Driving from Denali to Seward would have been a lengthy task under the best conditions. For us, this drive was extended substantially by the McKinley Fire, which was burning on both sides of the Parks Highway for a 20-mile stretch, and road damage caused by floods. The fire had produced four-hour delays the previous day, but fortunately, we only had to halt about 45 minutes while waiting for a pilot car to take our direction of traffic through the smolder.

Despite the unwanted stops, there were still a couple stops we wanted to make. We paused at Beluga Point on the Turnagain Arm to sing “Baby Beluga” and at Alyeska Resort to take the tram to the top of Mt. Alyeska. Smoke made viewing the seven glaciers that surround Mt. Alyeska’s summit less than ideal but still possible. Past Alyeska, we hit delays again, this time because of flooding. We didn’t arrive in Seward until right before midnight. Why didn’t we just take an alternate path? The thing about Alaska is that there usually isn’t an alternate route. In fact, many locations can’t be accessed by road at all and require a boat or plane to reach. We planned our destinations for this trip based on vehicular accessibility. Expecting multiple ways to arrive at any of those destinations would have been greedy.

Our first day in Seward, we went on a six-hour boat cruise through Kenai Fjords National Park. This cruise was rather cold thanks to a constant wind. I combated that by wearing a short-sleeved shirt, long-sleeved shirt, two coats, a neck gaiter, and gloves; all those layers kept the temperatures tolerably pleasant. And our issues with smoke and blazes weren’t over. Due to Alaska’s unusually dry summer, even its temperate rainforest was in flames. The Swan Lake Fire, which had already burned about 150,000 acres on the Kenai Peninsula, was flaring up due to high winds. The resulting smog made the cliffs and headlands of Resurrection Bay nothing more than dark, jagged giants as our cruise began. That haziness decreased as the day progressed but never completely dissipated.

Despite the murk, the cruise was a beautiful experience filled with vulnerable aquatic life and nature’s dramatic sculpting. We saw a bald eagle, black-legged kittiwakes, tufted puffins, horned puffins, common murres, sea otters, Stellar sea lions, and double-crested cormorants. Out of the birds, the puffins were my favorite. They flapped their wings like crazy to stay in the air. Apparently, puffins can complete up to 400 beats per minute to keep their heavy bones airborne. Those bones are reinforced to save the birds from becoming leaky sacks when they dive up to 300 feet into water. Puffins aren’t endangered, but thanks to humans their numbers are dwindling.

Aialik Glacier was our U-turn point. This glacier is one mile wide and has cliffs 300 feet high where it meets Aialik Bay rather abruptly. Although fairly stable, it calves frequently. We witnessed some of this calving; the rumbling crackles and crashing ice were unforgettable.

Our last day in Alaska, we went to Alaska SeaLife Center as our first outing. The Alaska SeaLife Center is part museum and part aquarium. It features creatures found in Alaska’s voluminous waters. My favorite area was the seabird habitat where we watched puffins dive deep into the tank for delicious herring snacks.

After the SeaLife Center, we took the two-mile hike to the face of Exit Glacier or where the face of Exit Glacier used to be. Exit Glacier, until recently, was one of the most accessible glaciers in Alaska. You could walk up to it and touch it. However, thanks to global warming, Exit Glacier’s melt rate has accelerated dramatically in the last decades. Now, almost 300 feet are dissolving each year. The park service can’t keep up with trail extensions. Although Exit was less of a hands-on experience and more of a striking reminder of the stupidity of our species, our hike was satisfying and the glacier’s katabatic wind a bracing memento of its lingering power.

That was our trip, a spectacular and smoky tramp through distinct landscapes. When we opened our suitcases upon reaching home, the campfire odor was overpowering. Alaska is a worthy destination for oh… at least a dozen vacations. It’s size and diversity mean endless options for mind-blowing adventures.

Admittedly, this excursion reminded me that I have little patience for tourists that are inconsiderate. You know, the ones that crowd out other people on tours to try to get more than their share of too-many pictures or the ones that won’t stop talking loudly when a ranger tells everyone to be quiet so the fracturing of a glacier can be heard. Yeah, I have no tolerance for that brand of thoughtlessness. If you too find selfish sightseer syndrome immensely irritating, Alaska’s most popular destinations in the peak of the tourist season may not be for you.

After Anchorage, our next stop was Denali National Park. The drive to Denali from Anchorage requires about five hours if you don’t take a break, but who doesn’t stop when they are winding through the interior of Alaska? Hence, it took us longer.

We were expecting most of this drive to be through sparse forest, or boreal forest if you want to get technical. Instead, until the last hour or so, the landscape was dense with trees and shrubs. Those plants obscured the vast bulk in front of us for who knows how long. A few hours into our journey, we suddenly caught a glimpse of a white-clad mass of a mountain climbing before us. It was a big bugger. We laughed when we later discovered we had just encountered Denali, the tallest peak in North America.

We stopped to view Denali officially at Denali Viewpoint South and completely lucked out. The sky was entirely clear and the outlook perfect. Apparently, 80% of the time Denali isn’t visible due to the storms it creates on its flanks not only because of its 20,310 feet but also because it towers three and a half miles vertically from its base. It is a mile longer from base to summit than Mt. Everest. I wish I could create a storm system to hide from the world on occasion.

We stayed in a cabin on a secluded lake just minutes from Denali National Park. It offered a refreshing change from the urban spread of Anchorage. When I say “refreshing” I mean both revitalizing and chilling. During the day, we each wore two jackets and beanies. At night, the temperatures dropped down to around freezing. This was in the middle of Alaska’s hottest months mind you.

Our first day in the park, we experienced Denali via bus. Tourists flow through Denali National Park in unusual ways. Private vehicles can only travel the first fifteen miles beyond the entrance. Past that point, the only vehicles permitted are transit buses and narrated tour buses operated by the National Park Service. Now, this isn’t Zion where you can get all the way to the end of the line in half an hour. At Denali, driving the entire length of the road and back takes about 12 hours. People do this in one long day… yeah, crazy people. The transit bus we took went as far as the Eielson Visitor Center, an eight-hour journey. That was long enough.

The bus experience felt like cultural soup. You are stuck for eight hours in a packed vehicle with 40 strangers from all over the world. Add in everyone’s eagerness to gawk at and snap pictures of the same caribou and moose, and you’ve got a recipe for a full-blown cultural clash. I felt like scientists in lab coats were taking notes behind the windows as riders dashed to get their share of each animal encounter. Though the people on the bus tested my politeness on occasion, I would do this ride all over again. (But seriously Italian guy, did you really need to push your knees into the back of my seat continually?)

Denali has few hiking trails. It’s kind of a choose-your-own-adventure park. Yup, you can pick your own means of bumping into bears. During the eight hours aboard our bus, we came across over 10 grizzlies doing bear things like foraging for berries and digging for roots. That brings me to the coolest thing about Denali. Denali felt wild and untouched in a way that even most national parks do not. Its bears aren’t like Yellowstone’s, ready to have a sip of your Diet Coke. These are creatures unaccustomed to humans and skittish around them. To maintain this skittishness, bus riders are asked to remain silent anytime a bear is spotted.

Rarer than any wildlife, we were treated to another unhindered view of Denali that day. It is the most elusive sight on the bus tours. Denali two days in a row? Luckkyyyy!

The next day, we explored Denali without a bus. First, we opted to browse the collection of shops at Denali Village, AKA “Glitter Gulch.” Though unrepentantly touristy, I’m not ashamed (mostly) to say I found numerous gifts at these stores. Maybe you got one. Afterward, we headed into the park again for a hike to the Mount Healy Overlook. This trail to the ridgeline of Mount Healy gains 1,700 feet in a little over two miles, most of that right at the end. It is so steep in a couple sections that a number of its switchbacks are only about 20 feet long. Did you know going uphill exercises your calves while going downhill exercises your quads? I never noticed that until this endeavor.

Once on Mount Healy’s ridge, you can continue on an unmaintained trail to its summit, which is another couple miles. We didn’t know where this path was leading at the time, but we were keen on following. It was spectacular and deserted on Mount Healy’s backbone. We felt like we had climbed into another world with the alpine tundra glowing around us and the frigid wind breathing the only sound. We’d reach the top of one hill and see the trail ascending the next. Curiosity would propel us up “just one more” incline until hours had passed and the sun was floating near the horizon, a position it held for hours each evening before finally surrendering to the pale sapphire of a perpetual twilight. Our time atop Mount Healy was one of the highlights of our trip. It resulted in us eating dinner in a crowded restaurant at 11:00 PM though. Packed restaurant at 11 PM? Only in Vegas and Alaska.

The next day was tiring. We drove from Denali to Seward. This trip was supposed to take less than seven hours. Instead, it took us 13. In my next post, I will uncover how our drive became a bit of a burn.

Jason and I have been talking about going to Alaska for nearly a decade now. We finally made our maiden voyage to that last frontier. We were there for over a week, and like the foxtrot, our trip went slow, slow and then quick, quick with a diversity of settings and climates.

For someone from a location much closer to the equator, Alaska felt a bit off. The sun never seemed to go up or come down; it just moved in a horizontal line from one side of the sky to the other. Plus, the twilights dragged on forever like a kid that has to be coaxed slowly into bed. The sun’s unwillingness to descend prolonged many of our excursions past when excursions should be prolonged, but more on that later.

We spent our first 36 hours experiencing Anchorage. It wasn’t enough time, but it allowed us to see a sliver of the most populated city in Alaska. In the downtown area, we lunched and shopped before heading to the Alaska Native Heritage Center. Dedicated to preserving and sharing Native cultures, the Alaska Native Heritage Center is enlightening and beautiful in its peaceful, woody spot within Anchorage. We enjoyed dance and drum performances and architectural portrayals of villages from five diverse tribe groups. I made a goal to learn how to pronounce the tribe names correctly of all those represented. It proved a difficult task, but I nearly succeeded.

Afterward, we headed to Chugach State Park, the third-largest state park in the United States. Chugach is just outside of Anchorage. It is easy to access but not crowded. We were hoping to do a longer hike in the park, but the Rodak Nature Trail turned out to be our only option due to closures caused by the Hungry Bears and Upstream Salmon Annual Fatal Meeting. Still, the Eagle River drifted unhurriedly beneath peaks grazed into bristly points by hundreds of slithering glaciers, and we were satisfied.

Before calling it a day, we hiked to Thunderbird Falls, an easy-to-justify undertaking along the Eklutna River. This 200-foot cascade is only partially visible from its trail and viewpoint, but since it merely requires a mile to reach, any complaints are unsound. Admittingly, it did leave me wanting a better glimpse though.

How did we fit these many activities into one day? Well, it’s not that difficult when daylight extends past 10:00 PM. Of course, that means eating dinner at 10:32, which is about when we finally consumed our evening meal. But hey, we could have eaten that meal on the restaurant’s patio without any artificial lighting.

The next day, we were off to Denali National Park after eating donuts, fried halibut, perogies, corn fritters, and fried potato slices at the Anchorage Market and Festival, the state’s largest open-air market. Like the level sun, healthy is a little off in Alaska. Next week, Denali is up.