DENALI NATIONAL PARK (June 14-18th) Sunset 12:19 AM

 

Denali National Park and Preserve is Alaska’s major tourist attraction, drawing over 400,000 people each summer.   Thanks to the good advice from our friends Monica & Lawry, we made reservations back in February.  Our base camp is Teklanika Campsite located 29 miles from the entrance.


Private vehicles are not allowed past mile 15 within Denali National Park, only the few lucky enough to get a reservation are allowed to drive in to Teklanika Campsite.  No private vehicular travel is permitted beyond this point.  You are given a permit to drive in and one to drive out on the day of your departure; you may not use your vehicle while in the parks.

Having set up our camp in this vast wilderness, surrounded by black spruce trees, I am mostly impressed by the absolute quiet, only the birds chirping in a distance.   Quiet, the absence of sound, Tranquility, allows what ever sound there is to travel far and sound loud, hence quiet is oddly noisy.

First class transportation within Denali

 Denali has a public transportation system to take visitors into areas where private vehicles are not allowed.  These old green school buses have designated stops but can also be flagged down anywhere on the roads.  The end of the road is Katnishna, at 92 mile mark.   When making campground reservations back in March we had been advised to book our tickets for this bus on the 15^th of June. All night it rained and did not let up in the morning.  So we dawned our raingear and boarded our bus punctually at 8:55 Am

First day out in Denali get to use my new rain suit. 

From the location of our campsite is only 64 miles to Katnishna.  I did not understand why this trip should take 10 hours but I quickly learn.    The dirt road narrows, to one lane, several potholes and dozens of blind corners where the bus can only slowly creep along.  All eyes are focused on the landscape trying to spot wildlife.  Once some animal is spotted the bus grinds to a halt, till all passengers have their fill of picture taking.

The bus driver, Jeremy a farmer from New Hampshire, makes sure no arms or heads pop out the bus windows.   We are caged in our green school bus enjoying the wilderness and seeing the local animals enjoying their freedom.   Jeremy also seemd to like to hit each and every pot hole dead on. 

Caribou

We had a successful venture because during that day we managed to see; caribou, Dahl sheep, grizzly bear, moose and wolf.  We are only allowed off the bus at the official rest stops, all just 10 minute breaks except for one 30 minute stop.

Dahl Sheep

Grizzly sitting on top of hill with her cub

Mama moose with her two young ones

Blonde Fox running across road

Polychrome Pass the road is carved out of the rocky side of the Outer mountain range.  It is single lane with vertical drops of over 1000 feet, not a ride for those afraid of heights.

One lane road around pass, look for Dahl sheep on rock

Road along edge of Polychrome pass

  I imagine the pass got its name from the multicolour rock, riche in iron deposit; it is all shades of rust, orange, red and purple.   As we cling to the edge of the multicolour rock in our green bus we can look over the valley that was formed more then 20,000 years ago.

We seen planes, boreal forest, taiga and tundra.  As we climb stony hill and drive through the Pass the highest elevation pass, 3,950 feet in Denali, the rains turns to snow, no mountain peaks to be seen this morning.

Snow at Stony Hill, June 15, 2011

As we approach the Eielson visitors centre, across the driver’s CB radio comes the warning to all bus drivers that there are bears in the parking lot.   We still have 14 miles to travel to get there. Fortunately the bears waited for us.

Mama Grizzy and her twins

A sow and two yearling cubs just walked up the hill to the edge of the visitor centre parking lot.  The rangers scrambled to assure a safe distance was kept.  It was an amazing experience to see grizzlies from less then 100 metres away.

 This was not our only grizzly sighting on this trip; we saw four on this day and 2 more the following day.

In the afternoon the rain stopped and the views were much improved but there is no hope in seeing Mt. McKinley.   It is a long day but we saw so much of the wilderness, it gives a new perspective of the earth, how vast it is and how old, and what a short moment in time we individually have on it.

By Polychrome Pass

Denali was mostly formed from a huge glacier.  In this latitude & elevation the park varies from a boreal forest of black spruce, to a willow covered taiga and rugged tundra of stinted growth.  The rivers and not full of rushing waters as I would have expected but more like a twisted braid of little streams of glacial melt through a wide expanse of glacial rock basin.  Up the hill sides is vegetation, willows, manly varieties of flowers, till you reach the rocky etched in stone faces of the summits towering above it all.

Exhausted from the growling bus ride we cook a quick dinner on the campfire.

  Our neighbours on the campground and who were also on our bus, is a Scottish couple from North Caroline.  They immigrated to the US 13 years ago.  We enjoy a pleasant evening talking about places we have travelled to.  They as well have been to Peru.   

Henry in Denali

Wonder Lake near Katnishna.  On a clear day they tell us we would have been able to see a reflection of Mt. McKinley in the lake. 

        The next day we rise to beautiful clear sunshine, so once again we climb onto the old green school bus and ride this time only to Tolgat.

Antlers from tow bulls that locked together and died. At Tolgat Visitors Centre

We have our picnic lunch and the hike the glacial river bed.

hiking

hiking along a glacial river bed

The flowers blooming are amazing, as they grow out of rock.  Due the clear skies we see the mountain range tops but no Mt. McKinley.

Just some of the flowers.  I am thinking of doing a chapter on just flowers.

        The evening we spend chatting with a couple from California that we had camped beside at Boya Lake in BC.  Such a small world this big planet of our is.

 

 While driving out of Denali Park we finally get to see the white snow covered peaks of Mount McKinley.   

Mount McKinley in the background

 

 They say that only 30% of the visitors to the park ever get to see this giant of a mountain that towers over all the other peaks.  It is so high that it has its own weather systems, and frequently a cloud forms around it and develops to a snow storm. 

Bullwinkle

Bullwinkle with girlfriend

  Just as we are about to leave the park, we see two moose very close to the road, but slightly hinded in the brush.