Denali National Park

Driving to Barrow, Alaska, the most northern inhabited settlement in the United States, was not an option.  So we settled on a more easily reachable location -- Denali National Park, which was only about 3 hours away from Anchorage.

Charlie advised us to take the "shuttle bus" that takes hikers and campers to various sites throughout the park rather than a tour bus.  The shuttle was a little over $20 per person where the tour bus was $75 per person.  (The seats weren't the "luxury" type that would've been on the tour bus, but they were comfortable enough for our needs.)  The driver for the shuttle bus was also an excellent tour guide.  He pointed out the various wild animals, hiking trails, mountain peaks, etc., along the 8-hour roundtrip ride.  We saw grizzly bears, caribou, moose, big horn sheep, foxes and more along the route.

 

The shuttle made plenty of stops where we could get out and stretch our legs as well as get some great pictures of the scenery.

The route's elevations changed dramatically throughout the ride.  We'd go from being several hundred feet high and then down to river banks.  By the time we arrived at the point closest to Mt McKinley, the storm clouds had covered the peak.  So we don't have any pictures of Mt McKinley.

Why am I sitting by myself?  On the trip out, my window was along the mountain sides.  So I didn't notice how narrow the road (wide enough for only one shuttle bus most of the route) was and how steep the dropoffs were until we were headed back to the park's visitor center.  At that point I was more than content to sit on the opposite side and be oblivious (as much as possible) to how close to death we were if the bus went off the narrow road.

At first you might think this picture was unintentional.  But Russ took this photo of the drop off from the "edge side" of the roadway.  Now do you understand my concerns?

 

Here's a picture of a post card I had purchased that shows what Mt McKinley looks like without clouds obscuring the view.

 

 

 It was around midnight by the time we got back to our motel just outside Denali National Park. We didn't use a flash with this photo of the view outside our motel room. That's about as dark as it gets this far north this time of year.   

 



Once we retire from the military, we can see ourselves living in Alaska during the summers.