was very centrally located. We grabbed a quick bite to eat from our supplies and climbed on the converted school bus to go on our Natural History tour. That’s when we found out why things looked so crazy near the lodge. The park road within the National Park “proper” is only 65 miles long. The first 14 miles are paved and cars aren’t allowed beyond the pavement. There are shuttle buses that take people into the park but there are no developed trails in this wilderness area. Our very informative driver told us all about the park history, the flora and fauna, and a little about the Athabascan culture. During the long drive we stopped at the Wilderness Center for an introductory film called “Music of Denali”; the Savage cabin that is now used as a by-station for the dog sledding Park Rangers in the winter and had a costumed interpreter harking back to 1940; and at the end of our trail, an Athabascan woman who talked and sang about her culture’s respect and love for the mountain. We saw a group of four caribou feeding in the Savage River from both directions. It was a pretty good way to get into the National Park and get some well-rounded exposure. But we also learned that only about 1 out of 8 people actually get to see Mt. McKinley (the legal name for the traditional named Denali) because at 20,320 feet it makes its own weather system and is almost always covered by clouds.

We returned to the lodge just in time to clean-up and walk over to the Denali Dinner Theater. It was a fun, energetic, musical show about the area settlers and the first team to climb Denali. The actors were our servers first and kept us well supplied with the all-you-can-eat salmon and ribs. It was yummy! The sun was shining on the mountain tops as we left at 10:30 so Ann, Marv & I went to one of the hot tubs, which overlook the river and the hills across it that are part of the National Park. The nearly full moon was setting above those hills, it was a mostly clear sky and the temperature was probably in the low fifties or so. But the hot tub was really hot and the setting was absolutely STUNNING!! The only thing that could drag us away was the knowledge that we had to have our bags out by 8:00 so we reluctantly left and got to bed at just about midnight.

Alaska Adventures: Day 2--June 20

Sun. June 20: Happy First Anniversary, Ken and Jen! And Happy Father’s Day to Marv and all dads. We had a very full day! We woke-up about 4:00 but dozed until 6:00. Marv went down and bought coffee to bring to the room, which we enjoyed with our simple breakfast of instant oatmeal and a fruit/cereal bar. The bus came at 8:30 to take us to the El Dorado Gold Mine Tour. It is an educational replica of both old-time and modern gold mining operations. It was mid-fifties and raining as we arrived after a quick stop at a segment of the Alaska Oil Pipeline. We got on an old narrow gauge railroad train, where we were entertained and the trip was narrated by “Earl”, who sang and played guitar and fiddle. We stopped within a permafrost tunnel and Tim demonstrated the parts of the mine that would be underground. They also showed the numerous fossil remains that can be found in this area from the Pleistocene era, including mammoths and American lion remains. We saw a camp for a prospector and the steam machinery used to sluice pay dirt, which would be piled with a dumping cart on pulleys. It was all pretty interesting. Then Yukon Yuma and Dexter, with the help of a few workers showed us how a modern mine would use a large water chute and a series of metal grids and Astroturf to refine the pay dirt now to finish-off with old fashioned panning. This part of the tour was outdoors in a steady rain. Finally we went into a covered area where we were given a bag of pay dirt and we each panned it (in warm water, luckily) to find whatever gold flecks we were able. When we finished we took into the Gift Shop where it was weighed and, if one wished, they would make jewelry out of one’s take. Ann had $12.00 worth, Shelby had $10.00 worth and we heard people say they had as much as $38.00 worth. With gold topping out on Saturday at over $1200 an ounce, it would be possible to have a tidy sum’s worth, However, Marv and I together only had $12.00 worth! I’m sure we ate our share’s worth in the warm cookies, hot chocolate and coffee which was available the whole time we were there. Marv found a t-shirt he liked at a reasonable price and we all piled back on the train to return to the bus, which took us back to the lodge. We only had about half an hour for lunch, so we had crackers, a cheese stick and cup-a-soup in our room before reporting downstairs for our next tour.

This time we got on the bus for about a 5 minute trip downriver to take the Sternwheeler Discovery trip on the Chena River. Our captain is a fourth generation Binkley whose great grandfather was a river boat captain and whose grandparents began the Discovery tours back in the nineteen fifties. Our narrator had been with the company for a long time and pointed things out to us along the river. There were unlimited lightly glazed doughnuts and hot coffee to enjoy as we cruised. We stopped beside the Trail Breaker Kennels of famous Iditarod racer Susan Butcher. She died a few years ago of leukemia, but her family continues the tradition of raising and racing Huskies. Her fifteen year old daughter was miked and, from the shore, she and a young man talked about the kennels and the puppies and racing. They hitched up a group of 10 dogs to a 4-wheeler and amid a cacophony of joyous barking the young man drove them around the large pond and through some hairpin turns. It was very exciting! The boat went on down river, passing some amazing homes. We went to where the Chena joins the Tanana (pronounced like Panama) River. This heavily silt-laden glacial river has laid down so many sand bars and tracks that the stern wheeler can no longer navigate it, so we turned around and stopped beside a native Athabaskan girl, who demonstrated how to prepare and smoke salmon chum to serve as food for dogs and told what they would do to prepare finer salmon for people. About then the rain finally quit and the sun broke through to become a nice afternoon. It was great timing because we went a little farther and the boat docked so we could disembark at the authentic replica village that the Binkley Company has built. Staffed entirely by young (mostly college age students) natives, we were treated to demonstrations of (1) how they made clothing and did bead work, particularly on moose hide, (2) a trapper’s home and cache, with a multitude of different animal hides, and (3) what a hunters’ camp would have been before western influence. During the talk there a bald eagle flew over our heads and disappeared into the trees beyond! At that part they had four reindeer in an enclosure (in the wild they are considered caribou) including a month-old calf. So cute! We had about twenty minutes to walk around the area on our own before we got back on the boat. We were treated to a smoked salmon spread made with cream cheese on crackers, which was quite delicious! The trip back up river took a little longer as we fought the current. After more time in the Gift Shop we returned to the Lodge about dinner time. We couldn’t fit in everything we wanted to do so we chose to grab another light snack in our rooms and then do what we could. I really wanted to go downtown for their Summer Solstice Festival. But I was outnumbered so Ann, Shelby, and Marv decided we should take a shuttle to the highly regarded museum at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks. The driver assured us it was the finest one in Alaska and it is quite spectacular. We got there about 7:00 and it was all we could do to seed the many fine exhibits before it closed at 9:00. They have a lot of information on the Aurora Borealis, including a film showing what causes it. I found that particularly fascinating. They had many displays about the pioneer women of Alaska, the Inuit cultural life, territory and statehood history, Russian influence, minerals and ores, prehistoric and present day animal life, and more. Upstairs there is an entire floor devoted to two thousand years of Alaskan art. It was a lot to take in! The shuttle picked us up at 9:00 and the driver kindly took us by the Horticulture Gardens and Caribou research pens, just because she thought we’d enjoy them. Back at the Lodge we went to the grill so Ann and Shelb could share a dessert and Marv and I could enjoy our first Alaskan beer, sweet potato fries (Marv) and a Trapper’s (sort of like a Greek) Salad (me). We returned to our room to pack things up so we can put our bags out at 7:30. They will be taken to Denali for us tomorrow or taken to a storage place if we mark them as not needed until we get on the ship. Marv and I ended our already very long day by going outside at midnight to enjoy the famous Midnight Sun of the summer solstice.

Alaska Adventures: Day 1--June 19, 2010.

Saturday, June 19, 2010: Our adventure began with a drive to Hastings to meet Ann and Shelby. We are leaving our truck at the Travel Agency there so we only have to pay the parking fee, which will be considerable, for one car. Our plane out of Grand Rapids was delayed by 30-45 minutes. But we found out one good reason to do a tour—they held the plane in Minneapolis because there were 29 in our group. They also did a gate change so that we disembarked, crossed the walkway and got right on our next plane. No waiting at all! We noticed in flight that we went at least an hour over the Canadian Rockies without seeing a single road or town. It’s nice to be able to see that the wilderness still exists! The flight was otherwise uneventful but they couldn’t get the scheduled movie, “Valentine’s Day” to play correctly so they showed “Invictus” instead. The story of Nelson Mandela and the South African rugby team was very inspiring although we missed the very, very end of it because the plane was pulling into the terminal by then. It was 65° (not at all what we expected) when we got on a bus without worrying about our bags and rode the short way to our first Princess Lodge. We had been given our room keys already so we dropped the backpacks in the room and went to explore the lodge. After walking a short path along the Chena River we bought post cards in the gift shop and then continued on a little trail through the woods beside the lodge before returning to the deck along the river. We talked and relaxed until it was about midnight “our time” so we returned to the rooms, where the bags had been delivered. We rearranged the bags a bit, updated the blog, wrote post cards and went to bed around 9:30 Alaska time with the sun still pretty high in the sky and casting shadows.

Now to get ready for Alaska

Wed. June 2, 2010: Marv got up and made the coffee in the morning and then decided to build a small fire with our leftover wood. He no sooner got it going than the clouds began to darken, thunder rumbled and the rains came. There was nothing to do but wait it out and play cards while the fire sputtered out in the deluge. When it let up, we wiped down the camper a little bit and packed up to head home. As we drove the back roads around Stockbridge that Marv knows so well from M.O.W., it rained on and off. We had a late lunch at the Michigan Brewery on our way and got home satisfied from our brief but successful getaway.

Now it's June!

Tue. June 1, 2010: After a simple breakfast and lots of good coffee we went for a hike. There are many trails in this area but none in the vicinity allow bikes, so it was just as well that we had decided not to bring them. The sky was still cloudy and just starting to break up. We walked around the campground and found that there were only four occupied sites by then. We went partway down the road, and then walked down the Pinckney-Waterloo Trail that connects the two areas. It must be very long because we passed Mile Marker 22. The trail was mostly woodlands, but we walked through a meadow that must have been a farm field at some point in the past. After we passed over a long boardwalk across a swampy area the trail became narrower and the foliage on each side was crowding the path and was still very wet from the rain. So we decided to return to the road and take it the rest of the mile or so to Highway 52. Along the way we saw lots of grape leaves so on the way back we picked lots of nice big ones. Back at the campsite, I washed them, boiled them in salt water, rolled them in 10 packs of 12 leaves and popped them in the freezer. They will be very welcome for making stuffed grape leaves back home!

After a lunch of leftover chicken we got out the inflatable two-person kayak we bought for our anniversary present and took it on its maiden voyage. We blew it up with the truck powered pump and walked it down the path right at our campsite to the lake. We both managed to get into it from a log sticking into the lake without getting our feet wet. We found it to be a lovely way to really see the lake. The sun was fully shining by now, fish were jumping and there were both snapping and box turtles to be seen. We even saw two sleek little creatures that we think were otters. The seats are quite comfortable and afford a lot of back support. We have to get used to coordinating our paddling but we only bumped each other a couple of times. The double kayak doesn’t glide as easily as our very shallow singles ones do, but it’s going to be great to take-along on long trips when we don’t want to hassle with the Loons. It all fits into a large duffle bag that weighs about 30 pounds and can be tossed in the back of the truck. Terrific!

The rest of the afternoon we spent sitting by the lake, enjoying the breeze and reading. I washed off the suntan lotion with our outdoor shower. When I finished my magazine I worked on this Blog and relaxed while Marv played with his ITouch. For dinner tonight we grilled hamburgers on our little gas grill and had potato salad and veggies. Afterwards we drove to the McDonald’s in Stockbridge to have an ice cream sundae while we checked the forecast on weather.com. However we were disappointed to find that they don’t have WiFi there! Instead we listened to the forecast on Michigan Radio and were relieved to find out that the predicted rain showers were supposed to hold off until afternoon. Back at the campsite Marv built a nice fire and we enjoyed s’mores for dessert and then went to bed.

Memorial Day Weekend: A Mini-Get-Away before Alaska

Monday, May 31, 2010: Our mini-get-away was beginning to look truly doomed when we pulled up to the stop light at Grand River and Okemos Road and the woman in the car behind us rushed up to tell us we had dropped our spare tire and it was sitting in the middle of the busy road. It all began when Marv put an aluminum patch on the wheel well which had been damaged when the first tire blew on our winter trip, north of Big Bend. In doing so, he realized that the well on that side was actually not in the right place; it was about an inch too far forward. We most likely had two blow-outs on that side during the trip because of the wheel making contact with the plastic. (We will deal with TrailManor when we get back to rectify that situation!!) But once he had it repaired, Marv felt it was safe to take it the short way we intended to go to camp. He put it all back together after dark, and apparently hadn’t pushed the spare tire “sling” back far enough, allowing the part holding the tire to work itself loose and fall off. We turned left at the light and pulled into the parking lot immediately to the left and assessed the damage. The remaining parts to the sling were bent from being dragged so Marv wrestled off the cotter pins and removed them. Then we rushed back and found the tire, still attached to the sling, next to the road, where someone had dragged it. Once our hearts stopped pounding, we decided there was no reason to return home, since we could carry the spare tire in the back of the truck.

On we went to Green Lake Rustic Campground, between Stockbridge and Chelsea in the Pinckney-Waterloo Recreation Area. We had passed this site many times on our trips to Ann Arbor over the years and had always thought we’d like to give it a try sometime. Arriving on Memorial Day afternoon was a good plan; as we anticipated most people had already packed up and left, so we had our choice of many sites. We found one on the lake and as we looked it over, deciding how to get up the bank to it, the guy next door suggested we pull through his site. That proved to be the best approach. Max turned out to be very friendly and talkative. He asked if Marv was a fisherman because he was looking for a partner. He also invited us over for a cold beer. But we really needed to get the camper up as the threatening rain clouds were gathering. Max was very impressed with how the camper unfolded and we invited him to have a look inside. By then it was starting to sprinkle and thunder so he went back to his site.

We got the inside of the trailer settled and then took a little snooze and played some Cribbage. The rain was pouring down and the thunder was crashing all the while. We got our dinner of a cold roasted chicken, potato salad and sliced tomatoes with slices of mozzarella in between. Quite elegant fare for camping! And it kept raining for a while after we ate. Finally, it stopped and we could get water for the toilet and register. By then the sun was setting so we played the rubber hand of Cribbage (I won), read for a while and then hit the sack.