Day Twenty-Three - 9/8/07 - Denali Cabin

We finally said goodbye to Nick and friends this morning, leaving them chocolate, a note, and the Dior scarf from Ray’s cabin (see 11/4 post). With a bittersweet LGTFOH, we left Anchorage behind and headed north toward Denali National Park. As we left the city, snow fell harder and by the time we arrived in Denali, at least six inches had accumulated. The park itself is larger than the state of Massachusetts, and contains the largest* mountain peak in the world. *Everest is technically taller from sea level, but rests on a plateau, so from base to peak is about 6000 feet shorter than Denali's 18,000 foot vertical rise. The mountain is known to most Americans as McKinley, named by some random guy on the U.S. Geological Survey before William McKinley even became president. Then McKinley was elected president, was fatally shot, and the name stuck. The original name from the Athabaskan natives is "Denali" meaning "The High One." Today, Alaskans all call the mountain Denali. Early Russian explorers also called it "Bolshaya Gora," meaning "Wicked Big Ass Mountain."

Although the peak is difficult to see because of the swirling precipitation it attracts especially during the winter, we hoped to catch a glimpse before we left Alaska the next day. Our view at our lunch break more closely resembled an elephant’s hide at close range and so we kept on. Our lunch break was saved by a riveting debate on whether Brad should pee in the toilet or the woods. We declared the location had high human traffic and so we should concentrate our use to the toilet, Brad retorted that he and other humans are animals, and other animals don’t have toilets. Our argument was settled by our decision to pee everywhere.

Hours later, we pulled into a cabin at mile marker 229.8 with a large pile of split logs and a grey pick-up, as per our directions. The woman who answered the door informed us that the Brown’s (our hosts for the night) lived next door, at which point we realized that large piles of split logs and grey pick-ups are par for the course up there. Diane Brown (Jim Brown’s sister-in-law) greeted us and showed us into a cozy one-room cabin with a bed, stove, refrigerator, small TV, and excellent movie library.

We settled in our free, heated abode with our friend Sam Adams and eventually cooked a glorious pasta dish before admiring the stars. Dave Brown stopped by with the kids to say hi and wish us well. We closed out the night with "Glengarry Glenn Ross," an overly dramatic adaptation of a play about salesmen starring numerous big stars and featuring every combination of curses imaginable. We dreamed profane dreams as we prepared for the big haul to God’s country.