July 26: Anchorage to Denali National Park
234 Miles |
We wound up four days at the 15 Chandeliers B&B in Anchorage. The day started rainy and cold. We donned our rain gear and set off at 6:45am. Five motorcycles plus a "chase car" with Jane, Janice, Terry, and Mark bound for Denali National Park. We quickly had some confusion over a turn and lost Tom, who actually made the correct turn. We would meet up with him hours later at the Visitor's Center.
The rain and looking for Tom hampered our progress and after two hours we had covered only 60 of the 240 miles to Denali. We needed to be at the park in time to check into our cabins as well as get lunch. We also needed to buy box dinners, since our bus tour of the park was from 2:00pm to 10:00pm and there is no food or water available on the bus.
The weather cleared a bit, the road dried up, there was surprisingly little traffic and we made the bus with all of 15 minutes to spare. We had booked the 66-mile trip (each way) to the Eielson Visitor Center inside the Park. You cannot drive private vehicles beyond the first 17 paved miles of the park road. After that, the road turns to narrow gravel and is restricted to buses and a minimal number of other vehicles. Our driver, Dale, was an eleven-year veteran of Denali and very knowledgeable. We looked to be off to a good start.
It's impossible to describe Denali or take photographs that capture the beauty of this park. Even with less than ideal light the expanses of mountains, plains, and tundra are exceptional. It is easy to see why people fall in love with the place and return year after year. The fact that hordes of people aren't driving all over the park also makes it special.
As you can see, our drought of wildlife on this trip was cured during our bus tour. We first saw a female wolf and then a huge moose with a rack that even Dale said was unusually large. We also saw several grizzly bears including one mother with a cub and another with triplet cubs, which is unusual. We were all snapping photos and marveling at our good luck in seeing so many animals. (Note: many of my bear and moose photos were taken with a long zoom. When cropped and enlarged, they are a bit grainy.
We arrived at the Visitor Center about 6:15pm and had 30 minutes to look around. I noticed that their bulletin board said that sunset was at 11:18pm! We reboarded the bus and got back to the main Visitor's Center about 10:15pm. We saw more bears on the return trip. We were all exhausted from the long day but exhilarated by the many animals and great park scenery we had seen. The only thing that we didn't accomplish was seeing Mt. McKinley (the locals all call it by its Indian name, "Denali"). There were too many clouds and the summer isn't a high-probability time for good views.
We spent the night at the Denali Sourdough Cabins. Very nice accommodations and the staff was extremely helpful.