Three years ago when we were at Denali we took some bus tour into the park. Bus tours or bus shuttles (or hike) are the only way to get in to the park. We were very disappointed then because the bus driver drove too fast and we didn’t see animals. Back in March when I planned our time in Denali for this summer, I wanted to make sure that we took a better tour this time. I signed us up for the Tundra Wilderness Tour. The tour was supposed to run from 1:00 pm - 9:30 pm. When we picked up our tickets, I noticed that we were scheduled for a 2:30 tour. I didn’t really think about it at the time, but that would make for a very late return.
The campground registration person told us to go into town to one of the hotels to board the bus because the best seats go quickly. We followed her advice. The bus is a retrofitted school bus. The retrofit was to install 2 separate seats in place of the standard “bench” seat everyone remembers from high school and to install a video camera system so that the driver can zoom in on a distant animal and passengers can see the animal on a video screen. The bus was packed like sardines! Five adults were crammed into the back seat. Unfortunately because the bus was so crowded, the day felt really long and we weren’t able to see as well as we would have liked. If someone has never been to Denali previously, I’d probably recommend that they take the tour, but we would never do it again. (Cost was $237 for both of us.) The other disappointment with the tour was that we got back a bit after 10:00 pm. Because it’s late in the season, the last hour of the tour was a waste – it was pitch dark. The driver was a great tour guide. During the winter he is a guide at Yellowstone driving one of the snow coaches. (Visiting Yellowstone in winter is on my list of things I want to do.) We got box snacks (roll, piece of cheese, reindeer sausage slices (like pepperoni) and bottle of water). Because the National Park Service doesn’t want any animals to get any “people food”, you have to eat your snack in the crowded bus. Most people had additional food along, but frankly it was difficult to eat because I couldn’t put one more thing on my lap.
The Tundra Wilderness Tour goes about 60 miles into the park. The road is paved for the first 9 miles, then gravel.
The highlight of the day was a grizzly bear who was digging roots very near the turn around. The grizzly was on the opposite side of the bus so I had to hover over other people to take these pictures.
I like this picture because you can see the size of his paw. Look at that foot!
Late as we got back near the park entrance we saw several moose. It was too dark to get pictures.
As we traveled on the bus we discussed that we really didn’t want to take the shuttle bus that we had booked for tomorrow. I couldn’t stand being trapped on another bus for 10+ hours.
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