Riley Creek Campground, Denali National Park, Day 40 June 11, 2013

Yesterday morning we left Teklanika Campground and headed out to the Park entrance. We had more beautiful scenery, but saw no animals. The day started out cloudy, but soon turned into a nice sun shinny day.

 We  needed to dump our holding tanks and refill with water. While I was there, a fifth wheel trailer moved over from another line to behind me. I didn't think too much about it, and went back and apologized for taking so long. He told me that it was OK because he was entertaining himself watching the other campers dump. I thought that was a little bit of a strange statement until Cindy told me later what was going on. It seems that there were two rental motor homes trying to dump and they had no idea how to proceed. They were trying to help each other and were having a hard time. She said it brought memories of the movie RV. It seems to me the rental places should do a better job of showing people how to use their RV. I guess everyone has to learn sometime. It brings back memories of my first time many, many dumps ago.

We wanted to stay at Riley Creek more than the one day I had paid for and went in to get more days. The line was so long that I decided to go and get a camp space and then go back after to get the longer stay. We had no sooner pulled into the campground, when we saw a mother moose with a baby walking on the road. Cindy got some good shots of them, and we were glad we hadn't waited to get the extra days. When we went back, they only had one day available, but were told to check back later because they do get cancellations.

After we got through with that, we wanted to go back to the small town and visit some of the shops we had seen on the way to the Park. They are very touristy, but were still fun to visit. One had fudge samples and kept asking if I would like to sample other flavors. With all the samples he gave out, there was no need to buy any. The samples were good sized and I soon got fudged out.

We found one store that sold fabric. She had her own designs for panels, and had some fabrics unique to Alaska.  We just had to have a few yard of the fabric and two of her panels. Surprise!! One, she told us was a composite if several pictures of Mt McKinley with various animals which was here own design. The other was Fireweed pictures for embellishing the other panel. Other than the price of the MT. McKinley panel her material prices were quite reasonable. We thought that panel would make quite a striking memory quilt,so we bought it also.

We found a coffee shop that had free wi-fi that was extremely fast, which allowed us to catch up on our posts. It is the Black Bear Coffee Shop, located on the board walk across the highway from the Princess Lodge.

 We were going to the 5:00 Cabin Night all you can eat dinner show, which was one of the coupons in the Alaska Tour Saver Book. After all the shopping, we had some time to walk through the Princess Lodge and visit some of their shops.

  By then it was time to go get our tickets to the dinner show, so we went down to the Lodge owned by Holland America to get our tickets to the show. Princess also has a dinner show, but doesn't have a coupon. The food was served family style and was a fun evening.

The waiter/entertainers.

This was our waiter, Charlie.

One of the views from a turn out by the Lodge.

 After the show, we had seen a Lodge high up on the mountain, and saw a sign inviting us to see the view, so up the mountain we drove. There were several comical sign along the road to the lodge. I guess someone has a sense of humor. They views from the Lodge were spectacular and we were glad we went up to see them.

 Keep in mind that there is only one narrow road up the mountain!

Coconuts in Alaska?

Some of the views from up high.

Cindy found this growing near where we are parked.

That’s about it for the day, thanks for visiting.