I got to see Denali!! Such a clear view this past weekend with beautiful weather! I just went to Denali National Park for the 1st time since moving to Alaska!! I was able to take a field course called geology of Denali through Alaska Geographic. I was offered a 75% scholarship to attend the course, and it was absolutely amazing!! Denny Capps (the park geologist) was a wealth of knowledge that kept us captivated from start to finish. I wasn't sure what to expect going into the course, as geology is not really my thing, but I was totally stoked to visit Denali nonetheless. I ended up gaining an interest in geology and having the best weekend camping out at Teklanika campground in the park and visiting sites that other visitors might not know to visit. I knew nothing about Denali going into this course so lets just say I learned a ton and probably have forgotten half of it by now. The park road is 92 miles and we went to the Toklat River which is at mile 53 in the course of the weekend. We were lucky that we had our own shuttle and did not have to take the bus, which would've have meant relying on that time schedule. You can see below why a bus system is needed as the road is only 1.5 lanes wide with no guard rails. It is quite dangerous to drive for the inexperienced.
This part of the road is failing due to a debris flow as well as other factors. You can see in the picture below where the debris is falling. This part of the road as well as many other parts of the road are difficult to keep open due to many debris flows in the area. The park is tasked with cleaning up after each instance. To try to figure out what is going on with this section of the road they are currently in the process of digging 2 wells and placing instruments in the wells to collect data. This well is down to 140 ft. and you can see the wires for the instruments. The coolest thing by far was taking a hike to see dinosaur tracks from the duck-billed dinosaur. Scientifically they are known as Hadrosaurs. Click here for more info from the park. We saw over 20 of these fossils, but these are some of the better ones. As you can imagine some of the fossils are either broken or the tracks weren't as clean as these ones. These are all cast fossils. "Cast fossils are formed when an organism dies and is buried between layers of mud and silt. The mud and silt form around what is left of the organism and slowly hardens and becomes sedimentary rock. The buried organism decays and the hardened rock leaves an impression where the organism once was. Lastly, mineral-enriched groundwater fills in the mold and hardens to form a cast fossil" (castfossils.weebly.com). In other words there was a print in the mud or some sort of soft ground that was filled in and hardened. In addition to seeing these amazing fossils and doing so much other site seeing we had some of the best views. Here is one of the only pics I took with me in the photo. After the course I did a midnight sun ATV tour with Denali ATV tours. They were great!! Not much wildlife, but with seeing wildlife on my own I wasn't that concerned. I just wanted to do something fun and not hurt my foot anymore, as I had already hiked more than I should've. Yes, I am still in a boot hoping that the stress fracture in my foot heals soon. I then stayed at the McKinley Chalet Resort. It was a great stay that wasn't too expensive. I didn't get any great views but the room was spacious and everything was clean and comfortable. I'm sure if I had payed more I could've gotten a better view, but since I was really just there to sleep it wasn't worth it. Overall it was an excellent trip, and even though the Alaska Geographic courses are a little pricey, they are totally worth it. I would consider going back and paying full price to take another course with them. Source:
https://castfossils.weebly.com/how-are-cast-fossils-formed.html
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This is my happy place! I have loved every Surf with Amigas trip I have been on! I contemplate traveling other places, but can’t bring myself to switch it up because of how great my experiences have been with Surf with Amigas. I have now been on 3 trips with Surf with Amigas, twice to Nicaragua and this year I was able to go to Costa Rica. (Unfortunately Nica is not in a good place right now.) I have wanted to try one of the trips to Costa Rica, but it never worked for my schedule until now. Costa Rica did not let me down!! I always question whether my experience will be just as good becasue it is really kudos to the awesome staff and other ladies who come on these trips. Every group has been different, but totally awesome, nonetheless!! I still think there is something about Nica that just draws me in, and makes me keep wanting to go back, but my experience in Costa Rica was equally as epic, and I feel that the waves were definitely better in Costa Rica! Here is a short video I made of clips from the 3 surfing trips I have taken. The surfing instruction I have received has been truly AMAZING! Watch the video to see for yourself. On this trip we surfed everyday and had an hour long yoga session. The surfing was crazy good!! I rode a few waves that were over 30 seconds. I could never dream of this happening, but somehow the waves were gentle enough to slowly push me to the shore. We even got to take a boat trip to surf some rights, all other surf was lefts, and have cocktails and nachos at a resort. Yin yoga is a great complement to the surfing. Reesie knew exactly what we needed in each class, and made it “hurt so good.” With the surfing and yoga we also had a few other scheduled activities. One night we made chocolate, another night we watched surfers at Pavones and had dinner there, we went on a jungle hike and played in a waterfall, and finally we had a bonfire/dance party on our last night! Here are some pics below. (Thanks to all the ladies on the trip for sharing, as I did not take many pics. So the majority of the pics are not my own.) To top it all off I got to experience this all with 2 of my best friends. If anyone is contemplating a similar trip I highly recommend you check out Surf With Amigas. As far as similar trips go their trips are on the cheaper end but they do not lack in the quality of service!! Thats a win in my book! Now I am back in Alaska! I head to Denali this weekend for an Alaska Geographic course titled the Geology of Denali! This will be my last trip of the summer. Hopefully then I will have some time to rest my foot and let the stress fracture heal. Here is the video that Surf With Amigas made about the trip. |