AKBrian's pics

Every year, the Denali National Park has a road lottery to allow cars to drive into the park. Ordinarily, cars are only allowed about 15 miles in (the road is 90 miles long) and you have to take a bus the rest of the way. The last four days of the year the park is open, they have a lottery and they allow 1600 (400 per day) cars to drive as far as they want into the park (weather permitting!). This year I entered the lottery for the first time ($10) and won! (this is the first year they've charged for the right to enter, so far fewer people signed up than in past years).

My sister and I drove up on September 18th, stayed the night in Healy, and drove into the park the next morning. I had a great time, and am very glad I finally did it. I was a little worried about driving in, since I knew the road was dirt, and every other vehicle I saw was an SUV or a truck (I drive a little Ford Focus!) but fortunately the road was in fine shape, and there was no problem going the entire 90 miles.

As you can see from some of the pictures, there was snow in places along the road (I think it had snowed about a week earlier), but the road was mostly dry.

We saw all the "usual" wildlife (Bears, sheep, moose, beavers, swans, etc). About the only thing we didn't see were caribou or wolves. On fortunately, it was pretty cold and windy in most places, so I didn't get out to take quite as many pictures as I should have, but I still got enough shots (and memories) to make the trip well worthwhile.

This is Mt. McKinley, as seen from a viewing spot about 50 miles or so south of the park entrance, the day before we drove into the park. We didn't see much of the mountain the day we were in the park, because of the clouds.

The mountains around McKinley, as seen from the same viewing spot.

This is what most of the road looked like, along the way. It looks kind of desolate from this picture, but I assure you, it's not.

This was a brown bear we saw (we only saw two, and the other one was quite a bit farther away). I suppose I would have liked a better/closer view, but that's a good incentive to buy a better camera with a longer lens!

This was a common sight wherever there was wildlife along the road! (ok, this spot with the bear was actually the worst).

A shot of what you'd see along the road. Spectacular vistas. I'll definitely have to come back some time in the summer!

A curious sheep. OK, maybe more hungry than curious. There was a group of about 6-8 of them here, but we couldn't linger too long, as there was a park ranger making sure everyone was moving along.

Another sheep in the same area. I always like to see these critters.

A neat cloud bank, about 75 miles into the park.

This was on the way out. If you look sharp, you can see the road ahead of us, to the left, and also at the top of the picture.

We crossed the sheep again, and this time they were resting from all that eating and posing for pictures. There was just one eating, but it was behind a bush, and I didn't get a very good shot of it.

The only moose we saw! It was a good distance away, but looked like a big one. I see these in my yard all the time, but it's neat to see one with such a big rack. Usually the ones I see in town are females or young ones.