Day 68 - Denali National Park

Last Day in the Park

Today was our last day in the park and it was basically a day of rest. Our only plan was to go to the science center for their daily noontime talk, so we slept in until the decadent time of 7am.

We had a fair bit of time before the talk so we went up to the visitor center to have coffee and see the park film about the seasons of Denali. The film was without narration, but very good...as was the coffee.

The Murie Science Center has a talk or film every day at noon. They are usually more detailed than the ranger talks and not really oriented towards children as many of the ranger talks are.

We got to the science center well ahead of time and had a chance to access their high-speed Internet connection to update our various devices. While we were there we ran into Rangers Bob and Tina again. They were in civilian attire on their day off and were on an infrequent foray out of the park. It was their 43rd anniversary and were going out to dinner. Evidently, one of the best restaurants in Alaska is only a few miles outside of the park and Bob had made reservations well in advance.

It was really nice to see them one more time before leaving as their hikes were real highlights of our stay here. We traded addresses and maybe we'll meet again.

Today's talk was about bears in Denali and their movements. While the first part of the presentation was a bit basic and mostly what we had heard before, the rest of the talk was about how they move about in the park. They have collared several bears each year to track their wanderings. Some bears hardly move around, mostly alpha males who have found an an abundant food source. Others range about, even going over the mountains into the southern part of the park, but even they tend to return to a home range. 

Interestingly, only one of the tagged bears actually left the park before returning to within the boundaries. For the bears and the park's wolves, their greatest danger is being hunted or trapped if they are outside the park. The bears have no predators besides other bears or humans.

After the talk, it was back to Speedy and the campground for more R'n'R.