We set off early, 8:30am, as we were not sure of the timing of our tour through the Denali National Park this afternoon. At Nenatena we were able to call Melinda at Alaskatours who told us that they had booked us on the 1:45pm tour, so no hurry as it’s only a 2 hour drive from Fairbanks.
We arrived at 10:45 after various photo shoot/pit stop opportunities and were able to check-in early to our rooms. There is a great view from the room, the hotel sits HIGH on the side of the valley above the main road, of the village and river below. We had also collected our tickets for the tour at check-in and had been very surprised when told that the tour lasts 8 hours! This had Jill & Helen very concerned! However, we were told that a boxed snack is provided but we were advised to take extra water and candy bars.
We ate lunch at the hotel and then caught our bus at 1:45pm. Arlene, you can imagine our horror when a Bluebird SCHOOL BUS turned up; we took Jill’s advice and sat near the front!
Denali National Park is HUGE, 6 million acres, the size of Massachusetts and welcomes over 500,000 visitors each year! We drove 53 miles into the park to the Tolkat River and then back along a single track gravel road at times perched thousands of feet up the side of mountains; it was REALLY exciting at times when another vehicle was coming the other way! The views are amazing, and we even caught glimpses through the clouds of the mountain, Denali, that our bus driver, Bill, said was rumored to be in the park! Apparently, most visitors never get to see it! Also the fall colors are very good now and more and more visitors are timing their visit to the park to see them.
Of course what everyone wants to see are the animals in their natural environment so we were disappointed when Bill told us that nobody had been seeing much wildlife for the past few days. We saw some Willow Ptarmigan, then some Dall Sheep and then a Gyr Falcon, which is apparently very rare and a ornithologist’s dream come true. Then as we maneuvered around an oncoming bus their driver shouted, “4 Grizzly Bears around the next corner”. We were then treated to an amazing show as Sow and her three cubs foraged through the tundra and eventually came up a watercourse right up to the bus and crossed the road in front of us. These bears are BIG! Right now they are eating like crazy, 40,000 calories a day, to get ready for their long hibernation. It probably won’t be long now before that happens as the first snowfall has already happened at the park and Bill expected that the park would only be open another week or so as the road closes once the snow gets too deep.
On our return trip from the Tolkat River we saw another Grizzly sow and her 2 cubs, a Snowshoe Hare and the we saw a Moose. It was way off in the distance, but through the binoculars you could still see that it was a bull with a large set of antlers.
We had also hoped to see Caribou, but no luck as they seem to have disappeared to everyone’s surprise. Got back to the hotel at 9pm and then went straight into the restaurant for dinner, we were starving.
Hoping to really see Denali tomorrow as we drive down to Anchorage, apparently there are good viewing points further south of here.
Will post photos when we get to Anchorage.
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