Blue skies and not much smoke/haze from fires. Winds were less than 3kts at Denali. Just to the west at 18,000ft there was a great tailwind to push me back home to Kenai.
Drove to my RV washed the canopy inside and out. Topped off with 100LL at $5.66 per gal.
Left PAEN at 3:20 PM Alaska Time Zone and flew to Denali. Mt Iliamna, Mt Redoubt, and Mt Spur were all clear. As I flew past Mt Spur, took a few photos of it as I climbed through 12,500ft to stay under the 40kt head wind.
The National Park Service has a map with frequencies to use:
Once near Mt Foraker, I started my climb to 17,500ft. Flew to the west of Mt Foraker, turning to the east once I was on the north side of the range. Flew past Denali before turning to the south for photos of the south side.
In all took 995 photos.
Here is the GPS screenshot of the flight:
Here is photo looking to the east showing Mt Foraker in the foreground/Denali in the background. The two glaciers in this view-longest one is the Yentna Glacier, the one to the right of it is the Lacuna Glacier:
Finally on the north side of the range, here is a cockpit view of my panel. Great tailwind as can be seen, at 17,575ft, not quite 2500 rpm (still plenty of throttle available-these RV are fantastic!), temp 13.5 degree F. It was a warm day:
Here is a photo of Denali's peaks, the one on the right is clearly the high one:
Here is a photo of the south looking north at Denali:
All in all it was a great day to sightsee!
Today is just as great, but time to wash/wax the RV for winter. Maybe a quick flight to Mt Redoubt if the skies are clear when I'm done.
Best regards,
Mike Bauer