- Got up about 4am again :) and ate the complimentary b-fast at the Hotel starting at 5am. A good b-fast, bagels, fruit, juice and coffee. At 6am the driver picked us up for the Wilderness Tundra Tour and we proceeded to pick up the bulk of the passengers from the Princess Hotel/Cruise Line Lodge. I think there was about 48 of us on the Bus. I met a nice couple from Canada who were taking a cruise from Whittier, AK after this portion of the tour.
- The bus enters the park and starts down the park road. If you were to take your car you can only drive the first 14 miles and after that there is a ranger station where only the tour buses can pass. The views/vistas are spectacular.
- The bus ride took about 8 hours and our job was to spot wildlife. We saw 4 bears, a couple of moose, some caribou, birds, a wolf and Dall sheep high up on a ridge. In the pics below you can see a Momma Grizzly walking right down the road with her cub and also a Willow Ptarmigan (state bird of Alaska) and her chicks.
- Back to the hotel and a few hours break before the white-water rafting ride on the Nenanna River. This river flows from the Nenanna glacier so the water has a bluish-tint and is only about 38 degrees. They put us in "dry" suits to keep us warm and it was pretty spectacular as I got drenched in about the first 2 minutes. The suit keeps you warm but my hands were freezing: Pic below of dry suit and the river:
- Back to the Hotel about 9:30pm and I'm exhausted. The day was Great !! and the weather so far has been picture-perfect. I would definitely recommend this but don't forget your wallet :) Went to bed and awaited my train ride back to Anchorage scheduled for tomorrow.
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