Friday, August 12, 2016
Photos
Super 8 was great! The bed was as comfy as at home. The room
was large and comfortable. The shower drained a little slowly so it wasn’t
perfect. All the personnel were friendly and personable. It was clean, quiet,
convenient and a good value. A good choice and I can recommend it.
We went to bed last night at 2am. I had thought to sleep in
but Clay was up at 6am. We went up to the 2nd floor for our free
breakfast and ate our fill of easy items. We got the 8am shuttle back to the
airport to pick up our Thrifty rental car. We got a Chevy Sonic. It is fine,
but Clay said he wouldn’t buy one.
We were on Hwy. 1 headed north out of Anchorage by 9am. Our
goal was to sightsee on our way to Denali. We did. We wound up spending about 2
hours in Wasilla! We went to the Harley Davidson store, the Iditarod Trail
Headquarters, Gold Rush Jewelry Design Center, saw the Princess tour train to
Denali passing the train station, had pizza and brewed root beer and beer at
Last Frontier Brewery. It was a $28 lunch! We shared a small sausage and
pepperoni pizza! It was all good and filling, but geez. I guess you have to
assume everything is imported and therefore expensive. (This pizza had a strong
garlic tomato sauce and while we liked it and ate it all, it would haunt us
both for days!) Talking about expensive.
Gas was $2.95/gallon in Healy.
The rest of the day-long drive was a drive. We stopped a
couple other times for photo ops and potty breaks and twice for road work lane
closures. We only got a partial view of the sun breaking through clouds on Denali
from the South View Point. We arrived at the Denali National Park Visitor
Center between 5-6pm. We wandered and watched a short film. Tomorrow we have
booked some very expensive independently operated 13+ hour bus excursion to
Kantishna Roadhouse and back. We still haven’t figured out how we made these
choices back in February. Clearly they were mistakes. We are not happy with our
decision to spend 2 nights here at Denali Park Village that we paid over $750
for in February. It is not as nice as Super 8 was in any way! How sad is that?
Again, I’m tired and I have another early morning tomorrow and I’m just trying
to get this down so, I’m glossing over details. But, 2nd floor no
elevator and no one asked us if that would work for us. No wifi in the room. We
also can’t get it from the Lodge where they claim it is included. Go figure.
Then there is the question of how we paid 3 times the price the NPS charges for
a similar tour into Denali. I have no idea. Clay is accepting the blame for
now. Anyway…
We walked next door to the Lodge to check out the dining
options as well as to the little commercial area where they have a market. It
did not have the take-out food the guest book in the room described. The Saloon
at the Lodge did not have the promised hot dogs, burgers and Alaskan beers. The
main dining area provided the food to the Saloon which made it in effect the
self-seating area for the main seating area. The menu was limited and
ridiculously expensive. There was nothing I wanted to eat there anyway and not
at those prices. Halibut was $46 or $47, salmon was about $36, and fish &
chips was $30. I suggested that even though it was late for us and we’d driven
all day that we get in the car and try somewhere else. We drove past the DNP
entrance to the Princess Lodges area. I believe it is called Glitter Gulch or
something like that. It was crowded! It was tacky and unappealing. I suggested
that we drive on north to Healy. It is a small town and I hoped it would be
quieter, less expensive and more authentic. We drove around and saw a busy
brewpub, a busy Thai food trailer and Rose’s Café. After going back and forth
and filling the gas tank, we went to Rose’s Café. It was comfortable with
friendly service and more reasonable prices. Clay had $15 fish & chips! I
had a $10.50 grilled ham & cheese sandwich that came with a huge side of
fries. We both had so many fries that we couldn’t come close to finishing them.
They were really good though. Rose’s closed at 9pm and we walked in at 8:30pm,
so we were the last customers to leave! We
were able to use Rose’s wifi for Internet and Clay downloaded email to his
phone. We received an email from Crystal before we left. Crystal Cruises has
some kind of thing with apps that we don’t understand how it will work aboard.
But, to use the apps they must be downloaded before you board as they won’t let
us use onboard Internet to download them Then once aboard you are supposed to
be able to access the daily program, event schedules, restaurant menus and
other things you would want to know aboard the ship from your phone or tablet.
Clay has a couple of the apps already installed. The email announced a new app
designed specifically for the North West Passage cruise called Crystal
Connection. If you downloaded it before boarding then they could notify you via
your device of auroras, or polar bear or walrus or whale sightings or zodiac
opportunities, etc. Lucky timing as Clay was able to download and install this
app before we left Rose’s Café.
Good night, tomorrow is another long busy day and I don’t have Internet for now! I’ll post this when I can.
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