Not surprising, we were all tired yesterday and decided to have a mellow day. The sky looked clear so we started the day with a drive into the park to see if we could spot the elusive Mt. McKinley. Apparently, only 30% of visitors see the mountain. The clouds hung low over that part of the park so we haven’t seen it yet but we enjoyed the scenery and saw three large bull moose with huge racks pretty close to the road. Then, we saw a grizzly walking down the center of the road. It literally walked right by Mike’s door of the truck, within 4′ of him. Watching its rolling swagger that close was beautiful and powerful.
Mike and I spent the afternoon cleaning the Casita and truck. Iris spent it sacked out on the bed, with one eye open just in case something interesting happened. On a whim, we checked whether there was room at Teklanika Campground. There was one spot left though several days after our current reservation ends, and we took it. Because it’s located within the restricted area of the park, once your vehicle is in the campground, it stays there until you leave at the end of your stay. You can buy a pass and ride any shuttle bus in the park for free as long as there is room, but you can’t take a bus back beyond the 15 mile checkpoint without buying another ticket to get back inside the restricted area. So, once you’re in, you’re in. Sounds great! We’ll spend the several days between reservations maybe doing some kayaking, which we can’t do here.
We had a really late lunch at Prospector’s Pizzaria and debriefed on the previous day’s drama. The debriefing took a while and several beers. We bought a chunk of fudge and some cookies and enjoyed a quiet evening with our treats.