|| More Than Pretty Things

I booked the 5:15pm wonderlake bus. We were the first to arrive at the Wilderness Access Center. The coach bus was cozy, somewhat school bus like, but really comfortable. It passed the Savage river entry where almost all other motor vehicles were disallowed. Lots of animal lovers, and we constantly stopped by, herds of white goats on really high mountains, the air must have been thin up there. Beavers, caribous, eagles, bears and finally a photogenic lynx.

The delight to me was to finally understand the grandeur of Mount McKinley (this was before I took the flight tour). The clouds cleared a little bit on top and we were lucky enough to capture the platinum of the wonder. The snow reflected with the sun light was glowing like that from heaven, talk about there is the creation of the world, he must have created everything from there :-) we later saw a few times of the same, the view offered was so open and wide that I could feel the darkness and the brightness all in one blink of the eye. It was amazing and would've been stupid to give up McKinley for Kenai (thought of that at the time). High land, low sky, raw beauty.

We got closer after a few hours, and eventually arrived at the wonderlake. It was called wonder because it was supposed to have a total reflection of the Mount McKinley in the lake at some days. Our driver said he had not seen it himself. There was some wonders of the lake, which was covered with blueberry trees (guess not those that we eat) and therefore had fierce mosquitoes all over space. I wore a mosquito net on top of my hat, still they clanged on and attacked in the least possible areas. Our bus picked up some campers but they got off fast.

The way back was the same winding and rolling, windy and chilly. Was wearing the heavy black snow jacket, felt the need for more. The coldness in the air cured my sickness from Richmond and that from the airports though. I recovered fast and was able to eat and sleep well for the first time in many days since Vermont. I asked the girl and the cook at Chinese Express to take out the soy source, and the food started to taste delicious .... things brightened up soon enough :-)