Denali National Park & Preserve

Denali National Park and Preserve in Alaska encompasses more than six million acres of wild terrain around North America's tallest peak, Denali, which rises to 20,310 feet above sea level. The park's single road, the 92-mile Denali Park Road, is closed to private vehicles beyond Mile 15; visitors travel the remainder by park bus or designated tour bus. Along the road, subarctic tundra gives way to glacial valleys and high passes, with Polychrome Pass and Eielson Visitor Center at Mile 66 offering some of the most dramatic views of the Alaska Range available from any road in the state. Wildlife is central to the Denali experience: grizzly bears, Dall sheep, caribou, wolves, and moose are frequently spotted from bus windows, and the open tundra makes observation far easier than in forested parks. The road itself is a spectacle — gravel switchbacks carved into mountainsides above braided glacial rivers — and the scale of the landscape is difficult to absorb from photographs. Hikers can leave the bus at any point and explore cross-country on the open tundra, since there are no maintained trails beyond the first few miles; route-finding skills and bear awareness are required. Backcountry campers obtain permits at the visitor center. The Denali Visitor Center near the park entrance offers ranger programs and exhibits on geology, wildlife, and the history of climbing Denali. Photography of the mountain itself is famously weather-dependent; the summit is visible only about one-third of the time in summer. Visitors who see Denali in clear conditions consider themselves fortunate, and many plan multi-day stays to improve the odds. Morning hours tend to be clearer than afternoons as convective clouds build over the range. Reserving park road bus tickets months in advance is essential for summer travel.