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Published: June 13th 2010
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Kerry cleaning bus windows
you can see how muddy the sides of the bus are We got to the Wilderness Access Center at Denali National Park at 8:45 for our shuttle bus trip that was supposed to leave at 9:15. Our driver was late, maybe 15 or 20 minutes. It had rained all night, a drizzle mostly, but there were puddles everywhere and it was chilly, in the mid 40's. We were happy to board the bus and get in out of the cold, but the heater wasn't doing much on the bus. The bus was only about half full, so it was easy to get window seats. We were going as far as Wonder Lake, a trip of 85 miles each way. There were rest stops and animal viewing stops and mountain viewing stops built into the schedule, making the trip 11 hours long.
Since it was raining and the clouds were quite low at times, there was very little mountain viewing, and we never saw Mt. McKinley today. The first few hours the only animals we saw were a seagull and a couple of snowshoe hares. Later we saw a couple of moose, some ducks, and a pair of ptarmigan. At the rest stops, several of the passengers and our driver would clean
the windows so we could see out to look for whatever we could find. The road through the park, once you get past Savage River at mile 15 is all gravel. Today it was all muddy gravel.
Our driver was a wonderful woman named Nancy, who obviously loves driving the shuttle bus to Wonder Lake. She was a wealth of information and gave us a great narrative on history, wildlife, and other interesting tidbits. She told us what animals we should look for in what areas and where to look. Unfortunately, most of the wildlife had stayed home watching tv or something. At Eielson visitor center, which usually has good views of Mt. McKinley, it was so socked in, we couldn't see any mountains at all. We were in a cloud, and it was chilly. It is a wonderful visitor center though.
We passed and were passed by other buses, sometimes it was a bit scary because the roads are narrow and winding. But the drivers have all done it many times before and they would pass each other with inches to spare, while we passengers stared out the window at the dropoff near our tires.
At
Wonder Lake it was raining so hard that hardly anyone got off the bus to take pictures, and only a few desperate souls that had to make a run for the bathrooms. The rain started letting up some on the return trip and we saw a few more animals; a moose, some dall sheep, loons, and some caribou (finally) high up in the snow. We could even see some of the mountain tops, freshly dusted with new snow. We saw three fledgling ravens and their nest under a bridge. The sun peeked out a couple of times and Nancy was even able to turn off the windshield wipers for a few minutes.
We arrived back at our departure point right on schedule and worn out. It was not an ideal day for the shuttle in Denali, but it was pretty anyway, and it certainly was memorable.
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Claudia
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Sad news
Sad news from the home front. Hal died this morning. We will send flowers and include your names.