Square Dancing RV'rs: July 2010

Paul's new job when he retires!

Old car with flowers

Chena Hot Springs near Fairbanks, Alaska

Pretty grass on drive to Artic Circle

Artic Circle

Yep, we made it!

Funky outhouse at Univ of Alaska

Fairbanks, Alaska

We're in Fairbanks and will be here for two more nights - leaving on Thursday, July 29th. On Sunday we had a beautiful day weather-wise plus a lovely trip on the Riverboat Discovery. This is a big sternwheeler that holds 900 passengers. The trip includes a demo from a seaplane pilot taking off and landing on the river, followed by a stop to watch a dog sled demo. They hitched up the dogs to an ATV and then then the dogs took off - running like you can't believe. It was quite interesting. Next we went up the river and saw lots of beautiful homes that have been built on the river. After turning around we stopped for more than an hour visiting a 'mock' Native village. While there we saw more of the dogs, saw how they used the moose, bear, fox, salmon, etc.

Monday morning we had the oil changed on the truck. Next was a visit for groceries to the commisary at Ft. Wainwright. In the afternoon we did the Eldorado Gold Mine tour. It was kind of hokey, but it was fun. We panned for gold and susposedly our gold flakes are worth $46.00. They take you on a little train ride into a perma-frost tunnel, and show you how various gold mining takes place. It is a lot of work!

Today we both got our haircuts and we're headed to the University of Alaska Museum. Then later in the day up to Chena Hot Springs.

Yes, I do own this road!

Denali National Park

Two grizzlies in Denali

Denali National Park

We had an interesting visit to the park. We never did see Mt. McKinley. But, we did see lots of wildlife. Our first evening in the park we were driving to our camptsite and saw first a moose, then a huge grizzly.

The next day we did a discovery hike with a ranger. This involved getting picked up by the hiker bus at our campground and then riding about an hour into the park. From there our ranger, Brian, and 9 of us set off on a hike. The hike involved hiking through the brush to the river and then hiking along the river. Along the way we saw lots of animal tracks and scat. We saw lynx, moose, wolf, grizzly bear, and cariboo tracks. We also saw bear, lynx, wolf, and moose scat. When we were done with hiking along the river we then had to hike through the tundra out about a mile back to the road. The tundra was very spongy in places.

We then boarded a park bus and road to the Eilson visitor center - at about mile 66 into the park. We immediately bosrded another bus to return to our campground. It was a long day - about 12 hours total.

We were staying at a campground at Savage River, which is about 13 miles inside the park. We stayed there two nights.

We left Denali on July 24th and drove to Fairbanks. We found a dry camping place at Pioneer city park. While at Pioneer park we discovered that they were having a square dance that evening. We danced with the Santa Swingers. They were glad to have us come to their dance. It was a fun evening.

Mr. Moose at Denali National Park

Carol, A moose for you

The sign says it all

Cariboo

Along the Denali Highway

Denali Highway view

The Denali highway is not in the park, but goes east for 130 miles. We did a day trip 50 miles - all gravel - it was really beautiful

South of Denali

We left Portage Glacier area on Sunday to drive to Anchorage. It was nice weather while we were near Portage on Friday and Saturday. Sunday morning it was raining and here it is Wednesday and it's still raining! We left Anchorage on Tuesday morning to drive Talkeetna. We were suppose to take a flightseeting trip on Tuesday eveing at 7:00pm, but it was cancelled due to very poor weather. We spent the night in Talkeetna - it is a very cute town. We went to the Roadhouse - an establishment dating back to 1919 where we had a great breakfasst (it was actually our lunch). All the meals are family style so we visited with a couple from Switzerland.

This morning (Wednesday, July 21) we drove north on the Parks Highway to Cantwell, Alaska which is about 25 miles south of the entrance to Denali. We're going to take a drive later on the gravel Denali Highway that goes east from Cantwell.

We've heard rumors that the weather is suppose to be getting nicer! We certainly hope so. Everyone is complaining about the bad weather Alaska is getting this summer. We hear that Fairbanks is usually a little warmer - so we'll be there in a few days.