Most people who have ever traveled the Denali Park Road that leads to the old mining site of Kantishna have gone by bus (and what a great trip that is!). The road lies in the heart of  6-million-acre Denali National Park and Preserve.

It starts at the Parks  Highway at 237 Mile and travels 92 miles through some of the thickest wildlife  and greatest scenery Alaska has to offer. While the first 15 miles of the road  is open to private traffic, the only way to see what lies beyond is usually on  one of the park’s shuttle buses, which transport thousands of tourists into the  park each summer.

Unless you happen to be one of the lucky winners in the  annual Denali Park Road lottery. And now is your chance to enter!

The 2011 road lottery is scheduled for Sept. 16-19. The application period is  June 1-30. Online application forms will be available at

http://www.recreation.gov/permits/Denali_National_Park/r/wildernessAreaDetails.do?page=detail&contractCode=NRSO&parkId=72314&topTabIndex=Permits

from 12:01 a.m. June 1 until midnight on June 30. There is a  non-refundable entry fee of $10 for each application.

As part of the all  online application process, lottery winners also will be billed the $25 road  lottery fee when they are drawn instead of paying it when they show up at the  park. Lottery winners will pay the $25 fee whether or not they  show up to drive the road. There are always lottery winners who don’t show up andthey have never had 400 people on the road.

The $25 fee will only be  refunded if the road does not open by 2 p.m. because of weather or road  conditions on the day of the permit. And if itis passable just part way you’ll only go that far.

In addition to the $25 road lottery  fee, all permit winners must pay a $20 park entrance fee.

Everyone who  submits an entry will be notified by email. Lottery winners also will receive a  letter confirming the day of their permit, with additional information on how to  obtain the road permit and how to prepare for the drive into the  park.

Names of lottery winners will be posted on the park’s website by  July 15.

Permits will still be transferable in that the person awarded the permit can give it to someone else if they are not able to go. The person transferring the permit must provide the original notification and a short note  explaining the transfer to the new permit holder, who must bring that  documentation to the park when they check in to get their permit.

I am back to consolidating trips so I only drive one or two days a week. And the trip to Alaska this year is for sure on hold now.

I have been hearing the same old song about getting a grip on our energy independence since the Arab Embargo in 1973. Never happen – too many cooks in the kitchen.

The big recession, which is still here for a lot of people, started with high fuel costs in the summer of 2008. Crude prices affect everything – and I mean everything! Put that together with Japan’s problem and to me it doesn’t look good. Batten down the hatches.

We brought these seeds back from our trip in 2008. Still seems like yesterday we were there! They took a long time to bloom but I think that was because of our cold, wet spring.

Duct tape is on my list of essential to have items in the Sprinter and it should be on yours.

From a friend . . .

A bear attacked this guy’s plane while parked in a remote field in Alaska. He had not cleaned it out after a long fishing trip and the bear smelled food.

He had 2 new tires, 3 cases of Duct Tape and several rolls of cellophane delivered. Then he went about repairing the plane so he could fly it home.

I don’t think anyone would want to follow us on vacation. Our Alaska trek was done not only when diesel prices were at their peak but during the coldest and wettest month of August that locals had lived through in years.

Two hundred years of glacial shrinkage in Alaska, and then came the winter and summer of 2007-2008.

Unusually large amounts of winter snow were followed by unusually chill temperatures in June, July and August.

Anchorage Daily News, http://www.adn.com/news/environment/story/555283.html

I think I will start watching Alaska weather a little closer. We are planning a 2010 jaunt into the Northwest Territories and Nunavut with the goal of spending a day in Tuktoyaktuk on the Artic Ocean. The trip should be in late August through much of September and the weather will be a major factor.

 It is great to be able to add to our trip history that we survived the summer of ’08 in Alaska!