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Five National P
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© Paxson Woelber
In a single vacation, is it possible to
capture the essence of a state that’s
larger and more geographically
diverse than most countries?
BY ALLEN COX
Parks, ONE TRIP
Gates of the Arctic National Park
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© Frank P. Flavin
Denali Backcountry Lodge
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ARCTIC OCEAN
Barrow
Gates of the Arctic
National Park
Fairbanks
Denali
National Park
Anchorage
Katmai
National Park
Wrangell-St.Elias
National Park
McCarthy
Seward
Kenai Fjords
National Park
GULF OF ALASKA
Dream vacations come in all forms.
entertained, punctual and well fed.
Days proved long, but on a dream
vacation, it’s easy to muster the
energy to rise early, ready for what
the day might present.
Katmai National Park
nps.gov/katm
In Anchorage, we boarded a
charter plane to cross Cook Inlet
and, at King Salmon, transferred to
a fleet of waiting pontoon planes.
Our destination? Brooks Camp in
Katmai National Park. This is bear
country; about 2,200 Alaska brown
bears call the park home, and the
main buffet is the salmon run on
the Brooks River.
As soon as we stepped off the
plane, a park ranger greeted us and
ushered us into the visitor center
for “bear training.” During the
presentation, the ranger displayed
a backpack a bear had shredded,
© John Hall’s Alaska
For some, it’s being pampered at
a cloistered spa resort; for others,
it’s adventure on the high seas or an
exotic journey to a faraway land. For
me, it’s experiencing the raw, rugged
beauty of Alaska. I’d long dreamed
of visiting the remote Wrangell
Mountains, of watching brown bears
feast on salmon in the Brooks River,
and of visiting a native village far
north of the Arctic Circle.
I asked myself: In a single
vacation, is it possible to capture
the essence of a state that’s larger
and more geographically diverse
than most countries? Once I found
out about John Hall’s Alaska, a tour
operator that’s all about helping
travelers experience the essence of
Alaska, I found that the answer is a
resounding “yes.” And I found that
the perfect way to see Alaska is by
visiting its many National Parks.
I hopped on a 12-day “National
Parks of Alaska” tour. Along
with about 25 other travelers,
I experienced the best of five
national parks and everything in
between via luxury motor coach,
bush plane, train and boat. Our
guide was born and raised in Alaska;
he knew well how to navigate the
vast state. He kept us informed,
Bear Viewing in Katmai National Park
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5 Alaska National Parks
and I wondered about it’s unfortunate
owner. Point taken, no food allowed—
not even a Tic Tac—on the trail to the
bear viewing platforms. We were told
we probably would encounter a bear on
the trail—speak softly, no eye contact,
slowly back away, don’t run. I was
ready to commit my immortal soul to
wherever it might end up, but, by God, I
was going to see bears fish for salmon.
I did encounter a bear on the trail.
It seemed, at the time, about the size
of an Airstream trailer. The training
tips sprang into action, and they
worked. The bear paid me little mind
and exited the trail, cutting a path
through the woods toward the river.
From the viewing platform, poised
beside the river, I watched salmon fling
themselves out of the water in attempts
to leap up a waterfall. A small gang of
brown bears waded at the base of the falls,
claws and jaws at the ready. Sometimes
a lucky fish would make it over the falls
and past the bears. Spectators cheered in
whispers. I was witnessing “survival of
the fittest” in action.
© Reinhard Pantke
Kennecott Mine in Wrangell-St. Elias National Park
Wrangell-St. Elias
National Park
nps.gov/wrst
For decades, the little town of
McCarthy, Alaska, had captivated my
curiosity. It’s not easy to get to—an
endless drive on a gravel road or a
thrilling yet bumpy flight in a bush plane
Ma Johnson’s Hotel
are the only options. We boarded a fleet
of bush planes for the breathtaking flight
from Glennallen at the edge of the park,
between some of the continent’s tallest
mountains and over vast glaciers to
McCarthy’s gravel airstrip.
In its early years, McCarthy, with its
saloons and bordellos, was the closest
thing to civilization for the workers
at the Kennecott Mine, a large-scale
operation that mined copper ore from
1911 until 1938. Today, McCarthy and
the Kennecott Mine are miniscule dots
on the map of the largest national park
in the United States.
McCarthy is experiencing a
revitalization with small-scale lodging, a
saloon, an amazing gourmet restaurant
(given its locale), plenty of outdoor
adventure outfitters and a hearty
community of folks living off the grid.
Anyone who has watched Discovery
Channel’s reality show, “The Edge
of Alaska,” has taken a virtual trip to
McCarthy and has met the show’s star
and local entrepreneur Neil Darish.
Darish, a man who paradoxically
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5 Alaska National Parks
seems intensely focused and a bit scattered, showed us
genuine McCarthy hospitality by leading us on a walking
tour of the historic town, serving us a multi-course dinner
in his restaurant and letting us bed down in his historic Ma
Johnson’s Hotel, the town’s finest.
On an excursion to nearby Kennecott Mine, a National
Historic Landmark District, I took a guided tour of the
14-story concentration mill and many of the copper mine’s
other buildings that are open to the public. From there, while
viewing the Kennecott Glacier at the edge of the mining
district, I couldn’t wrap my head around the scale of what I
was seeing. The glacier runs 27 miles from 16,300-plus-foot
Mt. Blackburn to the headwaters of the Kennecott River near
McCarthy. Not until I spotted a group of moving dots on the
glacier’s surface—park visitors on a glacier trek—could I grasp
the enormity of the glacial valley.
Gates of the Arctic National Park
nps.gov/gaar
After a motor coach journey, north to Fairbanks, we boarded
a charter for the 250-mile flight northwest to Anaktuvuk Pass, a
broad piece of tundra in the Brooks Range in the heart of Gates
of the Arctic National Park. As we deplaned, passengers pulled
bug spray out of bags, and a cloud of insecticide provided relief
from the onslaught of thirsty mosquitoes.
A tall fellow approached us from across the airstrip—our
Iñupiak host for the day. He told us the history of his people,
once nomadic caribou hunters that settled here some 60 years
ago, after the caribou population declined. He put the past and
present in perspective by explaining that his grandmother,
who had lived a nomadic lifestyle in her early years, now
prefers staying at home and using Facebook.
We followed our guide a few blocks to the small village’s
showplace, the Simon Paneak Memorial Museum, a cultural
center established by elders. Exhibits tell the fascinating story of
this remote part of Alaska and its people; notable is the museum’s
collection of caribou-hide masks with wolf-fur accents.
Caribou-hide asks at the Simon Paneak Memorial Museum
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Hiking in Gates of the Arctic National Park
© Paxson Woelber
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5 Alaska National Parks
As we boarded the charter to
leave, I realized I had just had a rare
glimpse of a people and culture I would
never experience anywhere outside of
Anaktuvuk Pass.
Next stop: Barrow (a.k.a. Utqiagvik),
the northernmost city in the U.S., on
the Arctic Ocean. A quick tour of this
city of nearly 4,500 reveals a lifestyle
closely tied to the region’s two seasons:
a very short summer and a long, frigid
winter. At the cultural center, scrimshaw
artists displayed their art for sale, locals
performed traditional dances, and later
the most courageous of us took the polar
bear plunge in the Arctic.
Denali National Park
nps.gov/dena
Alaska is a land of superlatives:
the largest national park, the
northernmost city and, now, the tallest
mountain in North America. Our guide
warned us that the chance of seeing
Denali on a clear day is slim. Upon
our arrival, it seemed no amount of
wishing would coax the mountain from
behind a gray shroud.
We made the 90-mile journey on the
only park road, with numerous stops
along the way to take in the top points
of interest—Savage River, Eielson
Visitor Center, Wonder Lake—and
finally reached our home for a few days:
Denali Backcountry Lodge.
The vastness of the Alaskan
wilderness takes on new meaning in
Denali National Park. Once again, the
problems of perspective and scale
presented themselves. I gained a new
dependence on interpretive signs at
visitor centers to figure out if a valley I
was viewing was five or 50 miles across.
Whale bone memorial in Barrow on the Arctic Ocean
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The variety of Denali ecosystems we
passed through, from forest to tundra,
was astounding, as was the wildlife.
Blondish grizzly bears patrolled trails
across the tundra and even used the
road as a thoroughfare. Dall sheep
navigated sheer cliff faces. Ptarmigans, a
ground bird in the grouse family, darted
cautiously among the low bush. A small
herd of caribou milled about in a lingering
snow patch on a hillside to escape the
relentless mosquitoes. Arctic ground
squirrels (a.k.a. bear burritos) stood their
ground, chirping, defending their little
swatch of territory from their neighbors.
After two days in the park, we made
an early departure on a gloriously
blue morning. Not a cloud in the sky.
Denali showed herself in full regalia,
magnificent and unfathomable. I felt
graced by Mother Nature.
5 Alaska National Parks
To book a tour with John Hall’s
Alaska, visit kissalaska.com.
Kenai Fjords National Park
nps.gov/kefj
From Denali, we boarded the Alaska
Railroad to Talkeetna and, from there—
after a jaw-dropping flightseeing side
trip to the Denali climbers’ basecamp—
we boarded the motor coach for
Anchorage and farther south to Seward
on the Kenai Peninsula. Seward, a
fishing port on Resurrection Bay, is
the gateway to Kenai Fjords National
Park. Here mountains and glaciers meet
the sea in a dramatic landscape—and
seascape—best accessed by boat.
Aboard the sightseeing vessel, Orca
Song, we cruised out of Resurrection
Bay and past a complex network of
coves and islands on the edge of the
Gulf of Alaska. We rounded a point and
entered the wide mouth of a bay, which
narrowed as we approached the Kenai
Mountains. Sharp peaks rose above
the 300-square-mile Harding Ice Field.
Orca Song approached a massive wall
of ice. Even at close range, I couldn’t
begin to estimate the height and width
of the blue-white wall as it met the sea.
Our on-board guide announced Aialik
Glacier, its face as tall as a 27-story
building, its width spanning a mile.
© John Hall’s Alaska
Kenai Fjords National Park
A thunderous crack reverberated
off the mountainsides. A moment later
a block of ice the size of an apartment
house crashed into the sea; another
followed a half-mile away, then another.
On our cruise back to Resurrection
Bay, we snaked through an archipelago
on the edge of the gulf. The boat slowed
to a stop and the guide announced
spouts at three o’clock. All heads
turned right as a pair of humpback
whales surfaced about 100 yards away,
spouting. I heard giant lungs exhale like
bellows, the sound carried on the wind.
Then they dove out of sight.
Orcas and sea lions rounded out
our wildlife viewing for the day. Back
in Seward, lazy seals lounged on
floats, gulls nodded off on posts, and I
disembarked, knowing that I just had an
intimate glimpse of some of the world’s
wildest and most majestic places, each
preserved as a national park.
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