Ocean Sail Issue 26 - Friday, August 18, 2000

Location: Dalton Highway – 175 miles south of the Artic Ocean

Lat: N68.27 W149.28

North from Valdez takes us to the historic copper mining camp of Kennicott and McCarthy. The world famous Kennicott mine was started in 1906 and operated till 1939 and produced the highest grade ore that has ever been mined in North America. It now is part of the Wrangle / St. Ellis National Park, the largest park in US park system. McCarthy is at the end 70 miles of gravel road that was once the railroad that carried the ore from the mine. The road was particularly rough, but it mostly slowed the passenger vehicles down. The Hummer was unfazed of course.

At the end of the road to Kennicott is a foot bridge and no motorized traffic can proceed beyond this point. Except of course the private land holders on the edge of the park that live in McCarthy. We took our bike for the five mile ride to Kennicott. After 60 years of neglect the mine is a shambles, but still mostly standing. The park service is preserving a few building and a hotel operates out of the old bunk house. Kennicott sits on the side of hill overlooking the Kennicott Glacier, but you can hardly tell it is a glacier for all the moraine and debris that cover it. Farther up the valley you can see the white flow nestled in the mountainsides. We continued up the trail past the mine and finally locking the bikes up when we were within half a mile of the glacier. As we got closer, the temperature crept lower and lower. We mounted the glacier where there were still a bit of surface debris and walked up until we were on clean white ice. Out hiking shoes were not prepared for this level of traction so we back down to the trail, the bikes and dinner at the Hummer.

Back tracking over the McCarthy dirt road takes us north again. We are headed back to Denali for another crack at the famous park – the weather does not look promising however. Traversing across Alaska on the unpaved Denali Highway should have reward us with panoramic vistas and breath taking views. All we got for our effort was a rain and mud spattered windshield. Arriving in Denali the next day is wet and cold. Still we have reservations at the one of the campgrounds for two nights so we decide to hang around. The weather has to get better right?

At the Rusty Spike bar in the Denali hotel, the bartender tells us it has been 37 days of rain. Still we make reservation for a shuttle bus into the park the next day. Since most of morning trips are full we opt for the 5:30 am ride. Its $21 a person, for a 8 hour shuttle bus ride from the entrance visitor center to the Elision visitor 66-miles inside the park.  There are 26 free slots left and we feel that despite the early start, a less crowded bus more comfortable. We fall asleep to the gentle patter of rain on the tent. 4:30 comes early and the rain is still with us  It is 38 degrees (American) and walking to the visitor center at 5am with our rain gear on wakes us up wither we want to be awake or not.

At five thirty the bus pulls up. Ten people including ourselves board the “Blue Bird” school bus. The driver is wired on caffeine and launches into his routine, leaving the poor German tourist wondering what is going on. We are told that on buses that provide seatbelts, and our does, and that it is federal law that the passengers (us) must wear them. He talks none stop for about 10 minutes as we motor through the dim wet morning. We are told that we that this is a shuttle bus, not a wildlife tour. That he may stop for wildlife viewing, but he has a schedule to keep. On and one it goes. Finally he shuts up for while and we are alone with our thoughts. Shortly we come to our first of many wildlife sightings: Caribou. They are a ways off and we only stop for a short while, but with only 10 people on a 50 passenger bus we are free to move around and take advantageous positions for wildlife sightings.

About 30 minutes into our 4 hour drive, Ktoo starts getting visibly excited. She starts to stand up and says “It’s a bear! Stop, Stop, It’s a bear!” and sure enough it is. A smallish Grizzly is about 50 yards away on the left side of the bus. The driver stops the bus and the group of ten rushes to the windows and lower the upper portion. The grizzly looks spooked and stops in his tracks, stands on his hind legs and looks at us. He then heads away, but just as he about to crest the hilltop he reverses his course and heads back down the hill toward the road behind us. Gaining the road he trots down the road from where we came. Our first bear sighting in less then 30 minutes.

Our driver Rick continues to give a running monolog of the park, the animals, himself, etc – stopping on demand for sighting of Dall sheep, moose, and more caribou.  Despite his self professed training as shuttle bus driver and not a wildlife guide he gives a pretty interesting monologue. We stop about every hour at strategically placed rest stops. The whole atmosphere is like a drive in zoo – Denali National Park and Wildlife Preserve and Drive in Zoo. Oh yeah I forgot about the mountain. Add High Attitude Climbing Gym and Playground to that.

There are two older couples in the front seats. I surmise that they are farmers or ranchers because they have a habit finding the white speck like sheep on the mountain several miles away and then attempting to count them. It takes me back to memories of  my grandfather in Oklahoma, farmer and rancher. I don’t suppose the farm supply bill caps and ostrich hide cowboy boots gives anything away either. They persist at finding these sheep until the driver does not even stop for their sighting any longer.

Halfway to the turn around point we come up behind on the resort provided wildlife tours – tan bus, ours is a green bus – shuttle bus. They have sighted a grizzly bear. More likely they nearly ran over him. The bear in on the right side of the road rooting around in the shrubs eating roots and berries. He is completely ignoring the bus and the flailing arms holding cameras and video cameras out of the windows. The windows by design only slide halfway down, which leads to some pretty interesting head, arm and shoulder combinations hanging out the window. I suppose its a good thing that the bears are ignoring them since we get to watch this “wild life” in his “natural” habitat. But also bad, because I think that bears, especially grizzly bears should be afraid of anything that has anything to do with humans. When I am hiking in the woods I want the bear to be afraid of me, so I don’t have to be afraid of it. Regardless of the philosophical arguments it is quite a sight to see a grizzly bear working on a beery patch.

After four hours of bumping around in the fog and light rain we come to Ellison Visitor Center – or mile 66 and a supposed view of Mt Denali. But we are left to our imagination and postcard images because all we can see is the fog rolling up the pass and streaks of horizontal rain. Inside the center there are charts showing the number days in August for the past ten yeas that the mountain was visible. They are all single digits and some are just “0”.

We had intended on hiking around the visitor center, but the cold, wind and rain change our mind and we settle back down to our 5th row seats for the 4 hour ride back. The weather has gone from bad to worse in the half-hour at that we are at the visitor center. The edge of the road is barely visible as we bump and wind our way back. Just a few minutes in to the return trip the buss pass over some bear scat that was not there on the way up. In less then a turn down the way we come to the scat owner lumbering along the road. After following it for a 100 yards or so it drops off the road and parallels the bus. We creep alone keeping pace with the bear as he fades in and out of the fog.

For the next three hours the rain falls and some passengers (Ktoo and I) drop in to an uneasy rest. Occasionally the driver lets loose a monologue as we cross various features of the park. On one instance he apologizes for  waking us up. Around one pm we are back in the entrance center with 6 bears sighted - 3 on the road, moose, caribou, Dall sheep, golden eagles, ptarmigan and other assorted birds to our wildlife score card. On the “big five” list as Rick the driver calls it we scored 4 out of five with a missing of wolf or fox. Not bad we are told. Sleepy, we walk back to the Hummer tent and when we arrive there is more blasting wind and rain. We crawl up for a snug nap.