Greetings from Denali National Park & Preserve

If you’re a city person, Denali can be a bit boring, mostly because it is UNDEVELOPED, and THAT is what makes it so unique in our Park system. It is the LAST FRONTIER and the service there strives to keep it that way. There are many animals there, mostly out of sight on the one road in and out of the park. Individual campers are allowed for short stays out of sight of the road and must leave their site as they find it, clean of debris or any sign of human intrusion. Visitors come in by bus and have a driver who initiates them to the wilds, and the fact that the NATIONAL PARKS BELONG TO US, not the president or anyone else. They are not to be sold or used for mining, logging, oil reclamation, natural gas, or gold for that matter. I picked up a rock and was told I was not allowed to remove it from the Park. This may seem like a small thing, but it is important that the Park be protected, There are bears, wolves, moose, elk, eagles, and even wood bison, which are darker than the bison of the plains. They seemed longer, and lower to the ground as well. Smaller animals live there as well, which are too numerous to be named here, but the wilderness of the area is the ONE place left that is protected from commercial development.

To me, it was like being on the lead horse or wagon of the first people from a foreign land to see the beauty of a vast area with Huge cloud surrounded mountains, woods, valleys, rivers and lakes, all seemingly uninhabited. We now know that there were Indigenous people who lived and worked there, but they were in harmony with their surroundings, prospering in the weather, temperatures, and animals. In our “civilized” world, we are used to signs of people everywhere. The difference is astounding when you think about it. Such a prize, to preserve and allow the presence of those initial residents the knowing that they will NOT be run over by greed, for that will destroy what is there forever.

Wild Hawk. 6/29/18

Sincerely,
Diana