Alaska - Day 7

You know you're not really on a usual vacation when the tour guide knocks on your door for "wake up calls" at 4:30 in the morning. You know you're in an unusual tourist destination when many people are dressed and ready to go sightseeing at 5:30 AM and when the gift shops are open by 6:00 AM. You know you're not going to see many animals or Mt. McKinley on a Denali Park tour when it's raining. And you know you'd better keep both that fleece jacket and rain gear handy when the temperature is still 43 degrees at 11:00 and hits a high of 51 degrees.

This has been the wettest and coldest summer for many years, according to the locals. And certainly we did not see Mt. McKinley due to low clouds and light rain. But we still had a wonderful Natural History Tour in Denali National Park. There were wild flowers, snowshoe hare, mew gulls, ground squirrels and a willow ptarmigan in summer colors of reddish-brown
mottled with some white (they turn completely white in the winter). We stopped at a cabin used by rangers on winter patrols, listened to a very informative and witty Athabascan Indian man talk about life in his village close to the Arctic Circle, watched a movie on the earliest tourists in the park (women in dresses and orthopedic-looking heels) and drove far enough into the park to see both the taiga and the tundra (you'll have to ask people who were on the tour to explain those terms to you). At over 6 million acres, the park is vast, and we were able to experience that. It was a good visit.

Our drive this afternoon took us to Anchorage, a 180 degree change from the wilderness of the park. This modern city is home to almost half of the state's population and has malls, coffee shops, lovely restaurants and many sightseeing opportunities. We will explore the city tomorrow.

One final note. Three of our people went for a walk at last night's Grizzly Bear Motel. The trail along the river was reported to go by beaver working on a dam. After walking about 30-40 minutes, they did see the beaver. The real excitement came when they noticed a grizzly bear
walking the trail towards them. They were able to keep calm and get off the trail on the uphill side, and we're very thankful that the bear got off the trail going downhill. In fact they were so calm that they were able to take two pictures of the departing bear. They have proof of
sightseeing not on our regular schedule! - Laurel Johnson, Tour Director