Day 14 – Tundra, Hiking, and Seeing Mt. McKinley!

On Sunday, July 19, we rode the bus into the park for about three hours to get out to where we were doing a discovery hike. We saw several moose and a few bears from the bus on the way in, almost all of which I got pictures of.

The hike was in a tundra area of the park, which was especially great as I have not even seen tundra outside of pictures. It was very neat, and the spongy texture of the ground was quite interesting to walk on. I saw many new flowers, plants, and lichens, some of which the guide told us about and some of which I have identified from a book. It was very foggy on the tundra, and visibility was fairly limited. However, the fog did lift a bit at times, allowing us to see somewhat of the area. We also saw some caribou on the tundra, and more on the way back. It was really neat to hike on the tundra, which is a terrain I have not experienced before. It is spongy and wet, because of the moss, but I saw many more flowers and caribou than I expected. We also saw dwarf blueberries and willows. It was strange to see willow as a small shrub, and blueberry looking like a very small plant!

After the hike, we rode a bus a bit further on into the park, to Eilson visitor center. There, we watched a very interesting short film about what climbers face when ascending Mt. McKinley.

When we got back to our campground, which was still quite wet, although the day had mostly been pretty nice, we decided to just pack up and head back to Palmer, though we had been planning on staying one more night and leaving in the morning.

We stopped at two Mt. McKinley viewing stations on the way back, but were not able to see the mountain. When we stopped at the second, though, we were able to see the mountain quite well. Mt. McKinley is Huge! It is also very beautiful, and we saw it at a really neat time. It was about 11:00, which meant… sunset! There was the mountain, and right in a dip next to it, the sunset. The yellow cloud seen in my pictures actually glowed golden, but my camera doesn’t do well with clouds or lighting. Sigh. The mountain was beautiful, however, and I got plenty of pictures. Fortunately it was still light enough to take good pictures.

1. ‘Twas a misty, moisty morning…’
2. A bull moose!
3. What a beautiful view from the bus! For a bit, a picture of Denali was on my homescreen – but I like this one better, as it has more higher up, instead of mostly just a screenfull of sky.
4. A view through the front windshield of the bus
5. Another moose
6. Bear! Unfortunately it was a ways away, but I was able to get a picture that I could zoom in on enough to let you see it.

And pictures from the tundra hike:

1. Monkshood
2. Tall Jacob’s Ladder? [The center went in, not out – as it appears to]
3. Arctic Dock
4. Mountain Avens
5. Rosewort
6. Some kind of a geranium, I think (The ranger told me, but I cannot remember except that it is a sign of approaching fall on the tundra)
7. Capitate Valerian

Assorted photos from the tundra and Eilson visitor center, as well as one of a mountain.

1. Caribou lichen and –
2. Caribou
3. Check out that fog!
4. A beautiful set of quilted art depicting the seasons of Denali
5. This moose skull, displayed outside of Eilson visitor center, has quite the teeth!
6. This is approximately where we took off for our hike, although we went along the road to the left of the gravel pad observable at the bottom of the picture to avoid crossing the creek by the taller shrubs. When we started, the fog had not come as low as it later did and we were able to see the lay of the land somewhat.
7. Aren’t the colors on that mountain beautiful? And yet, this (due to my camera) is not as lovely as the real thing!

And now for my pics of the mountain! (And sights on the way to it)

1. Mt McKinley!
2. A mountain, the name of which I do not know, but which was lovely anyways.
3. In a drop to the left of the mountain, from where we were, there was a beautiful sunset. The cloud merely looks yellow here, but it glowed golden in real life.
4. I just had to take a picture of this cloud-scape which we saw while driving from Denali National park to the viewing spot where we saw the mountain.
5. A more zoomed out photo of the mountain. Mt McKinley is the large peak, and you can also see the sunset from the other photo.

That’s all about Alaska! Thanks for reading about it, and I’m sorry it took so long to get this out.

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