Weekend in Denali – 2010
So, I woke up Friday morning in my crappy apartment, got up, and by 3 PM, I was looking at this:
If you don’t recognize it, that is the tallest peak in North America. It’s Athabascan name is “Denali”, meaning The Great One. In the U.S. it is known as Mount McKinley. 20,320 feet tall, it towers above all of the other peaks. A relatively young mountain compared to others, but still one of the tallest in the world.
It is a rare day that the mountain is “out”, but we got lucky. It was a beautiful, clear, day, with light, cotton candy, clouds. Considering how much rain and clouds had been in the area for the last several weeks, the timing couldn’t have been better.
Of course, I couldn’t stop there. My main goal was to go white water rafting. I have been wanting to do that for about 6 or 7 months. I signed up for the 7:30 AM time slot, and hoped to not get bumped. We had a couple of girls from the office meet up with us, and they wanted to go, too. We hadn’t signed them up, but we were told to have them show up, and they could go, as long as there was space available.
After the flight, the 5 of us (3 drivers, and 2 office people), went to dinner at one of the Dinner shows on the properties. It was an interesting, and entertaining show, but most importantly, free food. And the food was REALLY good! After that,
we went out and had some drinks. I had a Margarita 
. It was blue???? WTF? They make it with Blue Curacao, but it tasted fine. I didn’t like the girly look to it, but it gave me a nice feeling for the evening 
. I was the old guy in the group, and they all wanted to go to bed early! LOL! We were still in bed around 12:30 – 1:00 AM. Yes, we all had different rooms. Oh, and here is a view from my room.
I got up in time, had some juice, met up with friends from work, and we all got on! It was all I hoped it would be. My FIRST time ever rafting, and it was on the coldest river that anyone white water rafts on. We all had drysuits on, and they helped, except for our feet. We even had a guy fall of in the first 5 minutes. The guide got him right back on, and we continued on. The guide TRIED to get me and a friend to take a swim by hitting a couple of spots just right. He almost succeeded, but determination, and the other rafters kept us onboard! I don’t think I would mind if it were warm water. The water temperature was a chilly 35 degrees F.
That is the same river in the picture above that we went on.
After that, it was time to ATV! I was the only one who was inexperienced, but I told them to just go, and I will keep up. They did, and I did. It was a good group, and again, we lucked out. I had never ridden an ATV in terrain like that before. It was nothing too extreme, but it was more than I had expected. I did enjoy it, and I would do it again in a heartbeat. There were some really nice views. We rode like hell through a dry riverbed, and up some good hills. I want an ATV now .
After that, they all had to go back and go to work. So, I had one more night, but in a different hotel. I got employee discounts at both places, so, now I can give first hand descriptions of either place to our guests! I liked the one I stayed in on the 2nd night far better. The view was not as nice, but the room itself was far more comfortable. I didn’t like how the hotel was spread out on the property, and I even got lost, but the nice room made up for all of that.
I signed up for a Glacier Landing on the last afternoon, to give me something to do before the train ride back home. I got bumped from that one. I also talked to the guy who was picking people up for it, he told me to keep trying, even when I have an overnight trip in Denali. Sometimes I get to do that for work. All in all, I needed the break, and I had a really nice time. I didn’t want to leave, but I couldn’t afford to stay.
I recently got tomorrow’s dispatch… I have an overnight stay in Denali tomorrow night . I love my “job”
Thanks for reading,
Brad
