Flight Seeing
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The Flightseeing from Talkeetna is
unequaled anywhere! Local air taxi services, staffed by highly
experienced bush pilots committed to safety and excellence operate
a variety of aircraft including wheel, ski and float equipped
planes. Helicopters are also available. From the moment your
airplane or helicopter lifts off from the Talkeetna airport you
are surrounded by breathtaking scenery in every direction. Flights
over Mt. McKinley and the neighboring peaks offer the very best
views of Denali National Park and the surrounding wilderness.
These views are not available except from the air. See legendary
features of the mountain like:
- Great Gorge of the Ruth Glacier-deeper than the Grand Canyon
- Wickersham Wall, the 14,000 foot high north face of Mt.
McKinley
- Kahiltna Glacier
- West Buttress
- Notorious “Windy Corner”
The Don Sheldon Amphitheater named
after the pioneering bush pilot who built the 'Mountain House' in
the early spring of 1966. Sheldon reportedly flew all the
materials in from town on his bush plane at a time when few men
dared to take their aircraft onto the Glacier at all.
Legend has it that Sheldon strapped huge pieces of lumber to
the airplane fuselage and flew them to the glacier. Over time, he
perfected tricky landings on bumpy and ever-changing ice fields
proving that The Mountain House took more courage than manual
labor to build.
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Today, the modest shelter still stands on a five-acre private
in-holding in Denali National Park and Preserve. At 6,000 feet, the
land is a dramatic ledge of granite on Denali (Mount McKinley)
massif. A few feet from the shelter's front door, the rock falls
away in a steep jagged cliff to the ice below. It's an island of
civilization surrounded by a frozen ocean of ice and towering,
drastic mountains.
"The spirit
of Alaska lives in that cabin, " says Sheldon's
widow, Roberta, who cares for the cabin.
After Sheldon died of cancer in 1973, The National
Park Service renamed the majestic valley surrounding the cabin after
the pioneering glacier pilot. The Mountain House sits in the middle of
the Don Sheldon Amphitheater, a fitting tribute.
Sheldon built the cabin to provide shelter for pilots
who needed to set down in bad weather and for expeditions exploring
then-hidden areas of the Alaska Range. After his death, Roberta
decided to rent the shelter for the growing number of mountaineers,
skiers, photographers and wilderness seekers who venture to the Ruth
Glacier. Ski planes land less than a mile from the Mountain House. In
the right conditions, it's just a 15-minute trek in snowshoes from the
landing strip carved in the glacier. But the Mountain House is more
than 50 miles, across wilderness terrain, from lodging in Talkeetna. |
Doug Geeting Aviation 
