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Today I went to the Arctic Circle!!!!

I had made reservations to take a van tour to the Arctic Circle , which is basically just a latitude line north of Fairbanks, but the journey and scenery to get there is worth it!    The same road northwards a couple more days travel would get you to Prudhoe Bay and the Arctic Ocean.   I had mulled over wanting to go there, but it would be a 2 – 3 day trip.   I certainly was NOT going there with my camper–the shape of the road made that inadvisable.   And I didn’t know what to do with my dog and cat if I were to take the trip with a tour group.    So the shorter    trip just to the Arctic Circle was a good compromise.

The trip was in a van with 4 other people and the driver.  Arrangements had been made through the campground.  We were to be picked up at the campground at 2 pm and would return around 4 – 5 am the next morning.    So I took the dog on a nice long potty walk, then they would be fine in the camper.   Knowing them they would sleep the whole time I was gone!!

First stop was at the Alaska Pipeline which can be seen just outside Fairbanks.   

Then we get on the Dalton Highway: 

Pipeline and Yukon River.
Yukon River bridge.Finger Mt. – Bitterly cold here!

It was about 9 pm and still some daylight at the Arctic Circle, but soon the sun went down and we turned around and headed back, hoping to see some northern lights along the way.  Sure enough, the clouds rolled back and from 11:30PM  – approximately 2:30 AM, we saw the most gorgeous northern lights you could ever imagine!  I didn’t know before what they meant by northern lights “dancing”, but they sure did DANCE  all over the sky!!   Neither my cell phone nor my camera were good enough to catch the picture, so I am going to provide you with a beautiful borrowed  picture and  link to watch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wKg99PKCCtU

The van got back to the campground in Fairbanks at about 4:30 AM.  Burrito got a quick potty walk, and then I slept till almost lunchtime!!

 

Breakfast at the northernmost Dennys in America.

Get settled in at River’s Edge Campground.  http://www.riversedge.net/fairbanks-rv-park/

Went to Fairbanks Visitors Center where I picked up lots of brochures and information on places to see.  http://www.morristhompsoncenter.org/

 

 

When I first planned this Alaska trip, after Denali I planned to spend a few days in Fairbanks etc and then head back home.

But in June, I got notified that I had won the Denali Road Lottery and was assigned September 19th as my day.  The Road Lottery is an event at Denali National Park that is held the last week before they close the road to vehicles for the winter season.  Out of thousands of applicants online, they choose some for each day to be able to travel the entire Denali road in your own vehicle.  [Remember, you have to go on a shuttle bus ordinarily.]   I was thrilled to get chosen, but realized I would have to extend my trip slightly to accomodate that date and then would have to skeedaddle back to the lower 48 as roads could get more iffy as winter approached.

So, I decided to go to Fairbanks for a couple of weeks.   Admittedly, I have been traveling for quite a long time and gone lots of miles, so staying put in one place for a while would be good.   Then I could be nice and rested and relaxed for my last great hurrah at Denali before going home.

So off on the Denali Highway again, but this time going past Denali on to Fairbanks.

 Past that view of Mt. McKinley again.

And that quirky “igloo” again.

Because I had an appointment the next morning for some service at the RV place in Fairbanks, I decided to boondock at the Fairbanks Walmart for the night.   Better than having to hook up at an RV Park, and then unhook again to go to the service place.   Besides, I needed to get a few things at Walmart!   Like whoever saw such  a cute tiny little ketchup bottle  as  this?  Perfect for a camper!

My blogs for the next couple weeks might be hit or miss.   I don’t plan to write every day.   I don’t even plan to DO anything  everyday.   If I do something besides take a walk or read a book or take a nap, I might write something….  🙂

 

Long, long ago in a far away place…..

Really, my childhood was spent  living with my parents and family  in the jungles of Peru at a place called Yarinacocha.   In 7th grade, a very interesting family came down there for a year from Alaska.  The parents taught in the school and among other children, they had three Athabascan children they had adopted, one boy and two girls.   Twila now lives in Anchorage and Dawn in Fairbanks.  They were two of many friends that I was privileged to get re-acquainted with once more  when we found each other on Facebook!

Today I get to meet up with Twila again for the first time since 1971  I believe.

We decided to meet up at the Alaska Native Heritage Center.  If you are interested in visiting follow this link  :  http://www.alaskanative.net/

I found it very interesting, and not just because I was getting a personal tour from a native Alaskan!   We also had delicious salmon for lunch at the cafe there.

 

Tonight my son will be catching a red-eye back home from the Anchorage airport and I will stay in Anchorage for the weekend to visit with a childhood friend that lives there.

So we packed up the T@B again and headed back towards Anchorage.  There are stop on the South side of Denali Park where you can catch a last little glimpse of Mt. McKinley if she is out.  Well she came out for us once more!

We also got our second looky at the strange huge “igloo” that is just off the highway.   It was suppose to be a big resort, but went bust.

This time in Anchorage, we stayed at a different RV Park which was in the middle of the city but right off the highway.   Very tight spots and nothing to look at, but at least it was very clean and safe.    We got something to eat, then a short nap, then off to the airport late at night.

I’m sad to see my son go.  It’s been nice having him here.  Now it’ll be back to vacationing by myself!

Today we got up at the crack of dawn to go on our Wonder Lake Bus trip that we had booked.  The road into Denali is 93 miles long and Wonder Lake is almost to the end.  [Mile 85]    Individual private vehicles cannot drive the Denali road past Savage River at Mile 15 (without special permits like for photographers, etc).  So the park service provides a couple of different shuttle buses that a person can buy tickets to ride.   The bus we rode was called the green bus and for $49 each we could take the 11 hour ride to Wonder Lake and back.  There are no eating facilities anywhere along the route.  Water is available to fill a canteen at Eilsen.  Vault toilets are various places along the way and there are flush toilets at Eilsen.  Be prepared!  We took a back pack filled with water, sandwiches and other snacks.  We were dressed warmly also.

We boarded the bus at the Wilderness Access Center at 8  and soon were on our way past Park Headquarters, the Dog Kennels and Savage River.

 There’s a moose in those bushes!  Fireweed.  6 weeks till winter

according to legend.

 Bighorn sheep. Ptarmagan bird.

Polychrome. The green bus behind us. Not much fall colors left. Teklanika River.  Caribou moving west.  First views of Mt. McKinley (Denali).   The winding road.  View from Eilsen Visitor Center.

One of my friends just got married here 3 weeks ago, only the second wedding in Denali in history.

 That’s the wedding spot right there!  The view was awesome!  Our first bear in Denali! Wonder Lake.  The bears love these blueberries! Or these. Wonder Lake overlook. Wonder Lake rest stop.   More bears.

We arrived back at the Riley Creek campground in the evening, tired but exhilarated from all we had seen.  The best for me is that I get to go back for a second visit next month as I won a Denali Road Lottery ticket for September 19th!

Remember, there are no hookups in Denali.   No elec, no sewer, no water.   So with our handy-dandy T@B we had options:  Use the battery and propane sparingly for minimal amount of lights and use the Aldi furnace with propane.  We did fine even though it was quite cold and our battery and propane held out just fine.

Tomorrow we leave Denali and head back to Anchorage for my son to catch his flight back to his home in FL.

Anchorage to Denali National Park is about 238 miles and will take about 4 hours.   Yesterday we had gone grocery shopping because we knew there would not be any big stores near there.  So we are ready for adventure!

It was rainy most of the way to Denali.

We arrived at Denali about 1 pm.   We have reservations at the Riley Creek Campground, which is right inside the entrance to the park.   It has a couple of huge loops where the sites are located.   Trees are everywhere.  Each loop has one large bathroom house with toilets and sinks only, no showers as well as one bathroom house with vault toilets.   Nice name for an outhouse.   The sites are all gravel, with a fire pit and picnic table.   I found many of the sites were so short.   My T@B with RAV4 hooked up to it was too long, so I HAD to unhook and park it to the side.  Long campers would’ve been tight also.  To shower, you can either walk or drive to the shower house/Mercantile  that is located nearby.

We got set up at the site and then went up to the Visitors Center, where we ate at the cafe there, then took a 2 mile hike back to our campsite via a trail.   The trail went through the woods, down by the creek, past the train trestle and to the Mercantile.  My son thought it was silly that I kept talking about bears and making lots of noise on the trail, but seeing wildlife around the campground is not unusual.  Bears like to eat the berries on the bushes.

 

TODAY IS MY BIRTHDAY!!!!   Happy Birthday to me!

It was raining so much and we knew we would not be able to get any decent hikes in.  Our next destination was Denali National Park on the 25th, so after checking the weather apps, we found that the weather further north was better.   So we decided to leave Seward a day early and go to Anchorage for a day.   That would give us more options for celebrating [meaning eating out] and we could do some shopping to be ready for Denali.  Besides, my son’s cell phone had decided to crap out the last couple of days, so we could find some better wifi for him to try to hard reset the phone or even visit a cellphone store if necessary.    So, off to Anchorage.

It was great having my son here now to help me pack up the T@B!   I’ve also gotten a break from the driving since here’s been here as when he’s around, I always give him the keys and say “please drive me”.    He’s used to pulling his motorcycle on a trailer sometimes, so towing the camper is not hard for him.  The weather did improve, no rain in Anchorage and the sun came out.

When we arrived in Anchorage, we took care of getting the cellphone fixed (yes, when we got to decent wifi, he was able to reset it) and grocery shopping.  We ate supper at the “most famous pizza joint in Alaska”, http://moosestooth.net/   Yes, it WAS good, but different, not at all what we expected.

We stayed at Centennial Campground.   It is on the north side of Anchorage, right off the Glenn Highway.   We will never stay there ever again.    The clientele is sketchy and the bathrooms/shower facilities not clean.   My son went to use the restroom and told me “mom, don’t go there!”   So we made exclusive use of our T@B facilities and didn’t leave anything outside as it might’ve walked.   If I had been camping by myself, I would’ve left and found another campground, but with my son with me, we just dealt with it for one night.   Since I am planning to come back to Anchorage when we leave Denali and have to drop my son off at the airport, I have time enough to find a better place for then.

The only picture I have is of an interesting hill next to the campground where evidently people sled/toboggan etc down it in the winter: 

Tomorrow off to Denali!

 

Today my son and I  took a half-day kayaking trip with Liquid Adventures.   We paddled from Seward along the beach to Tonsina Creek and back.

http://www.liquid-adventures.com/content/tonsina-creek-half-day

Can you see the bald eagle we are looking at?

We ate lunch and walked around looking in the shops in downtown Seward, then back to the camp site for a nap and get ready for the big day tomorrow.

 

 

Today we had booked an 8.5 hour trip with Major Marine Tours in Sewards.

It was very cold and rainy, so as we arrived they were offering everyone if they wanted to re-book another day, but they were not going to cancel the trip. We figured it would just be part of the adventure. It cost about $225 per person.

 

 

 

 

 

As the boat cruised out of the Seward port, we saw some sea otters, ducks etc. swimming,

even an eagle! It was relatively smooth going inside Resurrection Bay. It got it’s name because the explorers who discovered it found the bay on Easter.

Once the boat left Resurrection Bay though, it became quite rough.

We cruised a few hours before reaching the area where we saw glaciers:

Humpback whales:
Stellar sea lions on the rocks:

Cataract Cove:

Spire Cove:

When we got back at about 5 pm, we went right next door to eat at a restaurant.   I can’t remember the name and it was expensive, but worth every dollar.   The halibut was to die for!!   I had lots of seafood in Alaska, but that was THE BEST.