In my opinion, no trip to Alaska is complete without spending at least one full day here at Denali National Park. My first experience was back in 2006, when a work assignment made it possible for David & I to take that "once in a lifetime" trip. After the completion of the conference I was attending, we spent 3 days/2 nights in the Denali area . . . leaving me to vow to return "someday." Since that fateful trip in 2006, I have been back to Denali National Park 5 times, each for a minimum of 4 nights camping at the Teklanika Campground inside the park at MM29.
Too often I hear of family and friends who want to go to Alaska, but they don't have the time or perhaps the money to really do more than a few hit or miss stops via a land excursion that is piggy-backed onto an Alaskan cruise. I cringe when I hear of their plans, especially knowing how much they might miss by not allowing more time and independence in their adventure.
That said, I also know and on this trip had to accept that how I enjoy and choose to experience Alaska is not for everyone . . . and what gives me great peace and joy, may simply be boring to others.
When you book a campsite at TEK, you must reserve and pay for a minimum of 3 nights. The dry campsites run $40/night (or half price with the NPS/BLM Access or Senior Pass). For David & me, this has never been an issue as the last couple of times, we booked for 5 or 6 nights at TEK. For this trip with Pam, I knew that 3 nights may have to be abbreviated to just 2 either due to a late arrival or perhaps the desire to check-out a day early. The latter would be the case this time.
Since the road slumping at Polychrome Pass back in the summer of 2021, access into the park has been greatly affected. In past years, David and/or I have gone as far as Wonder Lake (MM85) and even the end of the road (MM92). But with the transit buses limited to East Fork River (MM43), the park experience and opportunities to view wildlife are significantly reduced.
With the greatly reduced ride to East Fork and then back to our campground, the entire trip was about 2 hours long. Back at the campervan, we had a conversation of the experience had thus far, and how best to enjoy our time in Denali. It was agreed we'd have some lunch and then do the bus trip again in hopes of seeing more animals later in the day. We also decided we would plan to exit the campground the next morning, a day early, and enjoy some of the other park's activities at the front entrance area.
Here are a few of the photos taken during our two transit bus rides to East Fork (MM43) on Wednesday.
Ptarmigan - the Alaskan state bird, still in the process of changing colors from winter's full white to summer's brown camouflage.
The next morning, we had a leisurely breakfast before heading out to the main entrance of the park for showers at the Riley Creek Mercantile. We then headed over to the park headquarters/visitor center where we could park the campervan and take a shuttle bus to the Denali Park Kennels for their scheduled demonstration at 2:00pm. We enjoyed poking around the visitor center exhibits and watching a short movie about the park before heading over to the kennels. All in all, we made the most of our time at Denali NP and were happy with our decision to cut our time short by a day, to provide some cushion to see and do other things as we worked our way to our next scheduled stop . . . Moosepass Campground (Friday evening) and Seward for the Northwestern Glacier Tour on Saturday.
The Denali Park Kennels
TO BE CONTINUED - Talkeetna & Beyond
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