Denali is Awesome
The biggest trip that I've taken since being up in Alaska was spending a week in Denali National Park. Hiking a trail-less pristine wilderness is absolutely incredible. The park is about the size of Massachusets, so the 60 miles that Priya and I covered aren't even close to enough time spent in the park. It was gorgeous. We hiked through tundra, high tundra, up mountains, along glacial rivers, in the rain and in the heat of the sun, all while trying to avoid the swarms of mosquitoes that followed us like (literally) black clouds. The bus ride into the park itself was pretty sweet, and getting dropped off at a semi-random junction in the road and let go into the wilderness was awesome. Hang on, because there are a ton of pictures on this one. Despite my foreknowledge that these pictures can't possibly describing how incredible the trip was, I'm going to give it a shot anyway.
Priya and I on the bus ride in. That day was beautiful, affording incredible views of the Alaska Range.
One of said views.
Priya at Stony Creek. This is where we got dropped off of the bus.
Climbing over a rock outcropping. The first day we discovered how cold glacial streams are on the feet, how hard it is to get boots dry, and what lengths we were willing to go to to avoid getting our feet more wet.
Mountains across the stream from our first campsite.
Me on our first climb up to a plateau betweent two creeks. This climb was followed shortly by a fairly large thunderstorm. As we were traveling on a bare plateau at the time, it was less than cool.
Me on a gravel bar next to Clearwater Creek. Gravel bars were our friends...they meant no trudging through tundra (which is kind of like walking on irregularly shaped foot deep sponges), and if they were wide enough no river crossings.
Our first mosquito-free dinner in three days. This particular creek just happened to have enough breeze blowing through to keep the bugs away. It also let us dry out our gear a bit. After camping at Clearwater that night, we followed Moonlight Creek a ways until Priya got tired of it and decided we just climb straight up to the ridge. After several hours of 'schwacking through dense tangles of trees, we made it to the ridge, where we experienced incredibly smooth hiking. Lots of up and down, but few mosquitoes and high, dry tundra. Awesome.
Priya hiking the ridge.
Our first big climb on the ridge. The other side was a mess of scree...pretty rough going trying to get down safely.
Priya at the edge of one of the peaks we climbed over.
Me hiking the ridge. Unfortunately, smoke from a forest fire had blown in, so we didn't have the best of views. Hiking that ridge, though, gave me the most incredible edge-of-the-earth feeling that I've ever experienced.
Another shot of mountains along the ridge.
A picture from the last day of the hike. We climbed the peak just past those clouds expecting to have another 5- miles of peak climbing only to find...a road. We had been hiking the Kantishna Hills, and it turns out that the area we were in still had small, but active, mines operating in it, and there was a road to get back to them. So those last 5-7 miles went by way faster than we were expecting.
A griz rumbling around near the bus. We didn't see any griz on foot, which disappointed me. I still haven't see any bear on foot since I've been in Alaska.
The griz wandering between our bus and the wilderness photographers in front of us.
Cool view of the sun over the mountains on our way out. Denali is awesome.
Priya and I on the bus ride in. That day was beautiful, affording incredible views of the Alaska Range.
One of said views.
Priya at Stony Creek. This is where we got dropped off of the bus.
Climbing over a rock outcropping. The first day we discovered how cold glacial streams are on the feet, how hard it is to get boots dry, and what lengths we were willing to go to to avoid getting our feet more wet.
Mountains across the stream from our first campsite.
Me on our first climb up to a plateau betweent two creeks. This climb was followed shortly by a fairly large thunderstorm. As we were traveling on a bare plateau at the time, it was less than cool.
Me on a gravel bar next to Clearwater Creek. Gravel bars were our friends...they meant no trudging through tundra (which is kind of like walking on irregularly shaped foot deep sponges), and if they were wide enough no river crossings.
Our first mosquito-free dinner in three days. This particular creek just happened to have enough breeze blowing through to keep the bugs away. It also let us dry out our gear a bit. After camping at Clearwater that night, we followed Moonlight Creek a ways until Priya got tired of it and decided we just climb straight up to the ridge. After several hours of 'schwacking through dense tangles of trees, we made it to the ridge, where we experienced incredibly smooth hiking. Lots of up and down, but few mosquitoes and high, dry tundra. Awesome.
Priya hiking the ridge.
Our first big climb on the ridge. The other side was a mess of scree...pretty rough going trying to get down safely.
Priya at the edge of one of the peaks we climbed over.
Me hiking the ridge. Unfortunately, smoke from a forest fire had blown in, so we didn't have the best of views. Hiking that ridge, though, gave me the most incredible edge-of-the-earth feeling that I've ever experienced.
Another shot of mountains along the ridge.
A picture from the last day of the hike. We climbed the peak just past those clouds expecting to have another 5- miles of peak climbing only to find...a road. We had been hiking the Kantishna Hills, and it turns out that the area we were in still had small, but active, mines operating in it, and there was a road to get back to them. So those last 5-7 miles went by way faster than we were expecting.
A griz rumbling around near the bus. We didn't see any griz on foot, which disappointed me. I still haven't see any bear on foot since I've been in Alaska.
The griz wandering between our bus and the wilderness photographers in front of us.
Cool view of the sun over the mountains on our way out. Denali is awesome.
posted by Slim at
10:55 PM
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