“USA 🇺🇸 Alaska ~Denali National Park Tundra Tour and Driving from Tok to Denali”

• June 19, 2023
• By Pen
• 2 Comments

Denali National Park, Alaska!

We enjoyed five hours inside the park, where only buses with tour guests get to go, unless you have a hiking permit.

This was my second visit to Denali. I had no plans to go again. It was not my favorite stop. I did the train the first time, which was fun, and it was in September. But, it was very dry and brown. Only saw one Moose.

Because this is Daryl’s first visit to Alaska, I let him decide about Denali. I’m glad he wanted to go!!

I definitely preferred the bus option, like we did today; and in the month of June!
Absolutely Beautiful!

Yes, we saw Mt Denali!

Only 30 percent of guests who visit the park, get to see all or any parts of Mt Denali. We got to be part of the 30 percent group, today.

Wildlife Sightings in Denali National Park:

1 Grizzly 

6 Dall Sheep

15 Caribou 

6 Moose; including twin calves!

Great day!

Denali National Park and Preserve encompasses 6 million acres of Alaska’s interior wilderness. Its centerpiece is 20,310 foot-high Denali; North America’s tallest peak. With terrain of tundra, spruce forest and glaciers, the park is home to wildlife, including Grizzly Bears, Wolves, Moose, Caribou and Dall Sheep.
Popular activities in summer include biking, backpacking, hiking and mountaineering.

The park was established as Mt. McKinley National Park on Feb. 26, 1917. The original park was designated a wilderness area, the first National Park, created specifically to protect wildlife, and incorporated into Denali National Park and Preserve, in 1980.

The park was designated an international biosphere reserve in 1976.

In 2015, Mt. McKinley was renamed Mt. Denali to pay homage to the Athabaskan people who called the area home.
Denali means “the tall one,” or “mountain-big” in their native Koyukon language.

Today, Denali National Park accommodates a wide variety of visitor use, including wildlife viewing, mountaineering, cycling, and even dog sledding!
(Denali National Park and Preserve is actually the only national park with a working dog sled kennel).

It continues to provide a laboratory for research in the natural sciences.

Both female and male have horns in the deer family of Caribou/Reindeer 

This is how we got to view the Dall Sheep we saw, today. None were down off the mountain that we saw. Tiny specks of white, was it.

Dall sheep are unmistakable, looking like pure-white bighorn sheep. AND, like bighorn sheep, they have large, curled horns, but Dall sheep horns are longer and skinnier than their southern counterparts. Dall Sheep inhabit mountain ranges in Alaska and Canada and are often visible from quite far away.

⬆️ As seen up close
(not my photo)

Two more Caribou.
This time of the year, they still have their winter fur, so they can get pretty hot, during the day. Very smart to hand out in the snow.

This one was on the move

We made a large loop, so came by this area with Caribou, again. More had joined the cooler spot 

Reindeer and caribou are the same animal (Rangifer tarandus) and are a member of the deer family. In Europe, they are called reindeer. In North America, the animals are called Caribou: if they are wild and Reindeer, if they are domesticated. While Reindeer have been domesticated, successfully, and still thrive, the Caribou have not. They die in captivity.

We ended out tour with this highlight. A Mamma Moose and her twins; closer in to the visitor’s center, where there are more people, there are also less bears wandering around. It’s a great place for birthing their young, as 90 percent of Moose calves do not survive.

That being said, the 10 percent that do survive, thrive, so there is a healthy population of Moose in the Park.

More info on Denali National Park: https://www.travelalaska.com/Destinations/Parks-Public-Lands/Denali-National-Park-and-Preserve

***********

Our Drive from Tok to Denali ⬇️

It was stormy and raining for all but about ten minutes of our 6.5 hour drive. The roads are pretty good, on State Highways Alaska 2, and 3, but there are alway places to watch out for, in this case, by the time we were on the Parks Highway; verticals cracks in the lanes, along with frost heaves.  Just go slow in these areas. 

Construction on the roadways are very common, when traveling in Alaska. Summer is a short season, and it’s also the only time roads are clear from snow, to get repairs, done.

Our five minutes of sun on this drive 

I can not recommend the Denali Rainbow Village RV. While it is the closest RV park to Denali, it is nothing more than a dusty parking lot, with a strip mall and motel in front, but it does have full services.

⬆️ Our View 🙃

Two nights was plenty in this touristy place. It is very tight for big rigs, too. It can be done… but, as it was time to leave, the guests in front of us, across the narrow exit road, was blocking our exit, due to his vehicle, (newer truck) which had broken down on his trip in Alaska (we feel his pain). Somehow, this guy has to move his truck (power steering is shot) out of the way, before we could leave.

BTW, breakdowns happen all the time, no matter where you are or what you are doing, but the challenge in this upside down world is finding help, who are not out three weeks, due to lack of employees, and getting parts for said repairs. (Alaska or anywhere) It’s harder than ever.

In addition, for the $75 a night for full hookups, one must pay to have internet access. We lost $300 here, when we got stuck in Tok with our broken Jonah, but there will be no refund. I asked, for a partial refund, only, since we did not used their water/sewer/power. No go.

I get there needs to be cancellation policies in place, for those who just randomly change their minds to go elsewhere, but circumstances beyond anybody’s control should be considered, on a case to case basis. It’s better for business. We were paying $60 a night in Tok, while we could not modify our time in Denali; almost a week out.

I spoke with somebody on the Denali Tour. He had a friend stay here. His wife became gravely ill and they had to leave for a hospital stay. No refund at all.  

**************

The day after our Denali Tour, we broke camp and headed further south for the Kenai Peninsula, where we get to stay for three weeks! We have many fun things to do, already lined-up! We will not be driving to our first stay; Seward, all at once, like we did to get to Denali. We will boondock along the way; one night.

We like to break-up the long drives, so we can enjoy the scenery along the way! We only did the push for Denali, because our Park Tour was scheduled for Sunday morning, and we only got Jonah back, late Saturday afternoon! 

**************^

More Drama 

We arrived in Denali, from Tok in 6.5 hours, by almost 11:30PM. We were pooped, and could only think about bed!

BUT! NOT SO FAST!

We unhooked Jonah, and I drove her 12 feet and the tie-rod on the drivers side came apart! It freaked me out, as it made a noise and then sunk to the left. No steering capabilities! I was only going 5 mph, and thankfully, not going 60 mph, down a highway!

We had driven her about two miles after we got her picked up at the mechanics in Tok. All seemed fine, then, as far as the front end. She continues to not want to idle, so we still have issues, but the carburetor and alternator pulley were needed and we can tell improvement, there.
No, we are not happy with the work done on our Bug!
Yes, we made another call to Kingman, Arizona, the following business day.

It was midnight, on a Saturday night, after Jonah broke, so there was nothing we could do about her right then. Next day was Sunday, and that was not a good day to get mechanical assistance, either, plus we had the Denali Tour we did not want to miss. 

(no refunds on Park Tours)  

We finally hit the rack. The midnight sun doesn’t usually affect me, but I was really shook up over Jonah. When will this end? I did not sleep well at all! 

Luckily, we were at an RV Park right across the street from the shuttle stop that would take us to the Denali Bus Depot, which is where we would load on to the bus for the tour.

We walked over, boarded the shuttle, and headed for our tour; trying not to think too much about Jonah. 

After the tour, we got back to The Whale. Daryl had discovered there was an Ace Hardware in nearby town called Healy; opened till six on Sunday. He figured out the shuttle ($40) ride and got there. He was able to purchase what he needed, or I should say, was given what he needed. How nice of Ace Hardware!!!

When Jonah broke, this third time, Daryl found everything, but the bolt, on the ground, where it had all fallen apart.

Come to find out, it broke, primarily, because there was no Carter Pin holding it all together! Daryl checked the passenger side, and it also had no pin, and he could tightened it up with his fingers! Ridiculous!!!! That side was about to go, too!!!!

Yes, we paid for front and rear-end rebuild, including, but not limited to struts, shocks, and brakes, etc. errrr

Daryl went to work, and jacked up the Bug. I don’t know how he did it, because he didn’t have a spring compression tool, but he got both front-ends put back together AND included the Carter Pins. 

As bad as this was, we were shown mercy, because had the front-end broke when we were towing her, it would have been far more disastrous! It’s scary to even think about that!

***************