Today was a long day but most interesting. We set our alarm for 5:00 am as our tour
began at 6:15 am at the Denali National Park entrance. There were 16 of us on the bus plus our bus
driver, Rick Miller, who gave us a great running commentary along with several
lame jokes. Our tour was titled the
Kantishna Experience and it was only one of two bus tours that went to the end
of the Denali Highway at mile 92 in Kantishna, a former gold claim.
On our tour we saw five moose, four caribou, two grizzly bears
and several Dall sheep at a distance but the star of the trip was Mount
McKinley, also known locally as Denali, the highest peak in North America. We had excellent weather with clear views of
Mount McKinley for most of the day. Our
bus driver and park ranger (who spent about an hour with us) said they see this
only three or four times a summer.
Usually the mountain is covered in clouds and later in the afternoon the
clouds did arrive. We were quite
lucky. The bus driver said we also saw
more wild game than most trips. The only
major animal we did not see, which I was hoping to see, was wolves. We also saw a golden eagle and a harrier
hawk.
At Wonder Lake a park ranger boarded our bus and showed us
the house of Fannie Quigley, a colorful Alaska pioneer who lived in the area
for over 40 years. He told us many
stories of Fannie and other early settlers who mined, trapped and hunted in the
area before it became a national park.
Finally we had to turn around and return on the same gravel
road to the park entrance. We arrived
back about 6:00 pm making for a 12 hour tour.
We drove to a restaurant called The Salmon Bake and had parmesan crusted
halibut with veggies. It tasted great
and we came back to our cabin by the river and crashed.
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