It was pouring rain when the door finally swung open. Tourists, mostly elderly, slowly loaded on, collapsed umbrellas, stepped carefully into the aisle and removed wet, plastic ponchos.
I was reluctant to take the Denali Wilderness Tour. I would have rather hiked into the park, but my wife and I were left with a pair of unrefundable bus tickets after her father returned home earlier than expected.
"Alaskans?" the driver said to us matter-of-factly. "I hardly ever get any of those."
I slid into my seat and turned to my wife. "How long of a trip will this last?" She pressed my hand. She had read that budget-conscious travelers are being encouraged to vacation in their home state, and we were doing just that.
The bus lurched forward, and within minutes someone shouted, "Moose." The bus stopped, then turned into a roundabout while people frantically pawed at the fogged windows. A man called for more paper towels.
I sank into my chair and rubbed my forehead. Seven hours?
We set out again. Our driver told us over the intercom that we were entering a park the size of Massachusetts. He has driven the road for 17 years, and his knowledge of the park showed it.
"A bear," a woman squealed. False alarm.
During the winter, the driver stays in the park with his family, in a log home, getting by on occasional construction and carpentry jobs. He spoke in a patient, conversational monologue, delivering a sighing narrative like a man settling into an easy chair after a long day's work, a chuckle now and again for punctuation. Though he didn't say it, I know his job hardly pays enough for the long hours he puts into it.
The road became dirt and narrowed. "Some migratory birds ... go all the way down to South America, the farthest ... Antarctica ... the arctic tern."
We rolled forward. "It took 16 years to build this road," we're told, "to link the railroad with the gold mine in Kantishna."
The driver's impartiality about development in the park was almost disconcerting. Careful, balanced management is "keeping it wild while letting us enjoy access to the park."
I wanted to ask the driver a question to force him to shift from neutral -- "How about that plan to expand road access from the north?" But I didn't want to be one of those Alaskans who try to distinguish themselves from visitors, so I kept quiet. It was the driver's show, and I had to trust him.
We pulled over when he saw a magpie. "Magpie leads to fox," he said. A red fox slipped out of the brush and crept alongside the bus. It glanced into our cameras with sharp, nervous, yellow eyes.
Later, in a foggy pass, the driver again slowed. At the whisper of the word "wolf," the bus became instantly silent. Though considered vermin by some Alaska politicians and prey that needs to be "intensively managed" by the wildlife officials, the elusive and mysterious animal is at the top of most visitors' checklists.
And while the park's caribou and bear populations have held steady, the number of wolves has dropped by half since the 1950s. Two were seen earlier this summer with wire around their necks. One is believed to have died.
Today all we see are tracks.
The bus climbed to the top of Sable Pass, where willow gives way to undulating hills and valleys of tundra. We stopped to watch a blonde grizzly bear running. It looked over its shoulder as if being chased.
At a stop later, the driver and I talked. It's the most wildlife I'll see all summer, I told him, and his information is filling in many gaps in my knowledge of Alaska.
The clouds had mostly lifted by the time we returned. We were asked to pass our paper lunch boxes and plastic water bottles forward for recycling. The driver, in his slow porch-swing talk, thanked us, "because it's your park."
When a passenger yelled, "Thanks to the driver," my wife and I looked away from the window and then clapped, along with the others. We were glad to be tourists, too, for one memorable day in Denali National Park.
Girdwood resident Soren Wuerth teaches English in the Anchorage School District.
SOREN WUERTH
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