It's not denial . . . . it's Denali!

This past week I managed to get 6 days off of work to go to Denali National Park with some friends. Matt, who I know from church (and 5th grade, coincidentally), his friend Will, who came up to visit from Utah, and Matt's Forest Service coworker, Wade(who sneezed right as we took the picture). I felt privileged to be invited on a camping trip with 'the guys' and did my best not to be too concerned with the various sounds, odors and conversation topics that come up whenever guys get together.

The first night we camped at Nancy Lake state park and left early the next morning to get up to the park. We stopped at the south summitt overlook but Mt. McKinley was covered in clouds (as usual). Mt. McKinley was originally named Denali, meaning "The Great One." More about that to come . . . .

We continued on into the park where we had a reservation for Savage River campground. That night I kept wondering why I was so cold. I thought I was just weak and hadn't been camping in a while and that maybe I'd just forgotton the hardships of camping. But when I woke up in the middle of the night I looked out under my tent cover and saw snow.

(This was in the morning after most of it had melted.)

It cleared up and we took off down the road to hike the Savage River.

Despite the clouds, it wasn't raining and we had a beautiful view of the park.

We hiked up the river and aside from some Dall sheep high on the mountainside and some ground squirrels, we didn't see any wildlife.

That was the first part of the trip. To be continued . . . .