Denali Finale

The weather finally broke this morning and it is a lovely day.
Yesterday we arrived into Denali after a 4 hour train ride from McKinley Lodge.  A fairly nice trip with different scenery to the Rocky Mountaineer.
On arrival at the Denali Lodge we quickly tried to find some afternoon activities.  Connie went to a Husky Homestead and I did a photography workshop with a local boy by the name of Terry Body.  Here is his website www.terryboydphotography.com for anyone who is interested.


We both had a good time and ended up having pizza at 10:30.  The sky was very clear and the stars were out but no southern cross!!  They do have this thing called the big dipper though ;-)  We thought we might get to see the northern lights but lucked out.  We need to stay a bit longer and maybe travel a bit further north...

This morning we headed off for a 3.5 hour hike on one of the nearby mountains.  It was still a lovely clear day with absolutely no wind but as we were in the shadow of the mountain it was -5 degress celcius, apparently!  It didn't feel that cold to me but then I did have thermals, jumper and jacket on.  Our guided trip was nice and we ate many berries on the way.  Many were frozen and had a nice taste about them.  The only wildlife we say was a squirrel, some sort of bush chicken ants and lots of moose and sheep poo but no moose or sheep.The leaves were literally falling off the trees as we walked the track.  It was pretty amazing and as this only happens over 2-3 days in the year it was kind of special that we were there for it.
The wind is picking up now and the clouds are closing in as we await our motorcoach for Fairbanks and the final part of our tour.  Connie is getting excited but I'm not.  My efforts to convince Connie we should stay to experience a true Alaskan winter have fallen on deaf ears.  Winter is not far away now and all the locals say it's coming early this year.  It certainly feels it when the wind starts up and the chill factor drops to below zero.  It's amazing to think that in just 2 to 3 weeks this place will be white with snow and temperatures as low as -50 degrees!  Just impossible for us to imagine.
Bye for now and good luck Alonso in the Italian F1 race tomorrow.