Denali national park

Denali national park is the "must see" if you are somewhere around Anchorage or Fairbanks. It is very different from any of the parks we visited before. The area which is accessible for the tourists is surrounded by tremendously beautiful mountains. I'm not sure if they are always covered with snow like they are now, but probably not or less. And this is an amazing view. You can start enjoying these mountains even before or without entering the national park. We saw them on our way from Anchorage. We were very lucky - the weather was so good, that we could even see the gorgeous Denali (or McKinley) mountain which is not at all always possible. We've explored the travelers advises before coming here and found out, that it's quite often that people don't get to see it even if they come to the park. So, once again, we were lucky. The sky was clear and blue, the sun was shining, but not too much, just enough to enjoy it. On this weird picture with the tree growing from my head the Denali mountain can be seen pretty good.

The are between these mountain chains is quite empty. There are no big trees, in many places no trees at all, only bushes and sometimes even only grass. That's the area can be seen through for a big distances. And that makes the main tourist attraction - the wildlife observation - possible. We have seen several caribou, 4 bears, some sheeps (even 2 lambs), 1 moose and a couple of interesting birds. But most of them from a big distance, so that they were hardly visible and recognizable even with the binoculars. 

There is a road that goes through the park. Earlier it was open for private vehicles. But at some point it was considered to be interrupting the wildlife too much and now you can't drive in with a personal car. There are tour buses and shuttles. We took the shuttle. It drives around 6 hours round-trip. When there is wildlife on the way, the driver stops the bus and let's you watch and take pictures. Strangely the buses themselves are very uncomfortable. The windows are separated in two parts horizontally, so as you sit, you have a non-transparent part right at the level of your eyes. Also, if you want to take pictures, you have to open the upper part, which is quite hard to open. And you cannot afford riding with the open window all the time - it's cold.

We did see a moose very close 2 times. But it was while we were driving state Alaska highway 3 from Anchorage the day before. First time the moose was crossing the street, so that I really had to stop the car not to bump into him. Another time there was one drinking water on the side if the road, very close. We parked our car and went out to watch him. He didn't react anyhow neither at our presence nor at cars passing by. He only jumped away when a big truck drove by with the horrible sound, but didn't run away, just stayed away from the road for some time and eventually stayed in the area.

Unlike other parks in US this one doesn't have any designated hiking trails. But you can hop off the bus anytime (and almost everywhere except one not very large area) and just go hiking any direction you want.