Summer Travel Map

Saturday, July 18, 2009

Land Tour of Denali

July 18, 2009
Denali National Park and Preserve, AK

On Thursday, we started the day with a big breakfast at a local restaurant in Talkeetna. Geri and I split a "full" order of scrambled eggs (no substitutions) and home fries, and we almost had leftovers to take home. We got on the road later in the day, continuing our trip north along the Parks Highway toward Denali National Park and Preserve. This is a huge park, created in 1917 and enlarged several times over the years to its current size of 6+ million acres. We stopped at the Park's visitor center before finding a campground just outside the Park's entrance.

Friday, we began our exploration. I signed up for a shuttle bus tour of the interior of the park for early Saturday morning. There is only one road into the Park, which travels about 65 miles to a secondary visitor's center, then continues on for another 30 miles to a privately-run mining camp. Private vehicles aren't allowed past the 15-mile mark in order to minimize congestion and the impact on the wildlife.

Once the plan was set, we watched the two films presented at the visitor's centers (there are two separate buildings), and took in the sled dog demo. The Park maintains a group of 30+ sled dogs, both for historical preservation and as the primary means of winter transportation. They have a special shuttle that takes you 3-4 miles to the kennels where you can see the dogs up close, listen to a ranger talk (guy reminded me of the illegitimate son of Father Guido Sarducci), and watch the dogs haul said ranger around on a sled equipped with wheels. I've gone soft in my old age, since I feel for the dogs at this point.

I was up early on Saturday for the Park trip. Actually, Geri and I were both up, on and off, for most of the night with Maya Lynn, who had an upset stomach and yakked all over. We did our best to calm her and keep her hydrated, and she settled down toward morning (can't say "dawn" since it never gets dark this time of year).

There are two different kinds of bus trips: "shuttles" and "tours". Shuttles are basic school bus vehicles that drive along the road, stop for wildlife, and have a driver who makes commentary and answers questions. Tours are school bus vehicles with better seats and a porta-potty that drive along the road, stop for wildlife, and have a driver who makes commentary and answers questions for twice the price. Hmmm. This was an easy decision: shuttle for me. I signed up for the 7:00 departure (they actually start at 6:00 AM, but I'm a wuss).

The bus was almost completely booked full, with only 2 seats open. I found a spot in the last row. We saw our first wildlife, a moose, about 3 miles in, but he was in the trees and there was no photo opp. About 9 miles in, there's a viewpoint where we could see the peak of Denali, which is rare since the clouds generally obscure the view most days. We were surprised to see the mountain clearly, which was quite a treat. From there, the road winds across a section of tundra, crosses several rivers, and ends up at the Eielson Visitor's Center. We were quite surprised, and very pleased, to have a clear view of Denali from base to summit. We were told that this only happens several days a year. Woo-hoo!

In addition to the potential views of the mountain, the other main draw of the trip is wildlife. We saw several small groups of caribou, grizzly bears, ptarmigans, snow hares, arctic ground squirrels, Dahl sheep, golden eagles, and a wolf. Not bad for 8 hours on a bus and $32!

Click here for pictures from the bus trip.

1 comment:

Bob and Marlene Rea said...

Great pictures...makes me want to go back. You have a great collection of pics. Nice job.