gold dredge 8
We did meet with the Recreation Department rep who said they had several spots available. So we have a good backup plan.
Update: There was a cancelation at the River View RV Park, so we are good for a couple of days here. I will be checking to see if we can get into Denali early.
So, now that we have some time, we went on a couple of tours. First, we stopped at “Gold Daughters” for some lessons in panning for gold. Very helpful and for $20.00 you can pan all day from pay dirt brought in from an actual claim.
We stopped panning practice to head over to “Gold Dredge 8” which was scheduled for 1:30. Great tour over two hours long. You take a train ride to the dredge and along the way they stop and explain the various methods used to harvest and process the pay dirt that contains gold. Then you pull into the dredge and they give you some pay dirt to pan. They naturally have a very large gift shop, another shopping opportunity for you know who.
Panning for Gold
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Alyeska pipeline
We stopped by the Alaskan Pipeline on the way to the panning lessons. Pretty interesting, the vertical devices you see on the pipeline, I always thought collected heat to warm the pipeline. Come to find out they contain refrigeration material that helps the ground permafrost stay frozen and stabilize the mounts.
4th of july
7/4/17 – Day off! Decided to just relax today with no schedule. Weather was a little mucky, so we decided to go out to dinner instead of BBQ. Local restaurant The Turtle Club, was a recommendation in the “Things to do” brochure so we headed there. Looked shaky as we traveled to the same area as Dredge 8 and the Gold Daughters, but it turned out to be very good. I had prime rib and Linda of course had the Alaskan King Crab legs. Went to a local lake and caught a nice trout. Kind of a nasty day for fishing, but the fish were biting.
Turtle Club
7/5/17 – Took another day off, with a little shopping. Bought some new lures and went to one of the lakes at the Air Force Base to try them out. No luck, either no fish, bad lures or operator error!
north pole
So fishing no good, and we are at the North Pole, we may as well go and see Santa Clause! We stopped by his house and pretty amazing experience to see all the Christmas decorations in July. We did let him know that Brayden had been doing pretty good this year and he graduated from preschool in June.
DENALI NATIONAL PARK
7/10/17 – Left the North Pole and headed to Denali National Park. We didn’t get into the RV Park we wanted so we’ll see what we get.
7/11/17 – Headed off into Denali for a RECON run in the jeep to see what is there and how far you can travel in your POV. We have seen the differences and how reservation on bus trips are required to see the best part of some of these parks. We found you can drive in about 15 miles which doesn’t show you much. We went back to the Visitor Center and were lucky enough to catch the last bus to the Denali Sled Dog Kennel. Very cool, they still use these dogs during the winter to patrol the park.
7/12/17 – We have reservations for a bus tour into the park that goes in 66 miles to the Eileson Visitor Center. Now 66 miles on the bus is scheduled to take “Nine Hours”! The speed limit in the park is 25mph, so it is a slow go. Early rise for us to get to the park and catch the bus, we have to be there at 0720 and it is not just around the corner. We stayed at McKinley RV Park which is 25 miles from the visitor center.
There is a lot of wildlife here as you would expect, Here are some we saw on the Denali tour. A couple were above average and not normally seen in the park, let alone on the tour. The first was a Golden Eagle that swooped in to pick up some road kill right in front of the bus, and the second was a Black Wolf that was trotting alongside the road for about 1/2 hour. Now there are only 72 wolves in the Denali Park which is 6 million acres. The bus driver who has been guiding tours for 7 years had never seen the Black Wolf on tour and was more excited than any one else. It was the end of an 8 hour bus ride and we all just wanted to get back, but drivers have a rule they cannot pass wildlife on the road. Linda got the only shot of the Golden Eagle as it flew away.
It is very hard to describe the beauty of this park.
"the magic bus"
If you know the story of Chris McCandless and the Magic Bus, the movie “Into the Wild” tells the story and you can find it on YouTube. While we were at the park in Denali the bus that was used in the movie was at the “49th State” bar and restaurant. Here are the pictures. The actual bus has been the subject of much controversy because people try and follow the path of Chris McCandless Into the Wild and died trying. There is a picture of Chris sitting in front of the bus. He died there because he could not leave the area due to the swollen river and the illness he had from eating the wrong local plants. I have placed a link below to the movie on Netflix. It's great if you have not seen the adventures of "Supertramp". The is a quote by Chris McCandless on the back of our coach. We received many horn honks as we traveled through out Alaska.
Fort Alaska
7/13/17 – On the road again headed to Willow. We are going to meet Jeff Maichel and check out his “Fort Alaska”. I met Jeff on a plane trip while traveling for La Mesa RV. Jeff described how he went online and purchased this property which is 10 acres and has 9 out buildings. Now get this, he paid $140,000 for this property. It was some kind of fish development center for the state where they counted the salmon. Jeff is flying in tomorrow and has invited us to come by and get the tour. Our stay at the Mat-Su RV park currently ends on the 15th, and we may move over to Fort Alaska for a few days and see how the fishing is. We are finding that the salmon run is off to a slow start, but I am sure we can get tied into them.
Did some fishing there in his private river. Looks beautiful, but I didn’t catch anything. The property is something to see, and he has spent considerable funds improving it. It is listed on VRBO Vacation Rental By Owner for $200 per night. He has three complete two bedroom apartments completed, and working on three more. A lot more pictures, I will try and insert them after I download them from the camera. Good visit, and got an invite to his new house on the water in Ketchikan. You can see some of the old equipment is still there as well as the renovations he has started on some of the existing out bldgs that came with the property.
We stayed in a real nice RV park with the biggest pull thru spaces I have ever been in. 18′ wide with 4 complete setups of electrical, water and sewer, so you can pull in either direction. Mat-Su RV park in Willow AK, five stars!
The link below will take you to Jeff's web page
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