A Bus, a Bear and a Mountain

Wednesday was a full day...full of misery, full of adventure, and full of wonder.  We begin with misery which is spelled b-u-s.  We promptly arrived at the designated pick-up spot at 6:20 am to board a bus for a 6-hour journey covering 92 miles into the heart of Denali National Park.  Why take a bus to the interior of the park when we had a perfectly good rental car?  Because, unless you win a lottery for a special end-of-season permit, via tour bus this is the only way allowed.  Our particular bus was 40 minutes late as we were standing outside in 30 degree temperature.  It arrives and we board.  And, please, don't picture in your mind one of those spacious, comfy tour buses with wifi.  This was a school bus, and the heater was broken and remained that way until the last ten minutes of our journey.  We put on all the extra layers of clothing we had and still were frozen and miserable the entire time.  Two-thirds of the way in and it started snowing...hard.  Our bus driver was so fascinated with the snow, I leaned over and said to Tom, "he sounds like he's from Florida, not Alaska".  Five minutes later we learn a few facts that we'd rather not know (as the snow is starting to accumulate):  1) Our bus driver IS from Florida, 2) He's new, this tour is only his third one and he's never seen snow like this in the park 3) The bus does not have a radio and 4) the driver continues to point out that the 900-foot drop along the one-lane gravel road is the steepest in the park (I kind of liked that fact, but Tom didn't).  It was a miserable ride, yet Tom and I were still were encouraged....by the fact that Tom in his meticulous planning of our trip (as he does every trip we take) had the foresight to know that we would not want to ride a b-u-s another six hours out of the park, so he had arranged for a small plane to meet us at the backcountry lodge (the turn around point) and fly us home.  That is, we were encouraged until it started snowing so hard, we knew that no plane would be flying in this weather.  Misery.

Less than 10 feet from the bear

Onto the adventure portion.  We did see some wildlife: sheep, a couple herds of caribou, another moose and a bear.  During the snowstorm, we came across a bear on the side of the road.  As much as I disliked the bus, the driver did manage to stop the bus with the grizzly right below my window.  I immediately opened the window as far as it would go and I leaned out as far as possible, thinking Tom would surely grab my feet if I started to fall out.  I was only ten feet (at most) from the bear...it was amazing. And all the while, the bear stayed right in front of me foraging for food and looking around.  If some of the pictures look a little blurry, that's just the enormous snowflakes that pelted me the entire time I was halfway out the window.  When I finally got back in the bus I was soaked (and even colder) but also exhilarated from it all.  I think the other passengers on the bus looked at me with alarm when I finally pulled myself back in, but I didn't care, I was still hoping not to be sharing the trip back with them. 

 
Now to the wonder portion.  Just as we pull into the lodge, the sun comes out and we see blue skies, we can fly back after all.  After lunch and a little hiking, Tom and I board the plane along with another couple who also decided that a 6-hour bus trip back was too much.  The pilot asks if we want to see any sights along the way and Tom immediately says "Mt. Denali" and off we go. Mt. Denali/McKinley is a very big mountain, but also very elusive.  It is often hidden amongst the clouds and bad weather.  But today we were blessed.  Our pilot flew us to the mountain and, voila, there it was looking very majestic.  We flew around the mountain for quite a while, banking left and then right, all the while our pilot saying, "we can get closer"...and he did.  I'm afraid some of my pictures didn't turn out so well because we were so close.  It was spectacular.  When we got back to the lodge later that night, we cancelled our morning flyover knowing that the touring planes would never get so close and stay so long.  We were so fortunate to see the mountain in this glorious fashion.