We decided to get the full Denali feeling by reserving a campsite at Teklanika Campground, which is 30 miles into the park. This beautiful little creek is right in the campground.

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The rules stated we must stay a minimum of 3 days and that our road pass entitled us to one trip into the campground and one trip out. During our stay we couldn't drive the car anywhere but rather had to take buses to explore the park using our "Tek Pass".

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We boarded our green schoolbus at 9:30 to begin our 6-hour adventure into the park. Needless to say we had high hopes of seeing wildlife. Our first stop was the Teklanika River overlook. No wildlife but a beautiful river.

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Dall sheep, relatives of the bighorn sheep, graze the alpine tundra for the young shoots of mountain avens. Our driver referred to the sheep high on the mountain faces as "dall dots" which is exactly what they looked like.

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The mountains within the park are spectacular. Many are snow capped with and without glaciers while others, like Sable Mountain, have no snow.

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When we got to Toklat River, we had an opportunity to "try on" some antlers. There was no way I could even hold these on my own so Jim and another gentleman helped me settle them on my head.

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We spotted these caribou feeding on a far-off snowfield. Caribou travel in groups and both sexes sport antlers, the only deer family members to do so. The Denali herd is much reduced from the thousands seen many years ago.

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Our driver Dan stopped along the road to point out a fresh grizzly bear print he had found in the sand. I was amazed at how large it was. It was nice seeing the print, but bring on the real thing!

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Mount McKinley has been called the Alaskan landscape's most impressive feature. Because of cloud cover this morning, it was doubtful that we would have the opportunity to view it's snowy summit, but we got lucky when the clouds lifted just enough to reveal this spectacular beauty. Mount McKinley is 20,320 feet high and is the highest mountain on the North American continent.

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On our return trip, we came around a corner and found a group of dall sheep very close to the road. It is just amazing how they are able to graze on the steep slopes.

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This ram was just relaxing in the sun seemingly without a care in the world. I had the opportunity to hold a ram horn and was amazed at how heavy it was. How do they balance with those things as they graze on the mountains?

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Although we had a very satisfying trip wildlife wise the first day, we decided to set out on the bus again today to see what we could see. Luck was with us when we came upon this mama grizzly and her cub right by the side of the road as we were driving though Sable Pass.

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It must have been playtime for the cub. They were rolling around on the grass and then all of a sudden started clawing, biting, and chewing the Sable Summit sign. If you'll look carefully, you'll see that the park service has put nails on the sign to discourage this behavior and save their signs - needless to say, this deterrent hasn't been successful!

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Once they got tired of the sign, they just marched across the road and into the brush. Our driver told us that we were very lucky to witness this close up encounter with the bears.

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We have seen bald eagles at some of the lakes we've camped at, but here at Denali there are golden eagles. A mew gull was pursuing this guy - our guess is the eagle had found the gull's nest and she/he was protecting eggs or young.

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When I spotted these caribou in the river it looked as though they were connected at the butt end so I called out "Siamese caribou". A split second later they were just two caribou wandering in the riverbed.

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As night approached, the sky began to cloud over with an approaching storm. This gave us some interest in the sky to photograph. Not a sunset but interesting just the same.

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The storm came in the night and as we were driving out of the park the sun showed its face giving us this rainbow.

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Heading Southeast from Denali toward Anchorage, we stopped for the night at Byers Lake. It was a nice little lake and great campground except for one thing - mosquitoes! This was a first experience with so many of the critters - when they talk about swarms of mosquitoes, they mean it! Thank goodness for a good supply of repellent.

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On the up side, the wild flowers at Byers Lake were really spectacular. There were bluebells, dwarf dogwood and lots of wild iris.

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