Days 46-52: More time with The Great One & A Couple of Close Calls

Karen Derrick-Davis
Jun 9
5 min read

Wildlife Bingo

Caribou
Porcupine
Grizzly
Red Fox
Moose
Dall Sheep
Willow Ptarmigan
Spruce Grouse
Canada Jay
Junco
Bald Eagle
Short-billed Gull
Crow
Raven

Highlights

Seeing Denali again from a different angle
Sharing part of our trip with a friend
Heartfelt thank you from our gay waitress who saw my "Pride!" sign on the trailer
Dogsled kennel tour

More Denali!

After picking up our friend at the Anchorage airport, we drove straight to Denali National Park & Preserve. On our previous trip to the area the week before with the kids, we stayed at Denali State Park, which is closer to Anchorage and still affords views of The Great One (aka Denali, previously, Mount McKinley ). This visit to Denali with our friend was for more days than we had with the kids, which gave us more time to go the extra distance to the national park.

Mother Nature shined on us, again, and we were able to see the mountain two days! The view from the north is closer, but less expansive.

The 92-mile Park Road is the only road in the park and it is closed to private vehicles at about mile 20. And a rock slide in 2024 has caused the closure of the Park Road at mile 43 until 2026, which cuts off the closer views of the mountain. The bus ride along the Park Road was still magnificent.

The transit bus that runs along the Park Road.

Denali through the bus window. Easy to see that there are two peaks, North Peak and South Peak.

We saw about 50 of the 1800 caribou in Denali.

We saw about 20 of the 1800 moose in Denali.

Porcupine munching down on the side of the road.

A Dall Sheep "nursery." Ten females and four babies. They like to be WAY up there!

A Grizzly Moment

The most notable wildlife moment of the trip was a grizzly encounter. Armed with bear spray and a knife, my husband went rockhounding in a riverbed not far from the campground. The riverbed crossed under the Park Road where he'd parked. He meandered down the riverbed, periodically looking up to scan for bears. At one point, he heard someone from a car on the road yell, "Bear!!" My husband looked up and a grizzly was also meandering down the riverbed -- in his direction!

The bear was about 100 yards away and did not appear to see my husband, so he climbed into some brush and hid -- bear spray and knife at the ready. The bear continued to slowly walk down the rocky path and passed within 20 yards of the hiding rockhound, without changing his behavior -- which is an indication that a wild animal has sensed you and is concerned. The guideline for a "safe" distance from a grizzly is 300 yards. Once the bear was about 200 yards away, my husband started carefully moving back toward the truck up at the road. As he was heading back, a bus approached on the road and stopped. The door opened and the driver yelled, "Sir! You are too close to that bear!" Ha, ha, if the driver only knew!!

Here, Moosey Moosey!

At the campsite, we had another close encounter. While sitting at the fire, our dog started intently peering into the trees. The three of us humans looked hard and saw nothing. We figured it was a hare.

Then, the dog started to softly growl. We humans took another look and barely made out a moose about 50 yards away in the trees. The dog was escorted into the trailer and we kept our eye on it while sitting at the fire. The guideline is to stay more than 25 yards away from a moose and we could be in the trailer within a few seconds, so we felt safe enough. I decided to turn in for the night and left the guys outside. Within 5 minutes, the trailer door opened and they were high-tailing it inside. The moose had run between our campsite and the next -- about 15 yards from the fire pit.

We have no photos of either encounter, so you will have to take my word for it!

Awesome Dogs

An unexpected treat at Denali was visiting the dogsled kennels. The park has uses dogsleds for transportation in the winter since its inception -- over 100 years ago. The first superintendent purchased dogs before anything else. Since the dogs are bred for qualities other than appearance, they all look different.

Back to the Travelers' Life

After a wonderful week, we dropped our friend back at the airport with ease and then spent the day in Anchorage taking care of auto needs. After over 7,000 miles on the road, our truck needed some attention. We realized the tread on our rear tires was wearing thin. So, a couple of weeks ago, we called around to Anchorage tire shops and found one that would order the tires for us. Now, the tires were in, but it was a Friday afternoon and the tire shop, which did not take appointments, was closed over the weekend.

Fortunately when I called at noon as we left the airport, the mechanic said we could come right over. Yay! We got the new tires and an oil change, and then got on the road heading back down to the Kenai Peninsula and our farthest destination, Homer.

Fellow Travelers

C, our cafe waitress who went out of her way to find me and thank me for the "Pride! Allies on board" shoe polish sign on our trailer window. She approached me while I was in the hallway of the giftshop, before we sat down in the cafe, to tell me how much the sign meant to her. She (white) and her African-American wife have worked the last eight summers in Alaska and spend winter in Arizona. Neither place is very welcoming. I didn't get to ask her why they chose those locations.