Denali Highway – Ulen Adventures

27 July 2018. Denali Highway

We left our campsite near the Maclaren River and started the slow four miles back to the Denali Highway. We were still disappointed that we didn’t see any moose or caribou on this road, despite having to repeatedly avoid piles of “signs” they left on the road.

When we got back to the Denali Highway, we found that the road construction had moved east such that we were now in the middle of a section that used a Pilot Car. I still don’t know if they figured out where we came from, but there we were trying to get through…

They were working to keep the Denali Highway in better shape. Here is a pilot car that we followed for awhile

We had another 10+ miles of dirt road, followed by an uneventful 28 miles of pavement to complete our journey across the Denali Highway. There were still nice vistas and the Alaskan range to our north. And we did catch sight of a fox running across the road!

Gulkana Glacier from Milepost 7 on Denali Highway

We eventually came to the Richardson Highway and turned north. Our goal for today was modest, just get a total of 100 miles driven for the day…

We finally saw Pink Salmon in the river- just north of our turn off to the Richardson Highway

We didn’t get very far traveling north on the Richardson Highway when we found a nice turn off for lunch. We went about 1 1/2 miles down a dirt road and had lunch in front of the Gulkana Glacier we had seen before from the Denali Highway.

The Richardson Highway runs north/south and has the Trans-Alaska Pipeline visibly running next to it some of the time. We stopped at an interpretive display and got some pictures. This section of the pipeline is in “earthquake country”, and the display talked about the construction techniques required to make sure that the shaking of the ground wouldn’t result in an oily mess.

How pipeline mounts on sliders – in earthquake fault area.

We found a campsite (yeah, we were the only ones here when we pulled in) at the Donnelly Creek Recreation Site and Campground. Nice and peaceful, at least until the rental motorhomes started showing up around 6pm. We did get a short hike done out to one of the “braids” on the Delta river.

26 July 2018. Denali Highway

26 July 2018. Denali Highway.

Today started out rainy and wet. The views of the mountains were even more obstructed. But, we packed up our campsite and meandered on down the highway.

Along the Denali Highway are several one lane wooden bridges. This one is over 1000 ft long

View of the 1000+ foot bridge crossing the Susitna River

The view was generally less forestry and more plains, because of the cloud cover, my general memory of this area was views of shrubbery and wetlands. We did catch site of a small group of caribou, but we really didn’t see a snow capped mountain all morning.

We were also surprised at the number of rental RV’s that were on this road. We even saw a tour bus!

We stopped to help a Swiss couple in a rental RV change a tire. Their spare was a little low, too. Chuck keeps being glad we have that air compressor!

We decided to leave the main highway and explore a bit, we headed north on Maclaren River Road – the book said 14 miles to the Maclaren Glacier.

Maclaren River “Road” to the Maclaren glacier. Crossed minor water a dozen times in the four miles we were on it.

Maclaren River “Road”, a bit rocky in places

Minor water crossing on Maclaren River Road

This time, the water crossing was not so minor. The first fork of the river crossing to the Maclaren Glacier that we chose not to do.

But we decided this was a great spot to camp -we were still hoping to see wildlife, and it was very peaceful and serene here!

Drone shot of our camping spot near Maclaren River

You can see both forks of the river you would have to cross to continue to the glacier. The book called it “treacherous and deep” we opted to stay on the west side.

From this panorama you can see from our campsite to the left, up to the glacier, and over to the beaver pond. No one else around.

A little closer look at just our campsite

One of two beavers we saw at the beaver pond near our campsite

It was a quiet night, raining on and off. But the only wildlife we saw here were the two beavers, some birds, moths and mosquitos.

25 July 2018. Denali Highway

25 July 2018. Denali Highway.

Crossing the Nenana River to leave the Denali Park area. The sign said, “just yesterday this water was glacier!”

Chuck getting ready to tackle the Denali highway: making sure the windshield is clean for great animal spotting and picture taking! He also took air out of the tires for a softer ride, and filled the fuel tanks.

Last look at Denali Mountain. Today it was covered in clouds, like it is 70% of the time.

The Denali Highway is 135 miles long, about 100 miles unpaved. We started in Cantwell (whole town consists of two gas stations and a gas station store!) and headed for Paxson (commercial building there closed in 2013). We read up on the road and decided to take it slow – try and avoid the rock chips and pot holes and enjoy the beauty, so we scheduled three days.

It really is a beautiful area – in many ways prettier than Denali National Park. But, I guess Denali National Park is where it’s at to protect the Dall Sheep, and I haven’t seen any Dall sheep over here… just a moose so far (and I was too slow with the new camera to capture a pic!). You start off with the Alaska Range mountains north of you (probably 10-15 miles) and drive among Spruce trees, ponds, streams, and Glacier Rivers for the first 40 miles (that’s as far as we went the first day). You can pull over almost anywhere once you hit the BLM land (20 miles in) (we picked a place a little further from the road to avoid any road dust). Then we had a very pleasant afternoon and evening. No gift shops, no tourists, no buses.

Lots of small lakes along the Denali Highway

I’m getting better with this camera – here is a close up of a Willow Ptarmigan (State bird of Alaska)

The goal of our finding our camping spot was to get a little more out of the way than the other drivers on the highway could reach. So, we drove down some rough embankments, and camped with a wonderful view of several Glaciers and the bottom half of mountains (many of the top halves were obscured by clouds).

Drone shot of us at our campsite near Milepost 96

Side view of our camping spot – near milepost 96

Our camping spot, View of West Fork Glacier

The West Fork Glacier in front of Mount Deborah – too cloudy to see the top of Mount Deborah

West facing view of our first night’s campsite.

View of Mt Nenana and some of the lower mountains of the Alaska Range

As we sat there that evening, Chuck spotted our second moose of the day, but we did not get that picture, either.