In the morning before we left Deadman Lake Campground we put on our DEET and head nets and took the nature hike which follows a boardwalk from the lake up the hill to the picnic area near the entrance.
Here's the lake in the morning sun with a few clouds reflected below.
There were signs to help you identify all the nifty wetland plants growing there.
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| Nagoonberry (Rubus artica) | Labrador Tea (Ledum palustris) |
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| Lowbush Cranberry (Vaccinium vitis-idaea) |
Cloudberry (Rubus chamaemorus) |
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| Bog Rosemary (Andromeda polifolia) | Cotton Grass (Eriophorum scheuchzeri) |
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And I found this Northern Lady's Slipper (Cypripedium passerinum) growing in a ditch nearby. It's also called a Sparrow's Egg Lady's Slipper.
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Having completed our morning exercise, we motored on up the Alaska Highway. Point A is Deadman Lake Campground. Point B is our destination today, Clearwater Lake State Recreation Site. Tomorrow we'll be going on up to Point C, Fairbanks.
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The drive takes you through rolling hills, past lots of little lakes and gives occasional views of mountains in the distance. We stopped at a turnout so I could catch the Wrangell Mountains to the south.
Most of the lakes in the area are pretty small but there are a few larger ones. Midway Lake is a long narrow lake that runs parallel to the highway.
You can see the Wrangell Mountains to the south even better here.
We stopped in beautiful downtown Tok, to change drivers. Tok is one of those places that everyone going just about anywhere in Interior Alaska has to go through. But aside from the view and a lot of RV parks and motels, it doesn't have much going for it.
Along about lunch time, when we were looking for a place to stop, we hit a series of construction zones with patches of gravel. I slowed down but a big RV coming the other way didn't. He kicked up a good sized rock that hit the windshield just above my head on the driver's side. It put out a long crack right away and by the time we got to our campsite a couple of hours later it was over 8 inches long.
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We'd gotten a small chip earlier in the trip and I'd been waiting to get nailed. Now that the windshield was broken we could just relax and not worry. We contacted our insurance company and they said we could wait to replace it until we got home. So of course nothing more happened to it for the rest of the trip!
Shortly after the windshield got hit we found a nice turnout for lunch with a great view of the Alaska Range to the west.
Here's Fernando and Rosita and the view.
Mid-afternoon on a very warm day (it was in the 80's!) we found a nice campsite at Clearwater Lake State Recreation Site just outside of Delta Junction. We took a little walk along the lake but the mosquitos were pretty fierce so we retreated to the trailer for the rest of the afternoon.
It was Saturday and there were people out on the lake well into the evening since of course the sun didn't go down until midnight. I saw someone in shorts set out to go fishing at 11:30 that night.
The next morning we drove into Delta Junction to get gas. The wind had come up and there was a mini-sandstorm blowing off the sandbars in the Tanana River. But it was clear in town. I struggled to stand upright and stay still enough as I took this photo of the view from downtown Delta Junction.
We motored on north from Delta Junction and as I was reading the Milepost out loud, it said to watch for moose in the lakes we had just passed. I looked up and what did I see? A bull moose swimming across the Tanana River! Walter found a place to park (wonders of wonders) and I hot footed it across the highway (no traffic) with my camera.
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| He looked back at me and I caught him at it! | |
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| He climbed up onto a gravel bar. | |
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| And then got back in the water to swim some more. | |
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| Then he found an even shallower section so I got a full shot of him. It looks like he's walking on water! | |
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| And then he took off back into the water and across the river. | |
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This was frankly a thrill of a lifetime for me. When I got back in the truck I turned to Walter and said, "I can die happy now." I'd bagged my bull moose, in spades!
In this same section of the Tanana River I got some lovely shots of the Alaska Range.
These mountains are the front portion of the range that runs through Denali National Park. In other words, they are BIG mountains.
And the Tanana River is the major river in the area.
We stopped to switch drivers at Birch Lake, a pretty little lake about an hour south of Fairbanks. We’d begun to see wild irises along the road but flower ID even at 50 mph is a bit of a challenge. But there were Wild Irises (Iris setosa) in bloom along the water's edge and that settled that.
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There were also Yellow Pond Lilies (Nuphar polysepala) in bloom in the lake.
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The next morning was spent doing errands and moving to Chena River Recreation Site, a state campground just a few blocks away. Then in the afternoon we visited the Museum of The North at the University of Alaska. All the tour books said it was supposed to be wonderful. All I can say is that they have a BIG collection and it's a little overwhelming. The display cases have multiple topics going on so they are hard to follow. My opinion: they need a good curator to redo their displays.
From there, we stopped at the University's Botanical Gardens. They had big Rainbird-style sprinklers going in much of the place so it was hard to walk around. Walter stayed in the truck and I wandered a bit but was frustrated because they didn’t have any plant ID signs out. The focus of the garden at this point seems to be trying to convince folks they can grow vegetables in Alaska.
There was this nice water garden with a nifty little bridge though.
The next morning we got up bright and early to make the 2 hour drive southwest to Denali National Park. The warm clear weather was gone and we had heavy rain part of the way.
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Just before the entrance to the park itself, we arrived at the commercial area known as "Glitter Gulch". Walter was so impressed with how awful it was that he insisted I take pictures. This is where the hotels are and the big RV parks and of course the t-shirt and tourist junk stores.
It is the exact opposite of what I think of a National Park being about and certainly is the opposite of Denali which is almost entirely wilderness.
It really is pretty awful. Here's a panorama shot.
There's a nice turnout right next to the entrance of the park so we stopped with the rest of the tourists and had someone take a picture of us next to the sign.
We got checked in to camp for a night at Riley Creek Campground which is near the entrance and the Visitor's Center and confirmed the arrangements for the rest of our stay.
After lunch we went up to the Visitor's Center where of course I saw more wildflowers! This is Northern Oxytrope (Oxytopis campestris) which we saw back at Kluane too.
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And this is Siberian Aster (Aster sibiricus).
We had hoped to take a hike in the afternoon but the weather didn't cooperate. So after dinner we drove out the road to Savage River. This a 19 mile drive and is as far as you can drive in the park in a private vehicle. The weather cleared a bit and we actually got to see a few mountains--though Denali wasn't out.
They were replacing culverts on the road and I counted 96 patches of gravel where they'd torn up the road—that kind of slowed folks down a bit. Here's one of the outhouses near Savage River. I just love the sod roofs. Every outhouse in Denali has one. Can I mow your roof for you lady?
Here you can see the Savage River and the mountains together.
We got one more nice view on the way back before the clouds moved in again.
They use sled dogs to patrol the park in the winter time. They keep the dogs in the park for the summer and take them out for walks in the morning and evening. On our way back to our campsite, we saw this young woman walking a very eager husky.
In Part XVIII, we'll take you 29 miles inside Denali to Teklanika Campground where we'll be camping for the next 3 days. And then we'll take the shuttle bus out to Eielson Visitor's Center at Mile 66. Wildflowers, bears, moose, Dahl sheep and caribou!