During our three days aboard the shuttle buses into the
park, we had very mixed experiences. On
the first day (our “reserved” shuttle bus) we were scheduled to Wonder
Lake. With a 7:25am pick-up we were
fortunate to get out before the clouds rolled in later in the day. We were able to see Mt. Denali from the Stony
Dome Overlook area; although the view became more obscured as we approached the
Eielson Visitor Center.
Along this part of the ride, we didn’t see much in the way
of wildlife close enough to photograph.
We saw “white dots” (Dall Sheep) on the peaks and “brown dots” (Caribou)
on the low tundra valleys. On the way
out to Wonder Lake, beyond Eielson we saw a bull moose feeding down on the
tundra. He was about 200 yards from the
road, and a challenge to photograph.
Shortly after that, however, we had our first great photo op, a grizzly
boar walking right up the road like he owned the place. And for about five minutes, he did! Our bus driver Barr said that she sees him along
that stretch of road every couple of weeks.
She turned off the bus as we watched him approach and then walk right
past the bus. How exciting!
Down at Wonder Lake, we were disappointed to learn that the
blueberries were not very plentiful this year due to the long rainy season and
lack of mosquitoes. I was surprised to
hear that since reports from Wonder Lake this year had been that the mozzies
were significant. I suppose everything
is relative. Yes, there were plenty of
them around down by the lake and up at the bus parking spot. I was happy I had bug dope.
The ride back from Wonder Lake afforded us our second bear
sighting, again on the road (approximately MM 70). There was a grizzly sow plus two larger cubs
(probably second year, maybe even third) in the road. As our bus approached, they began to run,
still in the road. They continued for a
couple of minutes until a bus approached from the opposite direction. At that time, they all three darted off to
the right of our bus, out into the tundra. They took cover in some heavy brush, but one
of the cubs decided to run through the tundra, creating a rooster tail of water
spray behind it. How exciting!
From there, the bulk of our ride back to camp had some brief
sightings. We did see another grizzly
bear high up on a plateau above the Tolkat River as well as a soaring golden
eagle. We also saw a horry marmot along
the road crossing over the Polychrome Pass.
Back at camp, we settled in for a nice spaghetti dinner and
TV time on the laptop.
The next day (Monday) was a miserable day; it was cold, damp
and rainy. We caught the shuttle bus
around 8:30 and headed in to Eielson.
Along the way, we saw very little.
I’m not sure if it was because we were on a bus with a bunch of foreign
professional photographers who were treating the ride like a tour waiting to
have wildlife pointed out to them . . . or that the weather was getting worse
the further into the park we traveled. We
did see a couple of bears, one walking along the river bed of the East Fork of
the Toklat River and the other walking up a rocky ravine near Stony Dome. When we got to Eielson we were happy to get
with the dispatcher to secure another bus to Wonder Lake.
Our new bus mates were not much better as this bus was
largely comprised of a packaged tour group from Europe. It was clear from hearing them complain, they
didn’t understand the nature of the shuttle bus system in the park. They were fussy about the weather, the lack
of animal sightings.
At each rest stop, David used the squeegee
and water bucket to clean the windows around our seats. Not much good that it would do, however, as
within five minutes they were mucked up again.
Our ride out to Wonder Lake and then back out towards the park entrance
was slow and uneventful. Most of the
passengers were asleep for the three plus hour ride.
By this time however, the roads were really nasty, making it impossible to keep
the windows of the bus clean enough to see through.
No comments:
Post a Comment