the last frontier (Talkeetna: home, school, camp)

[onthamove]

i am not new to this forum but i am to the alaska part, i have been fancying alaska for sometime now. at 17 after i graduated hs i drove west for the first time to the colorado rockies, i seriously thought about living there but decided not too because i am in instate school now in KY . i however am a wonderer whenever the smallest chance to wonder knocks, i have wondered on two more trips after that to colorado utah nevada and arizona and i love it meeting amazing people and seeing such incredible landscape and i hate ky and i dont really like my situation (no friends) i am a rambler if there ever was one and have an extensive post card collection!!! but this is my question for alakans, i am 19 now and have been takin these trips for a little over a year but havent yet made it to alaska i wanna summit mt. mckinley like i did pikes peak and mt evans and mt elbert, i HAVE to summit mt mckinley thats all there is to it PERIOD. my time frame for going would be december 20-jan15 and i was wondering how that time was for traveling the alaska highway into the yukon? i camp whereeve i go and cold and snow are my best friends after my car. everyone says i am crazy for going by myself 4,000 miles away in the dead of winter to alaska but do they plow the alaska highway? i have alaska fever like i had colorado fever at hs graduation

[Metlakatla]

Thank heaven this forum is getting back to normal.

Best of luck to ya...I'm fixin' to go to sleep but I believe that most of your questions can be answered by doing a search.

If you want to summit Denali, look for some climbing groups to hook up with. It isn't something you want to try on your own.

[onthamove]

thanks metlakatla!!!

[HighlandLady]

To witness Denali, you have to see her firsthand. Pikes Peak is NOT Denali...not even close, I've climbed Pikes Peak. As Met stated, utilize the search option in the right hand upper corner.

[Metlakatla]

As a student, you could always come up in the summer and work too.

I'm not sure that the time frame you mentioned is optimal for climbing Denali. I think prime climbing season is in Feb. In late Dec. I'd worry about the risk of avalanches etc.

And please forgive me for sounding like a mom but please don't camp out in the winter if you drive here.

Just come up, find a place to base yourself out of---you might like Talkeetna, and just go from there.

[Captain Crunch]

Many wanders come to Alaska to visit and stay...its addicting

Come in the spring...with plenty of time and funds to stay awhile

[Rance]

I think Talkeetna is like the base station for the Denali climbers. Fly out of there to the mountain and start climbing. You might run into some folks there that can point you in the right direction for getting started. Talkeetna is a neat little community with some great views of the mountain. You could even take one of the glacier flights and land on the mountian in the summer. I'm going to try for that this next summer.

[onthamove]

thanks for the replies!!! yea i am insanely excited words can't describe, i want some place that is human free and deserted so i can experience north america at its best. i am tempted to go in summer instead of mid decmeber through mid jan but i love snow. i do worry about stayin places when i go on one of my trips this past summer i almost ended up stayin in a little town near the four corners called durango, i was heading east back home and spent a week there i loved durango but i had to come home, if i had it to do over i may have very well stayed.

[Marty Van Diest]

You aren't going to climb Mt Mckinley in the winter. First, you can't even get there without an experienced mountain pilot. They aren't going to fly someone with no climbing experience to the glacier in winter.

I'm not sure how cold it is on the back side of the moon, but McKinley in mid-winter is probably colder.

Alaska is a great adventure...come in the summer and you will love it.

[Woof]

Why don't you go somewhere not as cold in that time of the winter, such as Mt Whitney or Mt Shasta in CA, get rescued by helicopter, recover in a hospital, and then drive up to Denali/McKinley in the summer?