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July 22: Drive from Fairbanks to Denali - Wonder Lake Campground, Alaska
Bob: Monika couldn't sleep, so we were up early and on our way, but I was tired. The road South was a nice scenic 2-lane highway with the big plus of truck passing lanes on the steep uphill segments where I could cower while going the speed limit with the Prius. We were held up by road construction and didn't reach the Riley Creek campground at the entrance to Denali National Park, where we had to sign in and get our shuttle bus tickets, until 11 am. We opted to have lunch at the commercial strip just a mile down the road from the park entrance, which reminded us of Gatlinburg, Tennessee in the Smoky Mountains (that is NOT a compliment!). After a lunch with crowds of people, cars jammed into all available parking spaces, and loud music booming into our ears, my head was pounding and I was really ready to get into the park. |
Monika: We were all packed and on our way by 8 am. It still took us 3 hours to drive the 110 miles between Fairbanks and Denali because we were held up by road construction several times during the trip. We finally registered and were told the camper bus would leave at 2 pm. That gave us enough time to go back to the little shopping area that had grown up outside the Princess Denali Lodge about a mile from the park entrance. We had lunch at the Subway which was rather crowded because it was the best thing around. |
Bob: We took the 2 pm shuttle and were very surprised that the 84-mile trip took five and a half hours! But the route along the gravel road cut into the mountainsides was very slow going and our bus necessarily made a couple of pit stops during the trip. But the scenery was GREAT! |
Monika: We boarded the camper bus with all our gear neatly tied to the top of our two rollies. One held our food and cooking gear, the other our clothes for the next couple days. The bus ride was 85 miles and lasted 5 1/2 hours. This was way beyond what I expected. |
Bob: Our driver stopped for wildlife sightings and other photo ops, as well as bathroom breaks. And sure enough we saw some of the local critters! |
Monika: But after the first 12 miles that were paved and open to everyone, the road became gravel and driving was slow. |
Bob: We crossed and recrossed the river as we worked our way into the backcountry, and I was surprised to see that the riverbeds were wide, flat, and "braided" in that the river divided up into many small channels rather than being one major stream. It was pretty and each braid would maybe be shallow enough to ford across, but with all those loose stones across the entire riverbed, the footing looked to be darn tricky--an ankle-twister for sure! One of our stops was by Polychrome Mountain, whose exposed slopes were a vivid palette of yellow-ocher-purple, which is caused by mineral deposits but all the same rather striking and MUCH different than the slate-gray mountainside you usually expect to see. |
Monika: We crossed a braided river and drove past the Polychrome Mountain. We also got closer to the Alaska Range and it had cleared enough to see some of the smaller mountains, but Mt McKinley was in hiding in clouds. |
Bob: I was tired, hungry, and stressed by dealing with so many new, unknown factors by the time we reached Wonder Lake campground. The reservation website had implied reserved spaces, but the campground turned out to be on a first come, first served basis with no real organization or signs about which campsites were occupied and which still available. As a result, you had to hike out on little paths to each campsite, then see if it was actually occupied, and then hike back to the main road and try again. That procedure is fairly easy if you are backpacking, but our fully-loaded rollies were awkward on the trails and dusk was falling. We followed the road to the far end of the campground and finally found an empty site and managed to set up the tent just before it started raining. Thankfully our new, heretofore untested, Aldi tent had no leaks. |
Monika: Finally at 7:30 we reached our campground, picked our site, braved the mosquitoes, and had dinner. Our new tent was easy to set up and the rain fly worked perfectly, because it had started to rain and we just crawled into the tent and went to sleep |
