Denali Summit Flight!

The Piper 31-350 Navajo.

Inside and our pilot Riley.

Ready to go!

The spine of the Alaskan range leading to Denali.

Denali! It stands head and shoulders over all others.

The North and South summit of Denali - the Great One, for obvious reasons.

Other peaks for which I cannot remember the names.

The beautiful marking of the rock moraine on the glacier flowing down the from the Alaskan Range.

Absolutely stunning as we descend and head back to Healy.

In this photo you can see the landslide where the road collapsed down into the river in 2021.

Thursday, August 17^th. (Continued)

At 2:25 I was picked up with two other couples by Arctic Air and driven to the tiny airport in Healy. Our pilot, Riley, gave us a briefing about safety features, on what to expect, and what to do. Then we boarded the twin engine piper aircraft and taxied down the runaway before taking off. Destination: the summit of Denali! When I planned and booked this trip, I wanted to see the highest mountain in North America – Denali. It is the centre piece of this national park. However, things conspired against me. The mountain is usually enshrouded in clouds as it creates its own weather systems, and the road through the park to Wonder Lake where you get the best view of the mountain reflected in the lake, suffered a landslide which closed half the route and blocked access to the lake (on the way back we got a view of the slide which you cannot see from the turnaround point on the road). The McKinley Chalet Resort is about 80 miles from the mountain, so the mountain cannot be seen from there either. As a matter of fact, only 30% of visitors to the park actually see Denali. I knew there was a flight to the summit but wasn’t really interested as it was expensive, and I had flown around Mt. Everest. But, today as the weather was looking much more promising, I decided to bite the bullet and give into my FOMO. I did not want to go home without seeing it. I did not want to go home saying, ‘I wish I had’. We flew at 170 knots directly to the mountain climbing steadily to 12000 feet where we had to put on oxygen masks as the cabin is not pressurized, and then continued up to 20310 feet or 6190 metres (6 kilometres above sea level). We flew within 3 miles of the mountain once around the north and south summits and then did a U-turn and circled it once more so that both sides of the plane got a good view. I was behind the two couples and could use both the left and right seat. Then we descended and began the flight back. Riley pointed out various peaks, glaciers and routes that the mountain climbers use to summit Denali. Climbing season ended at the end of July. On average only 50% of climbers per year achieve the summit. We flew past the beautiful multicoloured Polychrome Mountains. I was floored when I saw how quickly we climbed up and over the ‘mountains’ by the resort, which are about 4000’ and how small they looked as we climbed up to 12000’ and beyond. Denali is a monster and stands head and shoulders above anything else in the Alaska Mountain range. In fact, although Everest is the highest mountain, Denali has a higher vertical climb than Everest whose base is already standing on the uplifted continent of Asia. Denali has two summits and the south is 900’ higher than the north which is 19470’. I had a great time looking out the window and marvelling at the views and our luck after so many days of clouds and drizzle. Even Riley, our pilot said we couldn’t have picked a better day. Absolutely incredible! When we got back, we found out our pilot was only 21! The Koyukon people who inhabit the area around the mountain have referred to the peak as "Denali" for centuries. In 1896, a gold prospector named it "Mount McKinley" in support of then-presidential candidate William McKinley; that name was the official name recognized by the federal government of the United States from 1917 until 2015. In August 2015, 40 years after Alaska had done so, Barrack Obama was instrumental in overriding Ohio’s continued objection and getting the United States Department of the Interior to change the official name of the mountain to Denali. Ohio objected because President McKinley was born in Ohio.