May I present to you....Mount McKinley...... or Denali, as the Atabascan Indians call it, which means  "The High One". It is the highest mountain peak in the United States and in North America, with a summit elevation of 20,320 feet (6,194 m) above sea level. Measured base-to-peak, it is the tallest mountain on land. Measured by topographic prominence, it is the third most prominent peak in the world after Mount Everest and Aconcagua.

We finally saw the mountain, and how...!

We managed to get 2 seats on a 'flightseeing' tour with glacier landing,... as a Denali-business-employee-comp, ...yep, as in...for FREE!

Is that awesome or not!

We were on standby already several times but the flights always filled up with paying costumers but finally we got lucky and went up in the air on a beautiful clear, windless and warm evening at 6 pm.

The blue one was 'ours', a classic deHavilland "Beaver", and besides us there were 5 other people, and the pilot of course. We all got a headset so we could communicate with each other and hear the pilot as he told us everything we needed to know and than some about the Park and all the mountains and glaciers we flew over.

This is the Nenana River.. 'as seen from above'....

And these are some images of the Parks Highway and the Denali 'village' or 'canyon' as it is called.

Soon we started to see the colorful foothills from the

'Alaska Range', a relatively narrow, 650-km-long (400 mi) mountain range in the south central region of Alaska.
It is part of the Pacific Ring of Fire, and the Denali Fault that runs along the southern edge of the range is responsible for a number of earthquakes a year.

Because of the various different metals and minerals in the rocks and soil the lower hills and mountains came in a beautiful range of colors.

They were quickly  followed by the first snow capped mountains

And a whole bunch of beautiful glaciers and gorges, one of them being the Great Gorge of the Ruth Glacier – the World’s deepest gorge:

Than finally the really big guys appeared:

Mount Hunter,  or Begguya, the third highest major peak in the Alaska Range (13,965 feet). "Begguya" means child (of Denali) in the Dena'ina language. 

                Mount Foraker, the second highest peak in the Alaskan

Range at 17,400-foot

               

And Mount McKinley who as you can see has two significant summits,  the South Summit is the higher one, while the North Summit 'only' has an elevation of 19,470 feet.

Isn't it a beauty?!

Finally we landed on this glacier, close to Mt Mckinley's base camp at 7200 feet, where climbers start their adventure to the top. Only 58% make it and since the early 1900's the mountain has claimed more than 100 lives:






I was a little nervous about the landing but it went without a hitch and after a smooth turn while sliding around on the planes' skies we stepped out into about a foot of pristine snow (fallen last week when we had such nasty weather that they had to skip the glacier landings for 5 days in a row!)






The weather was absolutely perfect, sunny, not a cloud in the sky and no wind. They had warned us it could be chilly up there but it was so warm, we actually didn't even need a coat.











Its hard to put into words how beautiful it was up there, I'd say it was definitely one of the highlights of our travels so far! If you ever get the chance, do not pass up on it, it's money and time well spent (although the $449 pp is probably not in everyone's budget), we will never forget this place nor will you once you see it.

Just breath taking.....

On the way back it started to cloud up a little as it does so often around these mountains, they sort of create their own weather. Mount McKinley is very often in the clouds and if you are so lucky to see it from the ground somewhere along the Parks highway or from the various viewpoints in the Park itself you may call yourself the proud member of the 29% (that actually see it) club!

I'll end with this shot of a herd of white dots......  :)

They're Dall Sheep. Honestly!