Day 20

We woke up today and used the fresh blueberries to make blueberry pancakes. They were so good. We ate them all. It was an extraordinarily windy day again. We packed up and drove the 7 more miles to Denali. The road right before the entrance was filled with the typical tourist trap type places. We entered the park, filled our tanks and Amy registered for the campsite. Denali is different in that you can only drive 15 miles into the park. The rest of the way you must buy a ticket on an Aramark shuttle bus for 35 bucks. Seems like a rip-off but we will see. We went to the visitor center and registered for a junior ranger program for Grant so he would have some activities to do while we are here. We noticed a sign that said there were sled dog demonstrations at the kennels. Apparently in the winter, the rangers access the park primarily by dog sled. We missed the first presentation and so we went back to the trailer and had lunch. We caught the next bus and that took us to the dog kennels. There were probably 60 dogs or so. Some on chains and some in kennels. Some of them didn’t like small children, and they lunged at the gates as Grant and Alex went by. One particular one named Chinook, who happened to be a lead dog looked especially fierce. It was interesting to see the personality differences in the dogs depending on where they ran in the dog team. After we got to walk the kennels for a while, the rangers hooked up a small team and ran the sled around a gravel loop. It was funny as the other dogs in the kennels went nuts when they heard the word demonstration. They knew a few of them would be picked to come out and work and that’s what they love to do. Grant seemed to enjoy that. We came back and grilled some burgers at the campsite. We lit a campfire and made smores. Grant of course was fascinated by the fire. I will have to watch him closely. Amy and Shari have begun to research different types of edible berries. They plan to pick a whole mess of them I suppose. Tomorrow we will plan on a hike and a relaxing day.