Day 12, 7/2/2002, Sunrise 3:45am - Sunset 12:15am (still CRAZY); cloudy skies
Mt. McKinley Wilderness Lodge
on our own.
Every day of our trip had started gray with low clouds, fog and/or rain. On most days the clouds would lift to reveal some mixture of sun and clouds. Yesterday the ceiling never lifted enough to reveal the major goal of the land portion of our cruise. There had been so much to see on the ride up here yesterday that we often forgot we were in a position to see Mt. McKinley if the clouds would just lift! That was hard to forget here where the lodge contains the mountain's name and is situated to reveal a spectacular view (I'm told).
Yesterday was a long day so we slept late this morning and enjoyed a BIG breakfast in the lodge near a window with a superb view of the clouds shrouding the entire Alaska Range. After breakfast, we took a horse drawn wagon tour to the top of a ridge above the lodge, watched the driver's dog chase rocks (there was little else to see - see above), learned to pan for gold (found some), roasted marshmallows and ate s'mores (they didn't offer more). I think it might have been before the wagon ride but at some point in the day we saw The Denali PhotoSymphony: "Song of the Land", a multi-image presentation featuring great Denali photography projected on an ultra wide screen from 6 slide projectors against an aural backdrop of soaring music. The presentation was excellent but nearly eclipsed by the presenter who introduced it. He confessed that his only qualification for the job was that he knew where the switch to start the program was but, in truth, he was a very charming presenter. Of course his addressing us as ya'll was a breath of fresh air after 12 days away from Texas. (I've thus far resisted cluttering this narrative with links but for a bit of the flavor of the PhotoSymphony you will not want to miss the photos at their website - Click on '..PhotoSymphony...' above.)
Later in the afternoon we went on a nature walk led by a National Park Ranger who wished she had brought a camera to record the size of our group. I'm guessing there were 35-50 folks! We had noticed that the forests we passed through yesterday seemed mighty uniform, the Ranger confirmed that this was because there were only four species that grew to tree size in the area: White and Black Spruce, Paper Birch and Tamarack or "The Larch". Later in the evening we attended a Ranger presentation on the history of climbing Denali. (The aboriginal name for Mt. McKinley is Denali, meaning "The Great One" [not "one obscenely huge SUV"!])
We went to our room early as we had to do special packing for tomorrow night. We were only allowed one carry-on bag on the train. The rest of our bags would be trucked on to Fairbanks.
Created on ... July 16, 2002