Denali Wilderness Tour

It's 18 Jul 2011 and we hit the jackpot today on the Denali Tundra Wilderness Tour. 

I can't actually say I was all that interested in doing this back when it first appeared in the standard package of included excursions.  When I talked to fellow traveller Dan Troncone a while back he said he knew people who had done this very trip: they never saw Mt McKinley, only sporadically saw wildlife, and it rained.  After riding a train all day yesterday, and planning to ride a bus for eight hours tomorrow, I can definitely say I was apprehensive about riding around in the bush for eight more hours in a modestly upgraded school bus.  Ann seemed interested, however, so we planned to go.  Oh, and did I mention an 0400 wakeup for an 0500 departure?

This turned out to be a pretty amazing morning.  The sun was out bright and early, sky was clear, and it was forecast to get in the 70s.  Our bus driver, Matt Bartholow, like drivers on other side trips this summer, was very knowledgeable and kept up a stream of stories about the geography, its history, the wildlife, and how the park operates. 

Still, this is just an eight hour bus drive in the woods some 60 miles into the park "unless" one raises the level of excitement one or two notches.  This requires one actually see more than the road ahead.  Boy, did we get that!  

As we drove along we passed several places where we had a clear view of the mountain.  Matt was pretty excited at how clear it was, mentioning it on several occasions.  He never missed an opportunity to press ahead for fear conditions would change.  


The native Alaskan name is Denali or Great One.  About an hour into the trip we started seeing sheep up on the sides of the mountains.  It was a sign of early morning desperation (or too much caffiene ;-) that everyone on the bus flocked to one side to "ooh and ah" over some almost imperceptible white specs.  I got these shots with a modest use of the telephoto.

Balance was restored a short while later when we caught sight of some bear down in a small creek bed to the south of the road.  to the Matt, our driver, was filling time with stories about Mt McKinley.  

Things got really interesting when another bear joined the first and started working on baby bears right there in the middle of the road.  By the time the proud parents to be headed back to the brush, Matt was going nuts.  He mentioned in five years of working in the park he had never seen any of the wildlife actually mating, much less in the road, and got videos of the entire event. 

Even though this was a rare event, Matt remained intent on moving us along.  His concern was that the longer the day went on the greater chance Mt McKinley would generate its own weather and get socked in. 

  


So we moved along . . .  





. . . with just another "routine" Alaska mountain view . . . 

. . . and eventually got yet another and closer view of Denali. 

Things started to pick up as the local population finished up their morning coffee and got down to some serious grazing.

There are more and more animals as we get deeper into the park. 

I actually got some great video of this moose and her two babies.  Matt noted this was a tragedy in the making.  It seems Momma Moose was seen defending her kids a few weeks back.  In the process, she backed into one of her babes, stepping on a small leg.  In the video you can see a limp in one of the two babes.  Matt and the Rangers' guess Momma is sticking to this area because the babe had a bad leg and could not go too far.  Unfortunately, the longer they hang in the same area, the greater the chance a predator will go for any of them.

The Rangers will not intervene in this evolving drama.  Their view is that they are there to preserve the wilderness.  That includes letting nature take it's course.  This is more than a little practical because of the sheer size of the park, but is apparently a philosophy as well.  

And as the day rolls on, we get yet another look at McKinley . . . 

. . . until finally we get as close as we're going to get, and still it's clear as a bell. 

This presents about a 30 minute opportunity to get off the bus, get some pics, and generally stretch the legs.  There is another 30 miles of this road ahead.  In our case, for the sake of fitting the trip into just eight hours, this is as far we we're going. 

This is probably the only full group picture we got on the entire trip. 

 

There is not a lot to add to the pictures.  I've mentioned in prior posts that there are some things that are difficult to do with a camera.  This is a different problem in that I'm not sure how to capture anything as big and wild as this territory. 

I'll drop back and add a few videos a little later.  In the meantime, this is a pretty good picture summary of a whole day of driving.  At the end I have to say it was worth the trip.