Day 9 of my trip was billed as the best day to see Alaska’s wildlife. While
it wasn’t quite the "zoo" that I was expecting, we still saw Denali’s most
famous residents: brown bears, caribou, dall sheep, and moose. Our tour lasted
nearly seven hours, with the excellent driver/guide making the time pass quickly.

Before that, though, we took a trip to the park’s sled dog kennel. Denali
still uses sled dogs to patrol the park in the winter, and we got to meet and
greet most of the dogs. They’re all remarkably friendly, and they seem to love
what they do. They did a little demo with 5 dogs on a gravel trail, and they
were really moving fast. It was also funny to see how excited the dogs
when they were getting the sled ready… lots of barking "choose me!".

Pictures of everything after the link!

Let’s start out with the sled dog kennel:


One of the 30+ sled dogs in the park


Love this one


This one too. These Alaskan Huskies have great ice-blue eyes!


There they go!


They had to sit in order to get their bones

This was a little hike my dad and I took around the visitor center:


Like I’ve said, everything is SO green here

The rest of these photos are from our Tundra Wilderness Tour inside the park:


Moose


Amazing glacial valleys


Dall sheep


A slightly closer look. Check out those horns!


Caribou


Caribou butts


Nice rack


Amazing scenery here


Really like this shot


Panoramic view (click
for larger)


Here I am, standing in the middle of a glacial valley


The rocks in the river bed are amazing


See that muddy brown thing in the center? That’s a grizzly (brown) bear


Artsy shot of the day


I was "famous" on the bus for actually getting a picture of these two brown bears


Mother is on the left, her cub on the right

That’s all for Denali. I hope you enjoyed the photos!