NewMexiKen

By NewMexiKen [from 1998, minor edits]

Alaska has 10 or 11 highways (some are gravel), each with a number and most also named after someone. The only road north out of Anchorage is Hwy 1, the Glenn Highway. The Glenn goes northeast for 310 miles until it meets the Alaska Highway (the AlCan) at Tok. Thirty-five miles northeast of Anchorage, Hwy 1 intersects with the Parks Highway, Hwy 3. The Parks Highway begins at that intersection, tends west for 50 miles, then north past Denali National Park and, after 325 miles, Fairbanks. We did every mile of Hwy 3 twice.

The area near the road on the Glenn Hwy for the first thirty miles out of Anchorage seemed more suburban than rural. Eventually the 6000-foot peaks of the closest of the Chugach Mountains loom imposingly a mile above you along the highway (which is a freeway) and the last few miles you pass through the Palmer Hay Flats State Game Refuge. Once you turn left onto Hwy 3 however, the roadside congestion and clutter is again frightful as you pass through Wasilla. For several miles the roadside businesses exist for the recreational vehicle trade. Drive-through espresso places abound. Eventually, but not before you are 50 miles from Anchorage, you escape and are truly in rural Alaska.

There is very little along Hwy 3, yet it is not wilderness either. It seemed to me that man has left his mark on every mile — homes, the odd business, the service stations and convenience stores, abandoned cars, trucks and bulldozers, the half-dozen communities (in 200 miles). Not without beauty and interest, but not untarnished either. It gets better the further north you go, especially when you get into Denali State Park at mile 132.

We took the detour to Talkeetna up a 14-mile spur road and back. Talkeetna (population 600) is the jumping off place for climbing Mount McKinley and some think, as close to the Northern Exposure Cicley as real Alaska gets. The village began in 1901, but became more settled when the Alaska Railroad was built from 1915-1923. We stopped for a beer in the Fairview Inn, where President Harding is said to have been poisoned after he hammered in the last spike at Nenana in July 1923. He died later in San Francisco. The Inn is on the National Register of Historic Places and has a fascinating collection of photos and memorabilia on the walls, half real Alaskiana and half seemingly tourist-attracting kitsch. The clientele appeared to be about half locals and half tourists also. The Inn has seven rooms with a public bath. The village also has a museum that charges $1 and the model of Mount McKinley alone was worth more than that. Unfortunately the National Park Service ranger station for climbers was closed. Most attempts for the top of the highest mountain in North America (20,320 feet) are in May and June.

There is rumored to be a lovely view of Mount McKinley from Talkeetna — they are about 50 miles apart. We wouldn’t know though, as the clouds continued to hang low, particularly around The Great One. Indeed, the rain began just as we stopped at the first view point in Denali State Park (itself 506 square miles). We thought we could see the ends of the glaciers at the foot of the mountain, forty miles away, but clouds obscured all above. The view of the Chulitna River in the foreground and the autumn gold cottonwood forests on the endless hills was magnificent enough.

We arrived at Denali National Park and Preserve just before 5 PM, the temperature around 40º with occasional rain. The clouds hung low on the mountains, which near the eastern edge of the park rise to 5000-5500 feet, about 3500 above the Nenana River. The Nenana parallels the Parks Hwy for the last 25 miles south of the Park and for 50 north of it. The visitor center was open until 7 on this, a busy weekend. (By Tuesday, it would be on a much more limited schedule as winter came on.)

The only available campsite that late in the day was at the entrance campground, Riley Creek. We selected a beautiful site, then headed out on the 30-mile round trip into the Park. The road in this area tends east-west with the turn around at 15 miles at the Savage River. The Savage is the first of several parallel rivers running north from the mountains toward the Yukon River. The road rises and falls with the shoulders of the mountains ranging in elevation from 2000 to 2600 feet. The mountains are twice that height in this area, so impressive enough in their rise from the surrounding terrain.

The hills were mostly alpine tundra (at 2500 feet!). Closer to 2000 there were cottonwood and spruce forests, mostly sparse, but with ample willow and other brush. The colors, even on the gray day, were magnificent — the green of the spruce, the gorgeous yellows and golds of the cottonwoods, the autumn reds of the brush and wild flowers. We felt being there in September had paid one reward, buses into the Park or not.

Traffic was active and, like all the parks, you stop when others have stopped to see what they have seen. About 14 miles out we saw moose, a bull and cow. We were amazed. We had seen moose in Wyoming, but these were giants compared to those. These moose were gone on our return trip a few minutes later but we found seven others on the way back, a bull and six cows so far as we could tell. We assumed that the bull moose, like the elk, acquires a harem during the mating season. They were very close to the road.

There was some brightening of the sky while we were watching these moose, so we doubled back to an overlook that promised a view of Mount McKinley. Using the GPS, the DeLorme atlas and the compass (and adjusting for magnetic north), we knew exactly where to look to see The Great One 70 miles away, but the clouds remained. Because of weather, the peak is only visible 30% of the time year around, so we were not alone in our disappointment. We never did see it.