Saturday 21st June Denali National Park

We had a sleep in this morning and went for a ride up to the Grande Denali Hotel for breakfast and to take in the magnificent views. Then we hopped on the shuttle and went to the downtown strip to do some souvenir shopping. We had lunch in a cafe and then made our way back to our hotel because we were going on the 8 hour Tundra Wilderness Tour at 2pm. This tour focused on the land and the plants and animals that live within the park. The bus stopped frequently for a closer look at the wildlife and Cassandra our driver had a zoom lensed video which gave us live views of distant wildlife that we viewed on drop down screen at each bus seat. This made it easy to see the wildlife no matter where it was relative to the bus. We drove to the 62 mile mark and we could see Mt McKinley in the distance. Mt McKinley is the highest mountain peak in North America with a summit (6,168 m) above sea level. It is the third most prominent peak after Mount Everest and Aconcagu. We saw one grizzly bear, one moose, arctic squirrels and lots of caribou. The vastness of the wilderness was beautiful. We were a little disappointed because we paid $159 each for this tour only to find out that the Visitors Centre offered free shuttles, although the free shuttles did not have a guide on board and they did not have the zoom lensed video equipment.