frugaltraveler

We will be driving this July from Denali to Fairbanks, my question is how long will it take?..then driving from Fairbanks to Glennallen, how long will that take ?
Any help or advice would be much appreciated !

BudgetQueen

Denali Park to Fairbanks allow 2+ hours. I also suggest you spend at least 2 nights there, very worthwhile sightseeing available www.explorefairbanks.com

Fairbanks to Glennallen is 250 miles, I would allow 6 hours so to have some time for brief stops along the way.

frugaltraveler

thank you BudgetQueen for your information.. we are staying in Denali 3 nights and the next night is in Copper Center at the Princess Lodge. I wanted to do that Riverboat Discovery in Fairbanks and I was trying to coordinate with the drive from Denali and ending in Copper Center. Either we leave early in Denali and make the 8:30 Riverboat ride or make the 2pm time and drive late to Copper Center...my husband favors the earlier choice...Have you ever done this boat ride ?
thanks again for your information..

BudgetQueen

Since you ask, I would cut a night at Denali park and no, I would not be taking the 2pm boat tour and then driving to Copper Center that day. This is a marathon driving route you have planned and less than ideal in my opinion. You can NOT count on consistant 55mph++ driving, construction is about a given, which can tie you up for a significant amount of time.

Last trip I had an hour wait since I had just missed the pilot car on the Parks Highway at Ester.

Think carefully, you are considering leaving by 6am to catch the boat tour, then adding another 6 hours to get to Copper Center the same day???

egret

We stayed at the Copper Center Princess Lodge, and it was wonderful.
I would stay there again.

traveler2005

We did the Riverboat about 11 years ago (my son was 5 and he's now 16). It was kind of an interesting experience. As I recall, the boat went along a river and different things were demonstrated on either side. It was kind of like a Disney on a huge scale - i.e. you are seeing demonstrations of all kinds of things rather than actual places where they do them.

A must-have for driving in Alaska is a book called the Milepost. It gives you all kinds of travel information.

http://tinyurl.com/3b7tnp

Debbie

frugaltraveler

I bought the Milepost ( thanks traveler 2005)..and you are right, it has a wealth of information.. BudgetQueen - we have 3 nights at Denali because one day we are taking the all day bus trip into the park, and the next day we have a whitewater rafting excursion planned..
so I think we will do the early Riverboat Discovery ride.. I know this road trip will be jammed packed but we want to do it all !!.. I am hoping that when we get on our cruise from Whittier to Vancouver it will help that all we will want to do is relax..

traveler2005

We did the bus ride into the park too. It was a long ride - and it is just a schoolbus - not a comfortable bus. I'm glad that we did it, but we did not see as much wildlife as we thought we would.

Debbie

traveler2005

I noticed that your screen name is frugal traveler? Are you staying right in the park? We stayed nearby and it was cheaper. I think the name of the place had Bear in it. I could probably look it up.

One great thing about traveling in the summer in Alaska is that the days are SO long. That is nice for the driving. I can't remember what time I took photos to prove how light it was - but I think it was near midnight. I do remember when we flew in at like 2 AM, it was dusky even then - I could see the outline of Alaska from the air - that was so cool!

Debbie

frugaltraveler

We are staying at Denali River Cabins and the bus ride is in the early morning - I think at 6 or 6:15 am..I had read that the wildlife is more active earlier in the day.. what time did you take the bus ride? We are flying from Milwaukee to Chicago to Vancouver to Anchorage, leaving at 6am (here) and arriving in Anchorage at 1:30pm..our time will be off but its a vacation that some only get to dream about so I will not tolerate any whining from my family !! Its 5 weeks from Friday - its sneaking up on us fast. I also bought the Toursaver coupon books and there are 2 places we are staying in Alaska that are 2 for 1's and the rafting excursion is 2 for 1, so I have really tried to use those books ( I bought 2 since there are 4 of us ).. I really get frugal when I travel alone..when the family is along, they seem to insist on nothing less than Queen beds..it will be interesting to see what this totals out to be.. so far the 7 night cruise and airfare is just under $5000..and my goal was to keep it at $10,000.....and that is for 3 adults and one 16 yr old. I also have coupons from restaurant.com for 4 restaurants..that is a great coupon vacation tidbit.. the coupons are $4 and are for $25 if you spend $35..no problem with 4 of us.

traveler2005

I had to dig out my notes since your cabins sounded familiar. After a while, everything does. We actually stayed at the Denali Grizzly Bear Cabins. They just had double beds according to my notes.

The bus tour that we took was the 10 AM one to Wonder Lake. Hopefully you'll see more early in the morning. Our big disappointment was that we didn't see Denali!! Instead we took a photo of where it SHOULD be from a visitor center outlook. It was outlined on the window. I guess clear days are at a premium. On our arrival day, we stayed at a B&B in Anchorage and the woman told us that we should drive up there that day since it was clear. It wasn't in our plan and we were trying to rest up from the flight, so we didn't.

We also flew out of Chicago - but it was later in the day.

We didn't do the cruise and instead rented a car and drove around Alaska for 14 days - Anchorage to Glenallen to Tok to Fairbanks to Denali and back to Anchorage.

A big highlight was a 1 day tour from Fairbanks beyond the Arctic Circle. We flew up and then took a van back. It was expensive though. However we hadn't done a cruise.

Food and everything else were expensive in Alaska. I remember eating at a restaurant on our return and it felt like everything was so cheap.

Debbie