Robin Song tells about her experience in Denali National Park when she is given a road lottery ticket.
The first year I entered the Denali Park Road Lottery, I won. It was a memorable trip, but it was also many years ago and the last time I won, to date, though I’ve entered the Lottery several times since. I didn’t enter this year, for various reasons. Discouragement over not winning, year after year, is one.
Then, the “irony angel” smiled on me. An acquaintance won the Lottery, but sudden health issues prevented her from going and she offered her ticket to me. She, like I, had also entered the Lottery year after year and was thrilled to have won, at long last. With mixed feelings, I accepted her gracious offer, and suddenly I had a day to get ready to go.
Between excitement and things to do, I didn’t get to sleep until way later than I had planned. The alarm went off and on two and one-half hour’s sleep I headed for the Park with my two dogs. We arrived just after eight, with the rising sun lighting up the mountains ahead of me as I drove up the first hill past the Visitor’s Center.
My first sighting was a large bull moose with a stately rack, moving in the brush across a broad valley. It was just a dot with the naked eye, but binoculars brought into focus a majestic animal in its autumn mating glory. I took it as a good omen for the day.
The fall colors were past their peak in the Park, but it didn’t matter. When I got my first glimpse of Denali, I saw that the clouds were drawing back and there was a good chance I would get to see the entire mountain later in the day. Patches of blue sky were showing through the clouds and the sun was spotlighting the magnificent mountains as I drove through the Teklanika Valley. I stopped to watch a splendid bull caribou trotting along the west side of the Teklanika river. He seemed to have a single-minded purpose-perhaps scenting a cow.
Driving my Ford Explorer over the steep, narrow, windy mountain passes gave me a whole new respect for the buss drivers of the Park. How they manage to drive those dirt roads, with heart-stopping drop-offs alongside those hairpin turns while they’re also helping their excited passengers spot wildlife, is beyond me. I was just relieved not to encounter any on-coming traffic in any of those passes.
Rounding a bend in a valley between passes, I came upon several cars pulled over. One was leaving, heading my way. I asked its driver what had been spotted and she said; “A bear”. I parked behind the last car on the west side of the road, with a view of a narrow valley to my left. As I shut off the engine, I spotted a young bear up on the side of a hill. It headed down to the valley floor and I saw another head raise up above the brush, then another. It was a sow with two cubs. Tall mountains blocked the sun to the east, but there was enough light to do photography. I had the zoom lens on the family as they ate leaves off the brush, seemingly oblivious to the many human eyes watching them.
The sow had several options open to her to guide her cubs well away from the many vehicles gathered in the area, but for reasons known only to her, she deliberately headed straight for her human audience. I thought: “This could get interesting,” as I alternated between videos and still photos. Lyra, who has been scared by bears, sat next to me on the passenger seat, trembling and woofing quietly under her breath. I stroked her to help calm her. Darby, who not been scared by bears, curled up behind the driver’s seat and dozed, clearly unimpressed.
The three bears slowly made their way towards the road, stopping to dine on the leaves of bushes along the way. The sow-healthy and a beautiful toklat color-led the cubs between the vehicles and onto the road. I held my breath as they turned and headed my way. I just had time to grab my keys and fumble them into the starter and get the window up before the sow was even with my Explorer’s front bumper. One toklat-colored cub was on her far side, the other chocolate-colored cub walked behind her. Time seemed to slow as I watched the grizzly stride beside my car. I drank in every detail of her. If the window had been down, I could have reached out my arm and patted her furry head. She turned and glanced at the side of the car and saw her reflection in amongst the mud on the black metal. She startled and took a side-step, knocking lightly into her cub, who also side-stepped. The sow was reaching her paw forward, taking another step, when she turned her head and looked up at my window. Our eyes met for a solid two seconds. I was struck by how tiny her reddish-amber eyes were in her broad face. Her furry ears swiveled towards me. Feelings of awe, honor, and pure astonishment coursed through me in those moments. It felt like there was only me, the sow and her cubs in all the world. The experience was beyond description. Then she turned her head forward, her paw touched the ground and she continued walking on past the car. She and the cubs headed on up the road a little ways, then veered up a hillside, stopping to eat leaves, holding branches of the bushes in their paws as they grazed. After a few minutes, the sow again led the cubs back down onto the road, crossed it, and went down to the creek to my right. I was able to photograph the family as they walked along the gravel creek bed, until the sow took them out of sight in the thick brush on the west side of the valley.
Lyra had finally stopped trembling when the family went down by the creek. I praised her for keeping her cool while I climbed all around her, snapping photos as best I could while the bears passed by. Darby had shown mild interest, but she remained content to stay curled up and dozing as the excitement went on around her. For a yearling English Shepherd, I was amazed at her indifference.
The grizzly family safely across the valley, I headed on up the road in a daze of wonderment. For the rest of the day, whenever I recalled the bears, I smiled. It’s my closest encounter, to date, and I was very grateful to be inside my vehicle, watching a sow who was obviously well-versed in how to lead her two-year old cubs past people. She was calm and kept her cubs close and calm as well. I admired that sow, and I will never forget gazing into her eyes and feeling a touch of the wild as our eyes met.
I made it to Wonder Lake, but the sun had gone behind a curtain of high clouds. While Denali was in full view, there was very little sunlight on it. Nevertheless, it was magnificent. Lenticular clouds played over its summits. High winds lifted clouds from many of its craggy peaks. Wonder and Reflection Lakes were wind-whipped and the many photographers -waiting for the winds to die so the waters would become still and reflect the mountain -finally gave up and left. A loon fed its chick in Wonder Lake, and a large flock of ducks floated in a pond near the lake. I heard the distant calls of Sandhill Cranes flying by high overhead as I walked Lyra and Darby along the shore of Wonder Lake.
Driving back, I stopped to snap many photos of the setting sun spotlighting the sides of Denali as it shot through the clouds. The intricate braids of rivers shone silver in the dark valley below, and the fall colors in the brush of the foreground were muted in shadow. It was silent and peaceful and I had the road to myself most of the drive back.
I arrived at my friend Diane’s homestead- not far up the old Denali Highway- at eleven-thirty that night, tired and my head full of the day’s sights. Through the day I had thanked the powers that be for allowing me to be driving the Park road. It was a dream come true, and an adventure I will remember always.
By Robin Song
KTNA~Writer’s Voice, 101214
Bears Up Close
