We fly out of Kennedy Airport about 5:00 pm with a layover in Seattle before heading into Anchorage.  In the Seattle airport, I change into long pants and sweatshirt.  A preview of things to come. 

CLICK ON EACH THUMBNAIL TO OPEN PHOTO. 

We arrive in Anchorage airport at 1:00 am.  We wait an additional 1/2 hour for John and Jana to arrive.  Close call for them on catching their connection in Seattle due to delayed flight out of Orlando...but luckily they did. 

Our RV was waiting for us plugged in ready for us to go to sleep.  We had to await orientation by boss' son in the morning before setting off on our big adventure. This RV turned out to be a hunk of crap.  We later find that the roof profusely leaks, the service engine soon light came on the second day, the heat in the cab did not work, 2 of the camp chairs were broken, the refrigerator did not stay on if we did not restart the RV every day.  I'll stop there...but the list continues. 

After driving around the city to Walmart, Fred Meyers, and unsuccessful trip to REI...never found it (until a week later upon return to Anchorage).  We head off east of Anchorage on the Glenn Highway with Mt Sanford in view to the east.  We camp for $10 a night at Mendeltna Creek (milepost 153) at a quiet, lonely  campground.  This part of the state must not be big on tourism, as the host is not out of her way friendly...showers were $5 (hence we did not take any- at least today).  We do find out later on, that it is the norm to charge this much for showers) and Brad and John were reprimanded when asked if firewood was for sale.  This lady claims there are no open fires in Alaska without a permit.  Not one other person/campground we came across in Alaska knew of this.  neither was the postal worker at the Chickaloon postal shack that we encountered earlier in the day, when we parked in the post office parking lot.  We were told it was not a picnic spot (we were just trying to read our gps to do a cache 1/4 mile west.  Never found that cache after a 1/2 hour hunt and two gps units.   

Our first night camping.  Our introduction into Alaskan mosquitoes. 

We start out on our trip to Chitina by continuing east to Glennallen, then south on the Richardson Highway. We are stopped for about 10 minutes due to highway construction.  Very We pass our first glacier; the Matanuska Glacier.  ...had not researched this at all, as we were more excited to explore and hike on the Root Glacier in Kennicott (5 miles past McCarthy).  we took some pictures of the glacier.  Had we known, we'd have stopped at the glacier and take our guided glacier hike with crampons.  None the less, we continue on with a quick stop at the Visitor Center and an nearby overlook.

We get to Chitina, and it is a little one horse town.  The gas station charges $5 a gallon (a common find,  we find out).  My second "Did not Find" geocache- well if I had more time to search, I'd probably find it.  We are not going to start our 60 mile unpaved trek down the McCarthy Road.  At the beginning of the road, we look to the north and see loads of locals fishing with fishing wheels in the Copper River.  The road is narrow, and washboardy.  Not even 5 minutes into the ride, we decide this is not for us...not in this rickety, old piece of crap RV with the service engine light on. 

Decide to go back a few miles to the airport and find out how much it would cost to fly into McCarthy.  Well, the airport is not what we expected.  A small log cabin style building is closed.  No one around except one guy sitting by his car reading.  We talk to him. He is a bush pilot and waiting on a client.  He said we had to drive back another 10 miles to nearest phone to call the airplane operator.  John suggests we go to Valdez instead, which is something we discussed earlier in the year when planning our itinerary.  The bush pilot agreed Valdez is a great place to visit.  So Valdez it is. 

This turns out to be a wonderful solution to a stressful and defeating start to our trip. Along the way we stop at an area of famous Alyeska pipeline to read some informative signs and take some photos.  We stop quickly at a roadside attraction of Keystone Canyon Tunnel and the Worthington Glacier, which we can walk right up to- if we had crampons, we could have walked on it...but who knew. 

We camp in a state campground in Valdez, a few miles outside of town.  Wooded, quiet, empty campground.  Except for mosquitoes.  After choosing our site, we head down into town.  We sign up for a kayaking tour for Monday. 

In the process of signing up for the kaying tour at Anadyr Kayak tours, John shows interest in Heddy (the owner's) animal skull/bone collection on display.  John leaves with I think 3 animal skulls. 

Worthington Glacier

After leaving the campground, we park at the public dock parking area down in town, and get ready for our kayaking trip.  Along with one other couple from Anchorage, we embark on a boat ride with Sam, our "Right On" guide and Lee the boat captain.  We head to Columbia Bay, where we are dropped off on the beach near the glacier (this is where we see the eagles).  We begin our trip to kayak between the icebergs. 

The best part of the kayaking tour was kayaking in and around the icebergs that had come off the Columbia glacier.  The view from our lunch spot was pretty incredible with the glacier in the distance and the icebergs that had fallen off close to where we were.  While eating lunch we (everyone except John who was off peeing) saw a porcupine rambling down the hill. 

John got to ride solo in the guides kayak for a bit. He was hoping Jana would take some good photos, but the kayaks are sometimes hard to get in the entire frame.   

On the boat ride back to Valdez the captain was able to track down a pod of Orcas and we spent a while watching them – that was pretty cool.  Both our guide and captain told us it was very unusual to even see Orcas – they only see them 4-5 times a year.  We also saw some porpoises from the distance but they were going to fast for us to catch them.  We circled around a bit to get some good views of the whales.  At this point the whales are Brad's highlight...

We saw the refinery from the water and watch the fishing boats as made their catch.  Turns out getting fresh fish is not so simple in Valdez as the locals just catch their own, well  buying fish means vacuum sealed and frozen.  We did get some monster king crab for dinner – 2 clusters for all four of us....wish I had taken a picture....

Again we camp at the state campground, and have to be clever about cooking the crab.  BBQ is too small, so we break the crabs down bbq one of them, and boil the other.  Super delicious!!

John, Jana, Brad and Andrea; geared up for kayak trip

Otters

Pair of Eagles

Brad and Andrea at the Columbia Bay

Another pic of Andrea and Brad at Columbia Bay

One of the many Orca that we saw while on the motorboat ride back to town.

Sunny day.  After checking out the Valdez Glacier down the road from the campground for some photo opportunities.  We check into the full service campground in downtown Valdez so we can do laundry and take real showers.  With free wi-fi I can look up some geocaches to do.  We walk downtown, and head to a store to watch a video about the 1964 earthquake.  Quite boring.  Split up from John and Jana.  They did a nature walk.  We perused gift shops.  Then we did  some geocaches.  Finally!  Found 3, did not find 2.  One we searched 2x for without any luck, the other we quickly aborted mission due to muggles. 

Met Patrick, a local who fillets fish on the docks who is witness to many geocachers looking for the particular cache right near his station. 

Downtown Valdez; Fish Derbies

Valdez harbor

We take the ferry out of Valdez.  The trip is over 6 hours long along the Marine Highway.  The weather is misty, rainy, overcast.  We sit inside most of the time, but every time the captain mentions that sealife is in view, he head outside for some photos.  Humpback whales and porpoise. It is a good opportunity for us to discuss the next leg of our journey.  I make reservations for the next day at Chugach Outdoor Center- Brad and John to white water raft, and Andrea and Jana for lazy river trip.   

Whittier is a very, very, small town, nothing to stop for, so we just head west to wait in line at the interesting tunnel leading in/out of town that is shared by cars and the train.  Cars going out of town leave once an hour on the hour. 

On the other side of the tunnel, we stop at the Portage Glacier Visitor center for a geocache, and unexpected photo op with my idol, Smokey the Bear.  We do a small hike to Byron Glacier as well.  Neat, as we are walking on snow to get up to the glacier.. (still hasn't melted yet). 

Camped on the side of the road at a pulloff along the river leading to Hope.  This is 5 minutes from  the Chugach Outdoor Center. 

The roof begins to leak in the corner of the rear bedroom where John and Jana are, as it downpours all night. 

Brad & John on the ferry

Andrea and Brad on the ferry

Andrea and Smokey at the Portage Glacier Visitor Center

At Byron Glacier

Brad and John with mosquito nets on, trying to enjoy the great outdoors

It was raining so much the night before that as soon as we get to the Chugach Outdoor Center, we are told the river is too high to white water raft.  We change our plans to come back on Saturday. 

Since it is raining, we decide to go down into Seward to check it out.  We sign up for a kaying trip for Friday.  On the way out of town, we go stop off at Exit Glacier Recreation area.  We will hike instead...what the heck.  On the way we went looking for bear at Bear Creek Park a little spot across from a salmon fish weir.  Had lunch here and saw some eagles and salmon in the water heading upstream through a fish ladder to spawn in Bear Lake.  Still no bear. 

So we begin our hike up the Harding Ice Trail at Exit Glacier.  Our goal was to go up  approximately 2.2 miles to a supposed spectacular view.  At about 1.2 miles the weather got very misty/rainy and the trail was covered in snow now.  Jana and I turn back and John and Brad continue.  The girls then go to the small spur trail to the toe of Exit Glacier before finding refuge in the RV for another hour or so until the boys returned.  Still no bear. 

Camped on the side of the road at a pulloff on the road along the river leading to Exit Glacier after buying a fresh slab of salmon to bake in the oven in the RV. 

Andrea in front of Exit Glacier.

Jana's birthday is celebrated by a wonderful kayak trip around Fox Island; 10-12 mile trip.  We are the only four on this particular tour, but head on a tour boat with many others on different wildlife excursion with same tour company.  We are dropped off at Fox Island to meet our guide.  Again, donned in rain gear and spray skirts we begin our full day, tiring, but fun adventure.  We were in very open waters with huge swells, at the Eldorado Narrows area.  As well as sea lions, and some other sea life, we we saw Puffins.  I like Puffins.

We ended back at the Fox Island lodge after our long trip to our salmon bake dinner and a talk by Kenai Fjords National Park Ranger.

Camped on the side of the road at the same spot we had on Wednesday ..just before the Chugach Outdoor Center with a quick stop first the the salmon weir by the laundromat  (again, no bear).

Brad and Andrea again

John and Jana

Seward harbor

We wake up bright and early for our rafting trips. 

Brad and John’s trip was through class IV and V rapids.  The guide said it is one of the best spots in Alaska for rafting and the day was as fierce as any day because of the swollen river.  The boys had a blast and their raft was the only one where no one was ejected during the trip.  Due to the swimming test given at first, John said he would never go again.  The girls trip was nice and leisurely with some bird sightings. 

On our way to Anchorage, we stop in Girdwood for some famous sourdough bread...of which we did not buy- the loaves were tooooooo huge.  

We go back to Anchorage. and head straight for  REI – finally found it – and the ULU factory where I buy some Alaskan made kitchen items.  Lucky for us the weekend market was still going on and we checked it.  I buy some Puffin earrings carved from whale ivory.  John and Jana buy some pottery and antler art . One stand at the market has amazing salmon quesadillas that we ate for dinner. 

 We camp near Palmer at the Homestead RV Full Service Park.  $30 includes showers.  The sweet old man finally brings us a fire ring which includes a washing machine tumbler as a safety insert.  We never do have a fire. 

Andrea and Jana at the end of the leisurely float trip. 

Turnagain Arm view heading north to Anchorage

Our plan for the day was to head toward the musk ox farm and the Independence Mine.  The farm was interesting – learned about why they are domesticating musk ox and how they harvest their under fur (quivit).  Native women knit the fur after it has been spun into yarn and the particular patterns they use are unique to their geographic areas.  Prices are steep- hats over $150 and scarves over $300.  We buy nothing. 

 Drove to the Independence mine where it started raining (of  course) and while we waited for the rain to stop we had some lunch and played a game.  Finally the rain slowed down so we headed up to the visitor’s center to find out about this place.  We signed up for a geological tour but because there were only five of us on the tour we were able to go in and out of the buildings as well as learn about the geology of this once very productive gold mine.  The guide told us there probably was no gold in the mine today. 

After we left the mine we headed off to our next stop on our way to Denali.  Stopped at Nancy creek campground for the night.

At the Independence Mine.

At the mine.

Brad and John in the RV

Stopped in Talkeetna – the former gateway to Denali.  Small tourist town.  Had some salmon tacos – pretty good but not nearly as good as the salmon quesadillas we had at the open air market. 

Before Denali, we stop at a junk shop "Wal*Mikes", with a  reindeer tied up as attention getter.   In this most unlikely place John found the chimp holding a skull sitting on top of a pile of books with Darwin etched on the books – a sculpture he has tried previously to find for his office with no luck.  For the bargain price of $24.   

On the way to Denali, we saw a moose on the side of the road – first real wildlife sighting since we left the coastal area. 

Pulled into the first campground outside Denali to see if we could camp for the two nights before our reserved nights in the park.  As we headed into the mercantile Andrea spoke with a man that was checking out late and still had one night on his reservation – lucky for us as the campground was full for the night.  We were able to use his extra night and then get one additional night for us.  Checked out the town (a couple of small strips in about ½ mile on the road).  We ate our first meal out – salmon chowder (yummy) – crab legs – not as good as the ones in Seward, coconut salmon and reindeer sausage. 

Downtown Talkeetna

Entrance to Denali

Our first real day in Denali.  Slept in – woken up by leaking water in the RV (again).  Went to the main visitor’s center and checked out the place – went on a hike in search of moose – saw none – nice packed trails – rained again.

 Went to a sled dog demonstration – cool to see the dogs – not much of a demonstration.  Many people had been shuttled in on train and Princess Cruise Line Buses.  People of all ages also at the demonstration.  The puppies were cute. 

Headed back to the campground for an early dinner.  Went to a presentation on wolves with Ranger Yolanda from Birmingham, Alabama. 

Sled Dog Demonstration at the park.

Finally, ate outside and had a fire

At the Wolf presentation

Went into town for last minute gift shopping –John and Jana had to mail home some gifts.  Went to Healey for propane.  Good thing,  as our propane tank was empty this morning (well we thought it was).  We then headed into the Teklenika  campground at mile 29 in the park.  We quickly ate a snack and rushed to catch a bus into the park.  Our destination, Eielsen Visitor Center.  We saw our first real wildlife in the park – saw some white specks that were supposed to be Dall sheep (wished we had binoculars).  Saw some brown specks that were supposed to be a mother bear and her cub.  Then the real show started – a grizzly bear was very close the road and we watched it for about 10 minutes – it crossed the road in front of us then up the hill on the other side.  Not too long after we spotted two caribou in the distance – not so far away they were specks but they were not as close as the bear.  One more bear later on but we did not have a good angle.  Couple of eagles (we no longer get excited about eagles – need larger animals).  Of course there were hares, but they are all over.   

McKinley was not out today – we have several more trips scheduled for the park maybe we will get lucky another day.

Moose

The "BEAR"

Caribou with one antler

Dall sheep

Group photo

Today was our scheduled trip to Wonder lake – now we knew what to expect and were not so vigilant in looking for animals but rather sitting back and watching the view.   We lucked out with the weather – the sun was out and we got to see Mt. McKinley – this mountain is only visible 20 percent of the time.  At the Eilsen visitor center Andrea got to see a fox up close.  Wonder lake was beautiful but the mosquitos were horrible.  Most people quickly got back on the bus and started killing them while we waited.  Luckily the mosquitoes while thick, are quite slow, and hover more than they bite. 

Not much to see between the Eilsen visitors center and Wonder lake – I saw one beaver.   One the return trip we saw a caribou close up.

Compared to the previous day our driver was not as good – she did not work to locate any animals and didn’t talk much.  We all saw two foxes in the morning that day as well.  We saw a herd of moose – the irony of this was that while we were riding there was a park ranger sitting behind us and John was asking here where we could see moose.  The herd included a large male and several females – apparently very unusual at this time of the year as it was not mating season yet.

At night Brad and I went to the ranger presentation where I participated as Martha the Moose in a "Dating Game" style show.  I pick Mr. Wolf for my mate. 

 At Wonder Lake...with the mosquitoes

Fox at Eielsen Visitor Center

Me, as Martha the Moose at the ranger presentation

This was our last day in Denali and we were going to hike in search of Dall sheep.  We got our supplies together and headed out to catch the shuttle so we could hike in the area in which we had seen the sheep.  The ranger from the night before suggested Cathedral Mountain.  We got off the bus and moved up the mountain – this was our first time walking on tundra – very squishy and uneven.  Like moss ontop of small shrubs.  As we moved up the mountain we had to bushwhack often through the willow trees – of course this was bear and moose country – we saw lots of evidence – so we were trying to make noise as we moved up the mountain.  Brad sang a lot – the rest of us clapped our hands and make other kinds of noises.  "Hey Bear" was our mantra.  We never saw anything more than birds on our trip.  We did see lots of remains from lynx – rabbit feet – white feet lying all around.  We got to our initial goal and John wanted to continue so he went searching on his own.  Kept going up and up till we could not see him anymore.  He was on his own in this failed quest- the rest of us just waited on a ridge below. 

 On our way back to wait for  the bus we met two hikers who had just come down from these very mountains  the night before.  They found a heard of sheep up close and had pictures to prove it. 

That night we used up the rest of our food and had a fire.  During our whole trip, we kept staying up later and later, wanting to see sunset, wanting to see it dark out, wanting to see stars out......never happened. 

Our last night, and last campfire (second of entire trip)

Left the park early to drop John and Jana off at their lodge a few miles south of the park.  First they treated us to Fanny's Flapjack Breakfast outside the park. 

Got into Anchorage early afternoon.  Went to the flea market and had salmon quesadillas again.  We were feeling so lucky to have them again...They just were not as super delicious this time...

Went to Fred Meyer's parking lot and hung out for a few hours.  Bought some soup and played a game in the RV till it was time to return the RV. 

Got to the airport about 8:30 pm.  After spending time on several different lines, we finally had time to just sit around and wait......

Flight left Anchorage at 1:30 am.  Sitting in the airport, we finally got to see the skies dark.  There was a few hours layover in Seattle. 

Severe storms, however in New York prevented us from landing.  We were in a holding pattern around Pittsburgh area and had to eventually land to refuel.  We were finally able to land about 2 1/2 hours later. 

Got home at 8:30 pm.  Picked up the puppy from my moms.  Boy, she's grown a lot.