Chapter 7: Into The Wild
As I said before, if you want to see something in Alaska, you typically have to pay someone else to take you there. For most of the year, this is true in
Denali National Park. Although the park is larger than the entire state of New Hampshire, there is only one road. It’s paved for 15 miles and then turns into a narrow dirt road extending for another 75 miles or so before reaching its endpoint at Wonder Lake. Visitors are welcome to drive their own vehicles on the first paved portion, but beyond that point you can only enter in one of three ways:
- You ride on the park’s shuttle bus system (reservations recommended)
- You pay a small fortune to a tour company
- You win the lottery to drive your own car (this is only available part of the year)
Given my other choices were to either pay lots of money or risk the long odds of winning, I made reservations for the shuttle bus several months in advance, as soon as I had a good idea of our travel dates. They do sell some tickets on the day of the tour, but I wasn’t going to take any chances of being shut out for the one day we were there.
Normally, there are several options for bus tours in the park, but those were severely cut down due to COVID restrictions. Luckily, the tour we wanted remained on the books—a round trip drive to the Eielson Visitor Center and back.
This involved riding in a glorified school bus for 66 miles (one-way) along a rickety dirt road cut high into the side of mountains with no guardrail and barely enough room to pass any other buses coming the other direction. What could go wrong?
I booked the 7:00 a.m. bus tour for a few reasons. One, I wanted to have the best possible chance of seeing the mountains, and my experience is that typically humidity and clouds build up throughout the day, so the best chance of a clear view is earlier in the day. It’s not a foolproof idea, but I was just playing the odds. The same is generally true for wildlife sightings. Secondly, I was following the Rope Drop Always Works rule, which states that rope drop always works. And third, I didn’t want to get back late in the day and not be able to get into a restaurant anywhere.
We had breakfast in the hotel room (Pop Tarts and hotel room coffee, breakfast of champions) and then drove 10 miles to the park entrance. The bus depot is in a separate building away from the main visitor center campus. The bus depot is actually the first turn on the right after entering the park. We found a good parking space near the building (rope drop paying off already!) and went inside to check in.
By 6:45 a.m., we were all checked in and waiting outside in line for the bus. Our chariot arrived about ten minutes before departure time.
They got everyone checked in and reviewed all of the COVID rules for the trip (i.e. keep your arms and legs inside the vehicle and keep your mask on), and then we were off on our adventure.
The Rope Drop strategy paid off right away as we spotted a porcupine just two miles into the trip.
The entire bus tour was to take 8.5 hours, which meant we’d be arriving back at the bus depot at approximately 3:30 p.m. The driver informed us that we’d be stopping for a break about every 1.5-2 hours or so along the way, depending on how often we stopped for wildlife sightings. And I was impressed at how well they stuck to that schedule, even with the many unplanned stops we did make.
The park does offer a narrated tour bus in addition to the regular shuttle like the one we took. The tour bus is much more expensive, but you’re paying for a guide to narrate the entire journey, giving you the history of the park as well as all sorts of information on the wildlife, plant life, and geology of Denali.
My advice: save the money and take the
regular “transit” shuttle. The bus driver had her own microphone and happily narrated the whole trip for us anyway.
Also, there is no food or water inside the park. You must bring any snacks and drinks in with you, and of course take it all out when you leave. So if you didn't pack a lunch, you're gonna have a long day.
The first part of the trip was fairly uneventful. We passed the Savage River Campground and then entered the unpaved section of the road. The driver was obviously a veteran—she didn’t seem to slow down all that much.
Our first rest stop was at the Teklanika River. They had an observation area and bathrooms for all of us to use, which was awfully nice of them.
All of that silt in the waterway gets deposited via snowmelt and the movement of ice in the winters.
We continued on, and as we got closer to the mountain peaks the driver told us to look for small, white dots near the ridgelines, and asked us to call it out if we saw anything. No sooner had she said that than I raised my hand and called out some white dots near a mountain peak.
These are Dall Sheep, an all-white bighorn sheep species that is native to northwestern Canada and Alaska. They typically live above the tree lines high on these mountain ranges, using the altitude and steep peaks as their main protection from predators.
Rounding another corner, we spotted a brown bear snacking on plants along a hillside. He looked like he was fattening up for the winter pretty well.
Just over 40 miles into the journey, we approached Polychrome Pass, perhaps the most beautiful part of the drive. I imagine the colors show up even more on rare clear sunny days. Still, I found the scenery to be mesmerizing.
This was also probably the narrowest and most dangerous part of the road. You can see it cut into the ridge on the right, hanging well above the valley. I’d say the road was wide enough for 1.5 lanes. And yes, we did end up having to pass another bus at one point, which was a bit hair-raising. Julie shut her eyes and white-knuckled it through the maneuver, but the driver was a pro and everything went smoothly.
Here’s a couple of buses on the road, just for scale:
Just around the bend we reached the official overlook, where we got to take in the view. I thought it was gorgeous.
You can’t really tell, but it was extremely windy up there too, which made it feel very cold. We didn’t stay outside long. Just long enough to hike up a ridge for another photo.
Further down the road, we saw some caribou taking a break in a river valley. The four main animals we were looking for were bears, Dall sheep, caribou, and moose, and we’d already crossed three of them off the list.
We stopped at the Toklat River about 50 miles into the drive for another chance to use the restrooms and stretch our legs. Here we were treated to purple wildflowers in bloom all over the landscape.
And a sheep horn to mess around with.
Once we were back in the bus, we entered the home stretch. We started climbing the hills and ridges again, getting closer and closer to our first view of Denali. Given the increased cloud cover, we didn’t think we’d be as lucky as the day we’d first arrived in Anchorage. It made me glad we’d taken the drive to see the mountain on a clear day. After all, I needed to justify my 30% Club souvenirs.
But first, we found two more bears foraging for food. The driver guessed that this was most likely a mother and her (not-so-baby) cub. She said they can remain together for up to 5 years as the cub learns to hunt/gather his own food.
Finally, we started climbing a steep ridge, and the driver said to get out our cameras and cross our fingers that we’d get a decent view of the mountain. We crested the ridge, made a turn, and…
Well, hey. That’s not bad. Not bad at all. And certainly better than being completely socked in.
The Eielson Visitor Center is at mile 66 of the Denali Highway, and is a pretty cool building. It’s built right into the mountainside.
Unfortunately, the only part we were allowed to see due to COVID was the restroom. We spent roughly 45 minutes there. Just enough for the restroom, a picnic lunch (no points for guessing the menu) and a short hike just below the visitor center building. One of the ideas behind the transit bus is that they run continuously throughout the day. It gives travelers some flexibility. If we'd wanted to, we could have gone for a hike here at the visitor center (or somewhere else along the way) and spent a few hours before taking another bus back to the depot. They announce when the last bus of the day will come through, and travelers along the road can flag down a green bus anytime. It really does operate as a small transit system.
We stuck with "our" bus just because we weren't prepared to spend several hours hiking, especially with a 7-year-old in tow.
I kept taking photos of Denali. I mean, it’s the largest mountain in North America. I just couldn’t help myself.
Had enough of that? Fine, we’ll get back on the bus. I’ll say this, though: I really love our national parks.
The ride back was more businesslike, as we were just backtracking over the same road we came in on, so the driver had less information to share. But we did finish our wildlife bingo game when we found a moose on the return trip.
As you might imagine, an 8-hour bus ride on a dirt road can be tiring. They did a remarkable job of staying on schedule, and we pulled back into the bus depot right around 3:30 p.m. We drove just outside the park to the tourist village and wandered the gift shops for a bit in search of crappy t-shirts. Thankfully, they had plenty in stock. They were also well-prepared for visitors.
I ran into a snag with our dinner plans, though. I had planned on visiting Prospector’s Pizza, which was nearby and had pretty good reviews on Trip Advisor. But once again, they had changed their hours due to COVID, and were closed on Mondays. Of course, this was a Monday.
That sent us into a bit of a panic as there weren’t too many other places that looked too appealing to us. Without a reservation, I figured we had no shot of getting back into the 49th State Brewery, so we started scouring the visitor information flyers to see if there was some other alternative.
We ended up finding
Karsten’s Public House, which is part of the McKinley Chalet hotel (owned by one of the cruise lines).
It certainly looked inviting on the inside.
My notes are failing me here, because I don’t remember what everybody ordered. I only know that I was eyeing up a fried chicken sandwich, and I think that’s what Julie ordered and she ended up loving it. But I let the waiter talk me into ordering the steak frites, which you would think would be a good call, but it ended up being my least favorite meal of the trip.
I’m normally a sucker for steak, but this one was tougher than a middle-school cafeteria monitor. Everyone else seemed to like their food, so I was the one with the dud this time around.
Thankfully, dessert salvaged the meal.
Many of our national parks are in remote areas, which are hard to reach and involve long hours of traveling in order to see them. It took hours and several flights to reach Alaska, and then more hours of driving followed by a wilderness bus just to see Denali National Park. We had to spend 8 hours cramped in a school bus on a dirt road.
Totally worth it. Between the wildlife and the mountain scenery, I’d go back for more in a heartbeat.
Coming Up Next: if you’ve been bored by this TR so far, may I interest you in cute dogs?
Thanks for chiming in!
That was kinda a long story to say, yeah, so fast!! But you've made some really incredible family memories. Good job, Dad!
