Alaska 2011 - Denali Pre-Trip

Fairbanks and Denali National Park

August 27 – September 2, 2011

We were excited to be back traveling with Lindblad on another Photo Expedition. The pre-trip option to Fairbanks and Denali National Park was enticing since we had not been to this area before. We flew to Fairbanks a day early to spend an extra night at Pike’s Waterfront Lodge.

August 28

Iditarod dogs pull a four-wheeler as practice

To fill the extra day we took the Riverboat Discovery tour. This is a sternwheeler that goes down the Chena River to the Tanana River. Along this 3 1/2 hour trip we went by the home of the late Iditarod Champion, Susan Butcher, and her husband told us about the dogs and gave them a workout pulling a four-wheeler.

Many of the homes along the river had floatplanes parked nearby as flying is a main means of transportation in Alaska. As a demo for us, a bush pilot took off beside us, circled and landed alongside. He repeated this again.

On the way back up river we stopped at an Athabascan Indian Village where we took a walking tour, stopping at many buildings where their culture and survival skills were discussed and demonstrated. It was a sunny afternoon and an informative enjoyable time.

In the evening we met the rest of the group for dinner and a briefing. Afterward we were driven a ways out of town where we could see a section of the large oil pipeline, up close.

August 29

The next morning after breakfast we loaded the luggage onto the bus and then visited the University of Alaska Museum of the North before starting the drive to and through Denali National Park to North Face Lodge. We stopped at the park entrance visitors’ center to look around and eat our sack lunches. Everything was moved over to the lodge’s buses for the 89 mile, seven hour drive, mostly on a windy dirt road, to the lodge.

It was a beautiful sunny day with scattered clouds. The foliage on the small trees and shrubs had turned beautiful yellows, oranges and reds. 

We saw Mt. McKinley in the distance. We came across moose and brown bear on the drive. There was a picnic style dinner along the way and we had desert when we arrived at the lodge.

August 30

North Face Lodge

After a good night’s sleep and a nice breakfast when we met the camp staff, we had a briefing and they outlined the day’s options. We chose the leisure walks around the area and a trip to Wonder Lake. Since it was quite cool and things were damp from recent rain we wore our raingear and knee-high waterproof boots. With the foliage colors and the mountain peaking out from the clouds, it was a fun day to be a photographer. In the evening, after a storm passed by, the sky turned brilliant colors.

August 31

Sometime shortly after midnight I woke up and noticed that my heart was beating irregularly. This continued the rest of the night and by 5:30 I sent Paul out to see if someone could come evaluate me. Fortunately, the camp manager had EMT training and came quickly to check on me. We decided that I really did need to get to a medical facility to be checked. The options were limited: a 90-mile drive to the main road and then what, or take the close-by Kantishna Air Taxi to Fairbanks and then a flight to Anchorage. This was the one we chose and preceded to get packed to leave. In the mean time, my heart went back into normal rhythm.

Mt. McKinley from the Cessna flight to Fairbanks.

All the timings were perfect. The Cessna flight to Fairbanks took about 45 minutes and there was less than an hour before the Alaska flight took off for Anchorage for its 45-minute flight. After a few hours at the emergency room and some tests, and with consultation with my doctor at home, I was cleared to continue the trip. No real cause was ever determined for the problem.

The family who owns North Face Lodge also owns The Parkside Guest House, a delightful B&B close to downtown Anchorage. We were able to stay there the next two nights until we could reconnect with the group when they came out of the park. All worked out well, but it wasn’t an experience I’d like to repeat.

September 1

Parkside Guest House, Anchorage

Since we now have two unexpected days in Anchorage, we made the best of it by checking out the town and visiting the Native Heritage Center. We had lunch and dinner in town before the ten-block walk back to the Parkside B&B.

September 2

We rejoined the group at the Hilton. The B&B manager took us, and our luggage, to the hotel in the late morning after we had the unexpected chance to do some laundry. The Hilton held our luggage for us until check-in time. It was cooler and raining some of the time so we had made the right decision to save the Anchorage Museum for this day and enjoyed it and being inside.

We were checked in to our room and had had dinner by the time the group pulled in on the train from Denali at about 8:30 pm. We watched them arrive from our window. It was good to be back with the group and we got the briefing on the next day’s activities, which included the flight to Sitka to board the National Geographic Sea Lion and start the Twelve Day Photo Expedition of Alaska, British Columbia and the San Juan Islands.  We were with Lindblad Expeditions and its photo team of Jack and Rikki Swenson and National Geographic Photographer Flip Nicklin.

That's it for now. Grace and Paul