Here's Some Interesting Facts About Alaska

OK, this is another travel weekend for me and I don't have time to do a full blog post about our travels.  Instead, I'll share some of the interesting facts we learned about Alaska while we were there.

Fannie Quigley's Dinner Table

First a little story about Fannie Quigley.  Fannie  is legendary in the Kantishna mining district. She arrived in 1906, and stayed until her death in 1944, at the age of 74. She staked her share of mining claims, and mined them, and although she had never shot an animal before she arrived in Kantishna, her prowess as a hunter became known throughout the Territory of Alaska. She learned to hunt caribou, sheep and moose, and to trap fox, wolves, wolverine and lynx. She was famous for her wilderness cooking, including her famous flaky pie crusts made from rendered bear lard. She grew remarkable gardens full of vegetables and flowers on the rocky slopes above timberline.

OK, here's some interesting facts about the largest state in the Union:

• State sport - Dog Mushing. 
• State Nickname - The Last Frontier (no, not the Final Frontier)
• The United States purchased Alaska from Russia in 1867 for $7.2 million, about 2 cents an acre. I bet they would like to take that deal back.
• Alaska has more than 80 potentially active volcanoes and on average 1,000 earthquakes registering 3.5 or more on the Richter scale occur in Alaska each year. 
• Longest Day: Barrow the sun rises on May 10th, it don't set for nearly 3 months.
• Shortest Day: Barrow when sun sets on November 18th, Barrow residents do not see the sun again for nearly two months.  Yikes!
• There are more than 3,000 rivers in Alaska and over 3 million lakes.
• 17 of the highest 20 mountains in the U.S. are in Alaska. It has 19 peaks over 14,000 feet. 
• Of the total 365 million acres of land that make up Alaska, less than one-twentieth of 1% is settled.   If you got lost your bones may never be found.
• The largest state in the union, Alaska is one-fifth the size of the Lower 48 and spans 2,400 miles east to west and 1,420 miles north to south.  Take that Texas.

We were there for two weeks and only covered a tiny little corner of this enormous state.  I see more Alaska vacations in our future.

Flying to Kantishna

As I said in the previous post, there is one road in Denali National Park and it runs 92.5 miles between the entrance and Kantishna.  Founded as a gold mining camp in 1905, Kantishna endured longer than similar communities in the area, having been constructed nearest to the source of the gold.  Today the only lodges in the park are at Kantishna   To get there today visitors can ride park buses for 6 1/2 hours or do as we did and fly in on Kantishna Air Taxi.  Being a once in a life time experience we decided to go with the "Grand Tour" through the park and hopefully fly by "The High One".

Two Buses on The Park Road

Our Cessna 206 had room enough for 5 passengers and a pilot.  We were limited to 25 pounds of luggage each, which meant I had to choose between clothes and camera gear.   Fortunately for me, June let me put some clothes in her bag.

This blog post is going to be short on words and long on photos.   There is no way I can adequately describe the beauty of Denali from the air.  Hopefully these photos can give you some idea of the grandeur  and majesty.

Storms On The Horizon

Once we took off we were awed by the scenery from above.   The fall reds had just started to appear a couple days earlier.  From the air the tundra looked like it was painted by yellow, green and red brushes.   Our pilot told us what we were seeing as we traveled deeper into the park, but most of what he told us has faded from our memories.   What we do have are lots and lots of photos taken looking out from the plane.

Fall Colors

I don't know the exact route that we took and can't identify the rivers for you.   The pilot was flying around mountains and through valleys to dodge the storms.  This we greatly appreciated because we didn't have time to take Dramamine before the flight.  At one point he said "Hey look at that canyon.  I've never seen that before."   Seems we were in new territory for all of us.

An Undiscovered Canyon

Sun Trying To Break Through

The skies were mostly overcast but occasionally the sun would break through and add dramatic lighting to the already dramatic scenery.

Heard of Caribou

We flew over a heard of Caribou who didn't seem to mind the plane.   Until then I didn't realize how high we were.  The mountains are so massive that I had lost all perspective and thought we were closer to the ground than we were.

Rainbow and Braided River

The alternating rain and sunshine provide us with a view of several rainbows from above.  June and I were passing the camera back of forth to get picture of all of them.   We didn't want to miss a thing.

Muldrow Glacier

What looks like the surface of some alien planet is the Muldrow Glacier in  retreat.  Glaciers retreat when their terminus does not extend as far down valley as it previously did and their ice melts more quickly than snowfall can accumulate and form new glacial ice. Dirt accumulates on top of the ice that is left behind making it appear to be a strange landscape.  Higher temperatures have been causing many glaciers around the world to retreat recently.  If you have seeing a glacier on your "bucket list" I suggest you not wait too long.  They are retreating at an increasing rate and many will be gone in less than a dozen years.

Edge of Braided River

Many of the rivers in Denali are braided rivers, which have multiple channels and bars created when there is more sediment than the water can carry.  The braids are constantly changing and moving as the water levels rise and fall.   In this photo you can see the river, with the gravel bars below and the old river bed above.

Lakes Everywhere

Water can be found most everywhere in Denali National Park with approximately 12,200 lakes and ponds and 18,700 miles (30,000 km) of streams.

Top of McKinley

About 45 minutes into our flight our pilot said he thought the clouds might be breaking around Mt. McKinley.  He climbed above the clouds and there off in the distance was the top of The High One.   It was just barely peaking out above the clouds.  The tallest mountain in North America (20,320 ft or 6,194 m) creates it's own weather and is often wrapped clouds.

A Braided River

After our McKinley flyby we saw the landing strip and our flight was over too soon.  Before too long we were at the Skyline Lodge in Kantishna, which was to be our home for the next few days.  The photo below was taken a couple days after we arrived when the skies were clear and Mount McKinley could be seen off in the distance.  Only about 25% of the people who visit the park actually see the mountain.  We were blessed with clear skies driving up from Anchorage and one day of clear skies in the park.

Skyline Lodge and McKinley

The lodge is run by the Kantishna Air Taxi.   There were about 10 - 12 guest there and we met some nice people who became new friends.   

This completes only the third day of our two week vacation.  There is so much more to come.

Our First Denali Experience

Up to this point we have only seen Mount Denali from a distance and have not gotten into Denali National Park itself.   Today is the day!   With great anticipation we made our way through road construction (remember, there are only two seasons and we were there for the road construction season) to the park entrance.   We have about 6 hours until our flight into the interior of the park.

Beginning of Fall

The park is huge - 6,075,106 acres.  For comparison, the Great Smoky Mountains National Park is only 522,427 acres.  As big as it is, there is only one road in the park.  The park road stretches 92.5 miles from the entrance to the old mining community of Kantishna.  Cars are only allowed on the first 15 miles of the park road.  After that the road turns to a narrow gravel road and only park buses are allowed past mile 15.   We had some time and decided to drive the park road and see what we could see.

It was August 23, and fall had already come to Denali.   Most of the fall color was in the ground cover, bushes and the red and purple Fire Weed which grows prolifically.  There are few large trees  in the park because the thick moss acts as an insulating blanket keeping the ground permanently frozen below the first few inches.

Frozen Tundra

Moose Jam

Not many miles into the park we ran into a familiar scene.  Anyone who has tried to drive around Cades Cove in the Smokies knows what a Bear Jam is.   Someone  spots a bear, stops their car, often in the middle of the road, and all the other cars jam up behind.   We had found a Moose Jam!   If someone on a park bus spots wildlife the driver stops so everyone can get pictures.   Still being in the first 15 miles we joined one bus and the other 20 or so cars to check out the moose.

Our first experience in Denali was spectacular.  There were several cows and a couple bulls not far from the road.   One of the bulls still had velvet on his antlers and other other had lost most of his, with some shreds still hanging on.  They didn't seem to mind all the cars and people, but instead munched away on the brush.   It was not raining at this point and I was able to get some nice clear shots.

A Big Guy

All at once we heard a small dog barking.  It was probably inside someone's car with the windows rolled down.  When the moose heard this little yapper they took off.   Keep in mind a bull Moose can weigh as much as 1,100 pounds or 500 kg.  These large beasts were scared off by something that weighed a couple pounds.

Running Away

What a great start to our Denali Experience.  

Aspens damaged by Porcupines.

We wanted to take in  a Ranger led hike through the woods to the Sled Dog Kennel so we headed back to the visitor center.   These ranger led activities are always informative.  Among other things we learned that Porcupines love to eat the bark of Aspen and Cottenwood trees.

We also learned that the Red Squirrels love mushrooms and will preserve them by putting them in trees to dry.  They will then store them to be eaten later in the winter when most of the food is covered by several feet of snow.

Mushroom In A Tree

As I said earlier, there were mushrooms everywhere.   Here are a few we saw on our hike.

A Strange One

Colorful Groundcover

We thought the hike time was round trip but learned that it was one way!   We had just enough time to say hi to the park sled dogs.   These are working dogs.  The Park Service uses dog sleds to get into the interior of the park during winter.  No motorized snow mobiles here.   A few days later we came back for a sled dog demonstration.

Snoopy was on to something

A beautiful dog

Willow Ptarmigan

We had to really move quickly to get back to the Visitor Center and catch our plane to Kantishna at 4:30.   Part way down we came up on a flock (?) of Willow Ptarmigan, which is the Alaska State Bird.  These chicken like birds are mottled in the summer to blend in with their surroundings, like this hiking trail.  In the winter they turn solid white.  

One Alaska town was to be named after this plentiful bird. The town was settled by gold miners in the late 1800s and in 1902 the local post office was established requiring a community name. Due to the prevalence of Ptarmigan in the area that name was suggested as the official name for the new community. However, the spelling could not be agreed on and Chicken was used to avoid embarrassment.  The town of Chicken is still there with a population of 7.  Really.  I couldn't make this stuff up.


The adventure was about to get more exciting.   Come back tomorrow for tales of our fist bush plane flight by the mountains, valleys and glaciers of Denali National Park!