Today we went into the park. To do this, we had to take a bus. In Denali, there are basically two types of busses: the green busses and the tan busses. The tan busses are some “Nature Wilderness Tour”. They have tour guides on the bus. The green busses just have bus drivers who narrate as much as they feel like narrating. For the green busses, narration is optional. These bus drivers know their stuff though. Many of them have been driving a bus for around 30 seasons. They do this because they like to, because they want to.
Our bus driver was no exception. I brought a book with me, just in case, and Dale saw it as I was boarding the bus. He immediately poked fun at me, asking me why I brought that. Dale is a very interesting character. He is a contract computer programmer who left Wisconsin about 18 years ago because he came to Alaska and saw Denali and wanted to be here. He left Wisconsin with his truck and his golden retriever, and he moved to Alaska. He programs in Anchorage from September to May. From May to September, he drives a bus for Denali National Park. He has a cabin over the ridge from the park, where he doesn’t have curtains or blinds. He says he catches up on his sleep during the winter. He comes up to his cabin one weekend a month while he lives in Anchorage.
Dale at first struck me as kind of a House character. (The main guy from the TV show House.) He makes wise-crack jokes, he can be kind of cynical and rude, but, like House, that’s just his shell and his shell is not as think as House’s. Dale is deeply in love with Denali and the surrounding wilderness. That emanated out of him with every word he spoke.
And Dale talked a lot. He talked a most the entire 6-hour trip out to our last stop, Wonder Lake which was about 25 miles from the base of Denali. He was excited to see the mountain, finally, because he hadn’t seen it in about a month. We timed our trip in perfectly. It had been rainy and 45 degrees the last month. Summer came with us. He knows just about everything there is to know about the road and it’s different sections, the Park and the different sections we went through, the rivers we crossed over, all the animals we saw. There were some loud people in our bus, which made it hard to hear Dale on occasion, and sometimes he would ask them to tone it down. You could hear the irritation in his voice. But really, he just wanted everyone to be able to have a good experience with the land and wildlife he was showing us. And he did an excellent job. Bringing my book was pointless. We saw moose, caribou, some spots which were bears, some other spots which were Dall sheep (the reason why the park was created), a few golden eagles, and a pair of ptarmigan (the state bird) with chicks. While that seems like a lot, we’ve seen more wildlife in closer proximity before, but it was still a good time. Oh, and we saw Denali again and again. Making it two days in a row of seeing it. When we got to Wonder Lake, Denali was hiding behind some clouds, but we did see it closer a few times on the way out.
On the way back, Dale rarely talked. That was kind of his “deal”. He talks on the way out, he shuts up on the way back. He did still point stuff out, but for the most part, he just let us take in the beauty. I kind of wish he had kept talking because I think it would have kept me awake long. I did fall asleep for quite a bit on the way back. It was kind of bumpy, and the sun was shining on me, and then there were the hairpin turns with cliffs four feet to my right that I just really didn’t want to see. I did enjoy the beauty. And despite Dale’s front of a rough exterior, I really appreciate his respect and awe for a wilderness that he’s been in and through for 18 seasons. He drives those busses because he wants to. He doesn’t have to. He could hide behind his computer screen in Anchorage. Or, since he’s capable of taking off 4 months of the year to drive a bus, he could probably not drive a bus, but still stay in his cabin during the summer and be just fine. Instead he chooses to get up early for 9:15 busses, drive these busses full of loud people talking over him, and imparting his wisdom and respect to those loud people. And by the end of the day, they’re full of respect too. Or maybe their just tired and asleep. I know I was full of respect.
Ashley and I caught up internet stuff. I tried to get the blog I wrote off my phone and onto the computer, but that failed, so I didn’t deal with it til today.
Then we went to go look at Denali again. It was only 10:45 at night…the sun was still up. We got out there, and there she was, no clouds. Twice in one day. Spectacular.
It is a bit of a drive, even though it’s technically only 11 miles to where you can see the mountain. But the speed limits are low because there is wildlife and the roads are curvy and stuff, so it took a while. We changed the words to some Christmas carols on the way back. You’ll hear one someday probably. There were lots of giggles from that. They carried to the tent. Eventually we all got all of our hyperactivity out and fell asleep.
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