We went up the road 10 miles or so to a place called 'Fox' which is where the pavement ends if you're going north in Alaska. I wanted to ride all the way to the end of the paved roads and we were pretty close (actual end of pavement was further up and we had a good place to turn around so we did so while it was safe)
Near Fox is a turnoff to a small park where the Alaska Pipeline runs through. We spent some time there checking out the displays among 3 or 4 tour buses worth of other tourists. I have always been fascinated by the challenges faced by the designers of the pipeline and there were information signs as well as the actual pipeline to look at. They had many of the configurations of supports and insulation shown in the 1/4 mile stretch that was on display, so I was able to walk around them and appreciate just how big the thing is and how well engineered it is. While looking at the information boards I discovered that the principal designer of the pipeline is a Purdue Graduate. Go Purdue!
After visiting Fox we headed back through Fairbanks, checked out of our hotel and once again had to deal with heavily loaded motorcycles. I took a picture of the bed in the hotel room with all of my stuff on it. What you don't see is the tools and equipment I keep on my scooter - it's a tool bag, extra batteries, extra face shield, towels, spray cleaner, a bottle of oil, spray lubricant, two gas cans and a fuel pump!
I would have loved to have made the whole trip with an empty one, but at least with all of my camping gear we can stop whenever we want and camp comfortably. We flew down the highway to Denali (maybe a little too fast) and while dad waited on a waiting list to get in to see a ranger to register for a tour I went and found a campground and booked us in for a couple nights. Then we could enjoy our 8 hour tour without worrying about all of our stuff on our bikes in the parking lot.
The next day we boarded a bus that took us 60+ miles into the park to a visitor center near Mt. McKinley AKA Denali. Denali means "the great one" but we didn't get to see it today because of the rain. We did see a few grizzly bears, Dall Sheep, Caribou (Reindeer), a wolf and a moose.
Denali NP seemed unique to me because there is just one road into it, about 90 miles long, and it's not paved except near the entrance. You can get on a bus, ride out to almost anywhere along the road, and hop off the bus and hike into the wilderness. The driver will radio HQ and tell them where you left the bus and you are on your own. They have you view videos on how to deal with the wildlife and you rent a food storage container to carry your provisions (they also have another similar one for your waste to go in...) We didn't go through that program because we stayed on the bus out and back except for visiting the two information centers along the route. I was really amazed that people can go out with the bears and wolves, but the animals are not interested in the humans because they are not an opportunity to obtain food. They said that once an animal associates humans with food that animal must be destroyed. Apparently the programs are a success as the animals completely ignored us and we didn't hear any reports of hikers being attacked.
Today we are heading down the George Parks Highway to Anchorage and then to Girdwood, AK. I will be one fuel can short the rest of the trip - one of them (just filled!) flew off the bike the other day and sprayed gas all over the highway. Dad managed to avoid it but ended up stopping off the road on the very soft gravel shoulder and it gave way under the weight of his bike. Fortunately we were able to get the bike back up onto the road, but unfortunately he will need a new paint job on his fairing and right saddlebag. I felt terrible about it. All dad managed to fling at me was little water bottles and I'm tossing napalm bombs at him! Today I will have everything back on the bike so one item can't become unstable like that.
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