Friday morning, May 28th

We spent yesterday in Denali National Park on a six-hour bus trip to the Toklat River and back. There were some great moments on the trip, the biggest of which was that we got to see the top of Mt. McKinley which at 20,320 feet high is the highest point in North America. I bought a t-shirt that declares that I’m in the 30 percent club of people lucky to have seen the top of the mountain. The top of the mountain is usually covered by clouds.

We had an up-close sighting of a mother grizzly and her yearling. They came down from some rocks and walked down the road in front of the bus as they crossed to the other side of the road.

There was a similar situation with a Dall sheep which was grazing on the side of the road and decided to walk down the middle of the road in front of the bus for quite a distance until going out into the brush to continue his grazing. Also saw moose, snowshoe rabbits, ground squirrels that look like small prairie dogs, a Willow Ptarmigan which is the state bird, and lots of Dall sheep. All in all, it was a great day.


Today we are heading to Soltodna on the Kenai Peninsula. Cliff arranged for a fishing trip tomorrow on the Kasliof River. Hope we will catch some King Salmon. Yum. Sunday morning we plan to go to Seward and take a cruise to see whales, seals, sea otters and glaciers. Cliff saw whales when he and Bill took the cruise. I REALLY want to see a whale.

Time to get the clothes out of the dryer and get on the road.