Princess McKinley Lodge

[ErLee]

We are on a connoisseur escorted tour in June. We have a day at the McKinley Lodge with nothing planned. I know that lodge isn’t near anything, so I’ve looked at the list of excursions, but am undecided. If you’ve been to this lodge and have recommendations either FOR or AGAINST an excursion you’ve done, I’d love some input!

[AKStafford]

I'd go into Talkeetna and do a Denali flight tour. I've gone with K2 Aviation before and it was awesome.

[Northern Aurora]

We have stayed there several times as it is a convenient place to stop for one night when we are driving from Seward back to our home in Fairbanks.  Quite frankly, you do see people using the self-service laundry facilities.  At least in the past the front desk has also had board games available for use. On the property there are also several walking paths -- I wouldn't call them trails.

[mapleleaves]

If you're not interested in the Princess excursions, you could take the Princess shuttle  into town and find other activities or just wander around the 'town', have a beer, skip rocks on the river .....

https://www.talkeetnachamber.org/directory/

 

The Talkeetna Ranger Station is pretty interesting as it is where climbers register and get info about their ascent on Denali.

[rkacruiser]

I found Talkeetna to be an interesting small town and that was even during a Winter visit to Alaska.

[NEWLKAT]

We usually just take the shuttle to Talkeetna and walk around, also the Lodge has a Tree House you can hike to, it is kind of steep in places but not a very long hike. It was featured on Tree House Masters.

[capriccio]

8 hours ago, AKStafford said:

I'd go into Talkeetna and do a Denali flight tour. I've gone with K2 Aviation before and it was awesome.

We did this on our Alaska cruise back in mid-July 2007 with K2.  Our summit flight (small plane and the route requires use of an oxygen mask) ranks as our best excursion anywhere in the world even though I was nervous through the entire flight.😁

 

I'm sure the front desk at the Lodge still encourages guests to leave their name and room number if they want to be called if the mountain 'comes out.'  On our one night at the Lodge we went to bed around 11:30 after sitting on the lovely deck watching mostly clouds.  Within minutes the phone rang and a voice said, "This is Joy. The mountain is out!"  We got dressed, grabbed the cameras and hurried out of our building to see lots of other folks in various stages of dress/undress heading for the deck.  We sat and watched the mountain until after 1:30 am and it still wasn't dark out!  This is one of our favorite Alaska memories (and we've been 3 times).

 

I hope you have clear skies and good weather!

[Budget Queen]

If  you are transiting via the train,   it's of benefit to combine being in Talkeetna with activities,   and not go back and forth to the McKinley Lodge more than necessary.    My top choice is always a summit flight.   Just excellent way to see the beauty and vastness of Alaska.   

[rma2001]

Has anyone done the river float trip from the lodge?  I had wanted to do a Denali flight but that has been nixed. 

[ErLee]

On 4/29/2019 at 11:56 PM, Budget Queen said:

If  you are transiting via the train,   it's of benefit to combine being in Talkeetna with activities,   and not go back and forth to the McKinley Lodge more than necessary.    My top choice is always a summit flight.   Just excellent way to see the beauty and vastness of Alaska.   

 

That was my thought....we get to Talkeetna at noonish, so I thought we might rather see what there is to see there that day than go back for that the next day. 

 

I will I’ll look into the summit flights!

[ErLee]

On 4/29/2019 at 10:44 PM, capriccio said:

We did this on our Alaska cruise back in mid-July 2007 with K2.  Our summit flight (small plane and the route requires use of an oxygen mask) ranks as our best excursion anywhere in the world even though I was nervous through the entire flight.😁

 

I'm sure the front desk at the Lodge still encourages guests to leave their name and room number if they want to be called if the mountain 'comes out.'  On our one night at the Lodge we went to bed around 11:30 after sitting on the lovely deck watching mostly clouds.  Within minutes the phone rang and a voice said, "This is Joy. The mountain is out!"  We got dressed, grabbed the cameras and hurried out of our building to see lots of other folks in various stages of dress/undress heading for the deck.  We sat and watched the mountain until after 1:30 am and it still wasn't dark out!  This is one of our favorite Alaska memories (and we've been 3 times).

 

I hope you have clear skies and good weather!

 

I had heard about the “ mountain is out” call and will certainly be putting our name on that list!

[masterdrago]

On 4/29/2019 at 10:35 AM, ErLee said:

We are on a connoisseur escorted tour in June. We have a day at the McKinley Lodge with nothing planned. I know that lodge isn’t near anything, so I’ve looked at the list of excursions, but am undecided. If you’ve been to this lodge and have recommendations either FOR or AGAINST an excursion you’ve done, I’d love some input!

We're booked with Talkeetna Air Taxi for a Grand Denali w/glacier landing. They will come pick us up at the lodge.

[ErLee]

Thanks everyone for your input! Yesterday we booked a flight tour with K2, and we’re excited about doing that!  We ended up booking for Wednesday afternoon, the day we arrive in Talkeetna by train, so that still leaves the next day open, but it gives us some wiggle room in case the weather doesn’t cooperate for the flight on Wednesday. They said as long as they had space they could rebook us on Thursday if that happens.