Back in September, my friend, Joe and I took a trip up into Denali National Park. We had just finished hiking and sight seeing in Kenai Fjord National Park the day prior, and used the 4 hour drive up to Denali, from Anchorage, as a bit of rest and relaxation.
Joe tried to do a bit of research before getting into Denali, but we were confused with how the park was laid out and the best trails to hike, so we decided to just get to the visitor center and figure it out there. We did find out that although the park has a road through it, it is only accessible using park provided buses. You can only drive to the Teklanika rest area before either parking for a hike, or turning around.
Visitor Center
As we were coming to find, Alaska has a very specific time to be 'in-season'. After September 15th of each year, a lot of things shut down until spring. Although we were there the first week of September, the park and surrounding areas were already getting prepared for this closure. The season felt like it was coming to an end.
One of the parks visitor centers was already closed, and overall the park wasn't busy at all. We pulled into the visitor center parking lot and went inside to learn more about the park, hikes and our options!
We introduced ourself to the park rangers, who are always cheerful and happy to help, and let them know we were interested in a mid-difficulty hike, and wanted to see the park. Generally this question gets me a list of options to choose from, instead the park ranger said: "Theres a few hikes leaving from the visitor center, but all the cool hikes are going to be backcountry, and you should talk to the back country rangers".
So, we went over to the backcountry ranger station, in Denali they have their own section of the visitor center. Behind the rangers was a big board with zones, dates and numbers... very cryptic. They explained that if we wanted to go backcountry backpacking, we would need to pick an available zone and fill out some paperwork. They handed us a binder full of zone information, ranging from Unit 1 closest to the visitor center, Unit 45: Mt. Denali, and Unit 33: Stony Hill... There are 85 units to choose from, each with a limited number of overnight permits allowed.
We looked through the binder for good 'beginner' zones. We often came across "... many river crossings required" and promptly flipped the page. We looked for about 20 minutes before we finally found a unit that didn't look too difficult, and had available permits! There were exactly 2 permits left for Unit 33: Stony Hill.
They handed us the permit paperwork, which had a bunch of questions from; tent color, jacket colors, Sat phone number... and emergency contacts. All in all, it was a bit intimidating... and... by this point, we didn't actually have a tent, so we just put down the color we thought we might get... Whoops. In hind sight, this was not the smartest choice, but we were going to rent/purchase a tent outside the park right after getting our permits!
They checked our bear canister, and gave us a detailed map of our section, then had us sit in a 30 min 'safety and training' video, which went into detail on how to safely hike, avoid bears, cross rivers, etc.
The entire process was quite formal, and intense. Coming from National Parks where you just hike on a trail, this seemed like we just stepped into the major leagues! We got the rangers approval and our backpackers permit, which is apparently required to get a bus ticket... We paid for a bus ticket for the first bus out of the visitor center the following morning.
Off to get a tent... backpack... food... and sleeping pads. All in all, we were not prepared to go backcountry hiking. Luckily, there was an outdoor store just outside Denali NP, which rented everything we needed! We rented a tent, I purchased a new backpack for a bit more room, and we both got a sleeping pad. The total was like $35 bucks for two days! Pretty good...
We packed everything up the night before, checked over each others packs, and planned our route. This pretty much took 5+ hours and put us into the evening. We found a spot in the jeep and went to bed early and mentally prepared for the hike to follow.
Bus Ride
We woke up to a biting cold morning. Slowly got our of bed and fed ourselves a small breakfast. We were pretty groggy. We double checked our gear, checked in with our family one last time to let them know our plans, and headed over to the bus station. As we were waiting for the bus... looking around at the other hikers, they had a LOT more gear than us... This didn't help to settle our nerves.
We kept telling ourselves that if it got bad, we would just hike back to the road and go back, no big deal!
The green bluebird bus came around the corner, we all loaded up our packs and found a seat. It takes 4 hours to reach the back of the park and a full 8 hours to do the entire trip! We would be getting off, about 3 hours into the trip, so we had a lot of time to sit back and enjoy the ride!
Our bus driver had been working at the park for years and knew sooo much about the parks history, wildlife and visitors. She told us to keep an eye out for wildlife, and we were all very excited to! Not but 5 miles from the visitor center, we came across 2 moose on the road, crossing right in front of the bus.
The first group of hikers got off and stepped out to a wall of bushes... they looked left, then right and hiked right into them... Joe and I were very confused. There are literally no trails... Get out of the bus, wherever you want, and just start walking. Hike wherever you want. The only rule, you can only camp in your assigned unit, and you have to sleep more than half a mile from the road and out of sight.
We saw a grizzly bear running down a hill, just .25 miles from the bus. Before today, I've never seen a grizzly run full speed... I can confidently say there is 0% chance I could outrun a grizzly bear.
A group of campers were going to get out near that spot, but the bus driver said they cant let anyone out with a grizzly sighting less than .5 mile away. Luckily there was a river between us and the grizzly, so we drove about .5 mile and let them out... they hiked the opposite way of the bear.
All in all, we saw: 2 moose, 9 grizzly bears, 20 caribou, 4 ptarmigans on the ride up!
Mile 61: Stony Hill
After 3 hours of riding in the back of the bus, and 2 bus stops, we reached our stop, Stony Hill, Unit 33. It turned out, we weren't the only ones getting off here. We were going to be doing some of the hike with two other guys. They were hiking through Unit 33 to another Unit where they had a permit.
We got out at the Little Stony Creek, just before Stony Hill Overlook, one of the bus stops along the road. It was raining, cold, and foggy. The opposite of the weather at the visitor center.
We got our packs settled on our backs and together with the two other guys we met headed off, following Little Stony Creek. We thought following the river would be easier than hiking up the hills and through the tundra... This was our first lesson learned! Although the river was relatively low, it was still a river. Hiking and weaving in and out of the braids proved to be more difficult than expected. It wasn't long before we were jumping, and getting our boots a little wet. We hit some thick brush and had enough, and headed up the hill.
A few miles in we stopped to have lunch, which for Joe and I comprised of a bottle of plain warm, soylent. Not exactly gourmet, but its actually great backpacking food! High in calorie, nutritious, and included a fair bit of water. We ate soylent, cookies, and some banana bread for the entire time we were camping.
Once we made it to mile 3 and to the confluence, we split up with our new friends, they had to cross the river to the north, and we looked to find a good place to cross to the east.
We searched for about 2 hours but failed to find a decent place to cross the river and rather than getting our boots and only pair of socks wet (yes... I know... we should have brought more than one pair of socks), we started hiking up Stony Hill.
Hiking up wasn't easy, as I'm pretty sure we took the hardest path possible. The spongy vegetation of the tundra absorbed our steps and soaked our boots.
We hiked all day, mostly around Stony Hill and worked our way up the mountain. As we were looking for a place to set up camp, we came across a mom and cub grizzlies off in the distance, about .5 mile away. Now, while we've been hiking, we've been very aware of bears. We yell "aaaayyyyy ohhh bearrrr" every few hundred feet, keep our food in a bear container, and each of us cary bear spray. But, hiking just .5 a mile away from a mom and cub grizzly bear was FREAKY! We did our best to let them know we were there and watched them for a while, taking in their beauty.
As we hiked, we stopped often to take it all in. The solitude of Denali NP is crazy. We are literally in the middle of nowhere. We hiked quite a bit more, to get away from the bears before setting up camp.
We found a spot about halfway up Stony Hill, sheltered from the wind, and a place that wouldn't flood, and since we knew bears were in the area, we took extra care to place our bear canister at an appropriate distance.
Everything was soaked! Our boots, socks, and pants were dripping. We tried to dry everything out but had no luck since it was so humid and raining... It even snowed a little. We changed into our other set of dry clothes and got into our sleeping bags, hunkered down for the night, trying our best to stay warm!
Waking Up
We actually slept pretty well! Outside of being a little cold, the spongy tundra provided a nice soft cushion through the night. We woke up with the sun. As we got moving, Joe and I talked about our goals for the day. We wanted to summit Stony Hill and get our revenge on the river by crossing it!
We were pretty close to the summit, so it didn't take us long to finish the hike to the top. The views on. the way up were among the best we've seen all week! When we got to the top, we were stunned by the beauty! We spent 30 min and ate, 'drank', a great lunch!
I had some meetings to go to later in the day, so started our hike down the mountain and started looking for a place to cross the river. Since we didn't actually need to keep our boots dry, it was a bit easier to justify the risk of falling in. We had a fun time hiking out, and making the leap of faith across the river. Joe only got a little wet, but I fell as I tried to jump the river and got a bit wet!
We hiked out to the road and were really proud of what we had accomplished. We hiked ~10 miles, and make it through a night in Denali at the end of the season. It wasn't the most intense hike we've done, but it was one of the most memorable!
We caught a tourist bus on its way back to the visitor station. We were exhausted and felt so accomplished. We sat in the back and reflected on our journey. It was one of the coolest things I've ever done.
Denali humbled us. We came in thinking it would be no big deal, that we could handle anything Denali threw at us. We left with a greater respect for nature, and the beauty of the world.
Additional Media
Our friend over at Nat Park Stories interviewed a bus driver that's worked in Denali National Park for over 33 years! If you can't get enough of Denali NP, give this a listen!
