Denali National Park: Denali Park Road Log

What should I see on the Denali Park Road?

You’re sitting on the bus, binoculars in hand, heading into the heart of Denali National Park. You’re about to see a place where life continues as it has for thousands of years, without interference by man. It is not a zoo, and wild animals who live here set their own schedule. But if everyone on the bus keeps their eyes peeled, chances are excellent that it will pay off with wildlife sightings. Remember, there is no guarantee. But even if the only wildlife you see is a ground squirrel, the scenery alone is worth the trip.

Bus trips into the park generally start at the Visitor Access Center. Once you leave the bulk of development behind – the Alaska Railroad Depot, the new Murie Science and Learning Center – you’ll climb Government Hill. Look off to your left and you’ll see an expansive view that includes part of the Yanert Valley, which stretches through the Alaska Range. A tall railroad bridge spans Riley Creek This is an often-photographed scene in August and September, when bright yellow and blue Alaska Railroad engines pull a line of railroad cars across that bridge, surrounded by gold foliage of Fall.

At 6 million acres, Denali National Park is the third largest park in the United States. Alaska’s Gates of the Arctic National Park is a tad bigger and Wrangell St. Elias National Park and Preserve is the largest.

Denali National Park can be divided into three sections:

One third of the park is comprised of rock and ice, in high elevations, mainly to the south of the park road. There are few animals in that area.
The second third of the park is boggy in low elevations, more to the north and west. There are a few species who make that area their home.
The final third is high mountain passes and broad river valleys. This is where you are most likely to see wild animals. The park road goes right through this area.

The park road runs generally east and west, over four high mountain passes, all just under 4,000 feet elevation, between Igloo at Mile 33 and Eielson at Mile 66. That might not seem very high, but at Denali treeline is at about 3,000 feet. (In Colorado, dry tundra and alpine plants and animals begin at about 14,000 feet).

The road also takes you through the major vegetation zones of the park – taiga, moist tundra and dry tundra.

Moist tundra: Moist tundra includes willows, dwarf birch and alders. Dwarf birch have small leaves with serrated edges. Alders have cones. You’ll see willows and dwarf birch the entire trip. Here at Denali, willows are shrubs, not trees. There are also a wide variety of species of willows, all well adapted to the sub-arctic. Willows are very important food source for animals like moose, caribou, and snowshoe hare.

Taiga: There are four kinds of trees you are likely to see along the park road – white and black spruce, quaking aspen, paper birch and balsam poplar. (There are more species on the south side of the park)

These trees have adapted to surviving in temperatures of 30 below zero or colder, by doing something called “winter hardening.” They pull all the liquids out of their branches and into their roots. That’s why it is so easy to snap off a dry branch in the wintertime. Trees pack those cells with another substance that prevents the branches from freezing.
Those roots are pretty tasty for bears, who dig them up and eat them in the very early spring and fall, when they are filled with nutrients. When temperatures warm, all those nutrients flow back into the leaves.

Dry tundra: The land above tree level; provides some of the most productive late summer habitat. Because it is at a higher elevation, plants green up later. This is where you will see dazzling displays of wildflowers.

It also is the primary nesting habitat for some of Denali’s rarest birds. One of these is the Long Tailed Jaeger, which spends its entire life on the ocean, coming to land only to nest. Denali is one of the few places inland where this bird can be seen regularly.

The mountains on the south side of the park road, including Mount McKinley, generally get lots of precipitation. The biggest glaciers of the Alaska Range are also on the south side of the range. The north side, with small amounts of moisture, remains very dry.

Wildlife: If you’re lucky, you’ll see the wildlife for which Denali is known. Sharp-eyed visitors have a good chance of seeing what locals call “The Big Four:” bear, moose, caribou, and Dall sheep. You’ll also have a good chance of seeing ptarmigan and fox, and you might see a wolf or a beaver. And the luckiest of all will see lynx and wolverine.

Dandelion diggers: The second and third weeks of June, you’ll see a small group of people walking along the east end of the park road, hunched over, digging tool in hand. They are picking dandelions. These yellow flowers are invasive plants that crowd out native plants. Dandelion seeds come to Denali on tires of vehicles and on the soles of shoes.

Six years ago, the park began recruiting volunteers to dig up the persistent weeds. Now, every year, over a two-week period, volunteers spend all day digging up dandelions, roots and all. Hundreds of pounds of dandelions are removed each year. The good news is this: six years ago more than 500 pounds of dandelions were collected. In 2004, that number dropped to about 275 pounds. The dandelion removal may be working.

What do volunteers get in return for their effort? Free camping at Denali National Park during the week and a couple nights free camping afterwards.

Riley Creek Campground
Located in the park entrance area, this campground is close to everything. This is intended to take the place of Morino Campground, a tent-only campground in the entrance area, which was removed two years ago.

146 sites for RVs and tents
Flush toilet
$12 walk-in; $18 drive-in
27 sites are reserved for walk-ins only and not available by advance reservation

Mile 3

It isn’t until you actually drive past the headquarters area that you will begin to enter the wilderness for which you have really come. During the winter months, the road is closed at this point. Only non-motorized travelers, such as mushers and skiers can go further.

This is taiga forest, filled with white spruce and black spruce, interspersed here and there with quaking aspen, paper birch, balsam poplar and tamarack. This is moose habitat and there are some huge bull moose in the park. Watch for a flash of sun glinting off antlers, especially in the fall during rutting season. Look quickly and carefully in the riverbeds as you pass. Early in the season, cow moose and tiny calves on spindly legs may be in sight.
Fox are commonly spotted on this section of road, trotting along with a jaw filled with dead ground squirrel.

Moose like to nibble on the fresh willow leaves along the road early in the season. As the leaves emerge at higher elevations during the season, the moose follow those tasty treats up the hill. Later in the fall, they are more likely to return to the park road again. Moose may be seen anywhere between the entrance and Toklat. Watch for caribou anywhere above treeline.

But don’t be surprised if your visual hunt for wildlife is for naught. It is not unusual to see no animals on this section of road, depending on the time of day and season.

	Mile 9
	First view of Mount McKinley, about 75 miles away. It towers over the other mountains in the range.

	Mile 10.6
	Both peaks of Mount McKinley are framed by Double Mountain and Sable Mountain. Taiga disappears into tundra, waist-high thickets of willow and birch. That stretches into alpine tundra that includes lichens and mosses.

	Mile 12.8
	Savage River Campground. Located in a beautiful river valley, this campground is easy to access. 33 sites for RVs and tents $12 walk in; $18 drive in Water, flush toilets

Mile 14

Savage River Bridge. This is as far as you can drive with your own car. Check the ridges for Dall sheep. In 2003, a fox lived under the bridge and delighted tourists with a litter of kits, who skittered around the riverbed and sometimes the road.

If you look to the north, you’ll see the river cuts through a V-shaped valley, as it flows downstream. To the south, the valley is broad and wide where it has been scoured by glacier. The lay of the land makes it clear that this particular glacier never went further north than the Savage River Bridge.

Beyond the outer, northern edge of the Alaska Range, Interior Alaska remained virtually ice free, with the exception of a few glaciers in the far north Brooks Range. Scientists believe that is where many animals were able to survive during Alaska’s Ice Age.
(The University of Alaska Museum is an excellent resource for more information on that time period)

Mt. McKinley becomes visible again for the next five miles, then disappears until Sable Pass.

Mile 14 (cont.)

Hike: Savage River Loop Trail. North of the bridge. Walk an easy 3-mile loop down one bank of the river, across a bridge, and back the other side of the river. This is a very popular destination. You’ll have lots of company. Despite that, you have a good chance of seeing Dall sheep, marmots and ptarmigan. A resident porcupine continues to annoy the National Park Service by chewing on the check station at the bridge.

Common Question: Why are there sea gulls here?
Answer: Those aren’t sea gulls. They are mew gulls.

	Mile 16
	Primrose Ridge. This is a popular area for day hiking and enjoying wildflowers in early summer. Walking is all above brush line, and it is dry. There’s usually a breeze, so it is not buggy. But it is steep, and there is no official trail. [TK for now, but will have: “Click here for day hikes in Denali.” ] Watch for caribou.

	Mile 22.7
	Sanctuary Campground: 7 sites, tents only. No water. Chemical toilet. $9 fee.

	Mile 23.7
	Spindly white spruce lean this way and that, because these trees have shallow root systems. There is also a discontinuous band of permafrost in the area. There is no sure way to predict where it might be. Permafrost is frozen ground. Sometimes it manifests as ice lenses, which move underground.

Mile 29.1 (1.5 Hour Drive)

Teklanika Campground. This is the third season that tents are not allowed because of wolf conflicts. According to the National Park Service, wolves were showing non-natural behavior toward tent camps. They appeared overly inquisitive and were overcoming their natural fear of humans. Campers are required to spend three nights. The advantage: you can hop on an early morning bus from the campground and get deeper into the park and to better wildlife viewing terrain earlier.

Second largest campground with 53 sites
RVs Only
Flush toilets
$16 fee/night

	Mile 30.3
	Teklanika Rest Stop and overlook. The next rest stop is an hour bus ride away.

	Mile 31.3
	Teklanika Bridge. You enter Igloo Forest. Look for lynx and moose.

Mile 33.0

Driving up Igloo Canyon. Igloo Mountain, 4800 feet elevation, sits to the west and Cathedral Mountain, elevation 4709 feet, lies to the east. Trees are left behind at this point.

Wildlife viewing can really kick in now. This is a good spot for a relatively close look at Dall sheep, who feed in the high alpine near rugged terrain. Bears also frequent this area. Look everywhere. They can be seen ambling along the park road, down in the streambed, or up on the alpine slopes. Wolves and wolverine may be seen periodically in this area. This is also possibly the densest concentration of nesting Arctic Warblers, an Eurasian species of bird that flies here to breed. If you see a tangled mass of sticks in the willows, you have discovered a magpie nest. Other birds sometimes use these nests after the magpie leaves.

	Mile 34.1
	Igloo Campground remains closed because of its proximity to a wolf den. It has been closed for 2 ½ years.

	Mile 37.5
	Tattler Creek. Named for the Wandering Tattler, a large shorebird. The first Wandering Tattler nest known to science was found at Denali National Park. The first nests of the Arctic Warbler and Surfbird were also found here. This is a popular hike.

Mile 37-43

The road climbs to Sable Pass. This is critical grizzly bear country. Shuttle bus riders may get off the bus here, but they are not allowed to leave the road for five miles. No hiking allowed on the tundra here. Take a close look at the wooden Sable Pass sign. It has usually been chewed on. If its your lucky day, the “chewer”—a grizzly bear—will actually be there!

On Sable Pass, as with other passes along the road, the slope on the right-hand side of the bus is south facing, so vegetation there greens up early in the season. It’s also a prime spot for over-wintered berries. Consequently, you’re more likely to see bears on this side of the road early in the season.

The terrain on the left side of the bus faces north and doesn’t get as much sunlight, so snow melts later and new vegetation, which bears like to eat, doesn’t grow until later in the summer. So that would be the place to look for bears on later season trips. By the time the last of the snow melts on this side of the road, it is snowing again already.
When new berries ripen in the fall on south facing slopes, that’s where the bears go.

A broad expanse of landscape opens up to the south as you come down the other side of Sable Pass. Mount McKinley comes into view again, about 55 miles away.

Mile 43

A small cabin is visible down the embankment on the south side of the road.

Common Question: Who lives in that cabin?
Answer: No one. This is an historical cabin, the same structure used in the 1930s by famous biologist Adolf Murie.(he used many others too) Sometimes park rangers or researchers stay there while studying wildlife in the park. This year, the park’s artists-in-residence will spend a number of weeks based out of this cabin.

Research Then: Adolf Murie came to Denali to study the sheep-wolf relationship. Murie ended up doing all the baseline research on park animals, both prey and predators and their interrelationships. To do this, he spent months watching wild animals, taking notes. Consequently much of his research centered on behavior.
Research Now: These days, research is a bit more invasive. Animals are tranquilized and radio-collared. Researchers take blood samples and check for disease, sex, age. Then they track the animal with a mobile radio. They concentrate on populations, mortality, fertility.

Many of the cabins throughout the park were either built by the National Park Service, or by the Alaska Road Commision when the park road was built in 1923-1939. Some of the cabins were used as cook shacks during road construction. These days, they are used during winter months when rangers are patrolling the park by dog team.

Mile 43-46 (2 Hours 25 Minutes Bus Ride to Here)

Colorful Polychrome Pass. If you are afraid of heights, sit on the right side of the bus and don’t look out the left window. But it will be hard to resist admiring the 5-mile-wide grand view that is the Plains of Murie, stretching to the Alaska Range on the horizon. Boulders of all sizes on the fields below are called glacial erratics, left behind long ago by a retreating glacier. The color of the mountains is impressive and seems to change, depending on the light and time of day.

Common Question: What does Polychrome Mean?
Answer: In the Greek language, it means Many Colors.

Just past the rest stop is Marmot Rock, where (surprise!) a marmot usually hangs out.
Early in the season, it’s not unusual to encounter Dall sheep just a few steps away from the rest area. This is one of the few places along the park road where picas can be seen. Picas are not a rodent. They are in the same family as hares and rabbits. They emit a high-pitched squeak and are smaller than a ground squirrel.

Mount McKinley makes another appearance.

Mile 53

Toklat River and Toklat Bridge. Rest Area.
To the north is park employee housing, where summer workers live at the west end of the park during the summer. At this point, you are in the heart of the Alaska Range, in the middle of the broad, U-shaped valley that is the Toklat River Valley.

The Toklat River is a glacial, braided river. The braids, or channels, constantly change depending on the volume of water. Rainfall or snowmelt on the glaciers 10 miles away determines how much water is flowing.

Common Question: When does this riverbed fill with water?
Answer: Never. It’s not a flood plain and probably hasn’t filled bank-to-bank in thousands of years. (These sub-arctic rivers may have experienced huge floods at some point prior to man, however. High terraces along the Teklanika River indicate a high flow at some point in history)

How braided rivers work: As glaciers move, they break off large chunks of rock and pulverize them. This pulverized rock becomes suspended in water as glacial silt, turning the water cloudy. As the silt flows along, it eventually slows to the point that it drops out and is deposited, at least temporarily, filling the channels as the current eats away and creates new channels. Thus, the river slowly moves from one side of the riverbed to the other.

The riverbed is wide and flat and easy walking. Bears, caribou, and wolves all routinely wander down the riverbed. On hot days, caribou sometimes seek shade underneath the bridge.

From here to Eielson is serious bear country, the best possibility of seeing a bear along the park road. Keep your eyes peeled. Watch for The Mountain too. It will be in and out of view the rest of the trip.

Hike: Anywhere between Toklat and Eielson offers fabulous hiking above the trees. Just keep your eyes peeled for wildlife, particularly bears.

	Mile 58.3 (3,980 feet)
	This is the highest point on the park road.

	Mile 62 (3,900 feet)
	Perhaps the most photographed view in the park, on a clear day, Mount McKinley looms 36 miles away. This is the turn-around point for Tundra Wilderness Tours on clear days (usually the morning tour).

	Mile 64.5 Thorofare Pass (3,950 feet)
	This is what they call Thorofare Pass.

Mile 66 Eielson Visitor Center

Named after a pioneer Alaskan bush pilot Carl Ben Eielson.
This is the place to see The Mountain, only 33 miles away. Mount McKinley is visible now all the way to Wonder Lake.

There are flush toilets here and a covered picnic area. Park interpreters offer guided tundra walks.

The main reason to continue on another 20 miles to Wonder Lake is for the scenery. If skies are clear and Mount McKinley is out, it could be worth the trip.

This is probably the only place in the park you’ll see beaver – except for Horseshoe Lake, in the entrance area. Watch for waterfowl and moose in the many tundra ponds that dot the roadside. Most of these are kettle ponds, and most do not have fish living in them.
After leaving the Eielson bluffs, you’ll drive along a glacial lateral moraine all the way to Wonder Lake.

As you drive along the road to Wonder Lake, you may notice a plant that has not been seen most of the trip – alders. This is home to the Alder Flycatcher, a bird that has the record for spending the least amount of time in Alaska to breed. This bird takes 48 days a year in Alaska to mate, lay eggs, incubate, hatch the eggs, raise their young, and then fly away back to northern South America.

Mile 82

Wonder Lake
There are a lot of mosquitoes here in mid-summer. By a lot, we mean billions of annoying, biting, in-your-ears-and-nose bugs. Do not show up without a mosquito head net and plenty of bug dope. In early summer and end of August, when mosquitoes are fewer, you can’t beat this spot.

28 sites, tents only
Flush toilets
$16 fee

This is also a beautiful drive through brilliant fall colors. If berry picking is on your agenda, Wonder Lake is the place to do it.

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