Talkeetna and Hatcher Pass Road

Day 8 June 23

Still rainy, and there were some wildfires in the area, so we had smoke added to the mix. Not much visibility at all.We did some badly needed laundry, then drove to Talkeetna. This is the staging area for all the climbers that try to climb Mt McKinley. They are flown from here, to a glacier where the base camp is. I can't imagine camping on a glacier, but apparently it is necessary to climb the peak. It takes about 3 weeks from the time they are dropped off at the glacier, to get to the summit, and only about 1/2 of those who try it are successful. There are also flightseeing tours available, and if the weather had been better, we would have taken one. Talkeetna is a cute, old Alaska town, and there is lots of history there. In front of almost every shop, there was a moose of some kind,decorated to reflect the shop. There was a Hershey Kiss moose (in front of a candy shop), a "red Hat" moose, a MickeyMoose, and many others. Eventually they would all be auctioned off for charity. This one was the Wildflower moose, in front of the Wildflower Cafe, where we ate lunch. We did some shopping, ate lunch ( wonderful seafood chowder!), then decided to drive back down towards Hatcher Pass Road.

This road is a very curvy, gravel road, and we

got a lot of conflicting advice about whether

we should travel it in the RV. Finally we talked to a few locals that said it had just been graded and was fine so we decided to go for it. We came across a place called the "Albino Hare" and we stopped. It turned out to be gardens,and a small art shop. The owner was very friendly, and showed us all her plants. This is the blue Poppy she was very proud of.

There are lots of beaver ponds, and we stopped and watched them for a while. We did see the beavers, but the minute I opened my camera to take a picture, it heard the click, slapped it's tail on the water and was gone! At the summit, there was a beautiful lake, which still had ice on it.

We drove the entire road, and ended up staying at the same campground we stayed at 2 nights ago.

This is the creek that ran by our campsite.