Denali Autumn – Denali National Park & Preserve, Alaska

For the past several blogs I’ve been posting photos from Denali National Park from the 2016 trip and this will be the last.

It was a short autumn season while camping and photographing the highest peak of the North America; Mount Denali (formerly named Mt. McKinley). With unusually nice weather during my stay, I successfully captured five stunning sunsets glowing on the mountain.

The photo above is the sunrise glow on the east side of Denali, with autumn colored tundra carpeting the landscape.

The fall is the most beautiful season in interior Alaska. The tundra turns to golden fall colors with vivid red patches… I like the way the tundra glows under the warm evening light. 

Here are some more images at Wonder Lake. When the days are calm, the lake reflects Denali.

The old antlers were shed on the tundra hill. Mount Denali is in the background.

Denali glowed bright orange at sunset. This is the spot where Ansel Adam captured one of his famous black & white images, “Mount McKinley and Wonder Lake” in 1948.

Late August is the peak season for blueberries in Denali! The fully ripened berries were everywhere in the park. After 6 years of living in Alaska, I had never seen so many blueberry bushes. 

Frosted tundra leaves. At the end of August, the temperature drops in early mornings in Alaska. Nevertheless, it is art in nature.

The last image is from the Polychrome Pass area. The hill is turning to autumn colors. 

Interior Alaska, includes Denali National Park, is covered with snow with harsh subzero temperature during the long winter months... 

After this Denali photo project, I moved to Hawaii. After 6 years of living and capturing wild Alaskan nature, I was ready to move on to new subjects. I have been capturing beautiful yet different landscapes in this tropic island since September. I will post some of the photos on my next blog posting. Please check back in 2 weeks!

Mt. Denali (McKinley) Northface - Denali National Park & Preserve, Alaska in Autumn

My week long Denali photo project was success. I camped deep inside Denali National Park & Preserve for 5 nights in early fall to capture Mt. Denali (McKinley) at sunrise and sunset. The weather was more than perfect, Mt. Denali was out for my entire stay, which is extremely unusual.

 In late August, interior Alaska is already in autumn colors. The tundra started turning bright orange against the blue sky; the most beautiful time of the year. Nature showed off their its prime beauty before another harsh winter.

 The lake was a little calmer in the morning... Denali reflected on Wonder lake.

 This is the entire Wonder Lake, about 4 miles long, and Denali on a calm morning.

 After a long and challenging bush whack, I made it top of the range... The entire Wonder Lake and Denali was in view on my site with a bright crimson tundra hill! This one of the best views of Denali and Wonder Lake. The midday light was too harsh... I may have to come back there for sunset on a future trip.

 A few hours before sunset, I arrived at the spot where I dreamed of photographing the mountain at sunset. After 4 nights of sunset shooting, I selected this spot where I could capture the perfect reflection of Denali on Wonder Lake. I set up my camera, carefully adjusted it, and waited for sun to slowly shift toward the horizon. As the breeze slowed down, the ripple on the surface smoothed out. The bright white sun on the mountain slowly turned to a warm golden light, then orange to pink... The entire range glowed magenta as the sun lowered. It was the brightest glow during my 5 evenings in the area. The lake was flat at the time, and a perfect mirror image was on! The glow was shifting up to the highest peak the North America, then faded... It was the image that I dreamed of since I first saw the mountain 15 years ago.

When I made it back to the campsite, the northern lights started dancing above the sky. The lights were very active that night; waving, swirling, then spread over the sky. Then the faint light band stretched over Denali...

On one morning, I was shooting the mountain by the lake and a large caribou was found feeding on tundra. He was calm and quiet, I didn't notice him until he came close by... He rose his head and looked at me but he went on continuously feeding. He seemed at ease not caring about my presence.

The 5 nights at Wonder Lake in Denali was amazing... It was nonstop photographing and exploring the area. The place is truly magnificent. I'm deeply in love with Denali...

I will post more Denali images on next few blogs.  Please visit back soon.

Denali Sunset

In the mid July, I went camping in Denali National Park to photograph Mount McKinley, or Denali as it is known to Alaskans, the highest peak in North America.

It was overcast in the morning when I entered the park via the park shuttle. Unfortunately, Denali (Mt. McKinley) is often hid behind clouds during the prime summer season. At an elevation of 20,328 feet high, the mountain generates its own weather.

After several hours on the park's only road, I arrived at Wonder Lake Campground, at Mile 85. The campground's location offers a broad-side view of Mt. McKinley. However, most of the early part of the day revealed only gray clouds as background. It was cloudy all afternoon while hiking the McKinley Bar Trail to the river and back. I didn't expect to see the any of the mountain that day.

Around the time when I arrived back at the campsite that evening, the clouds started moving and created some windows. Part of the mountain peak began appearing. It was in mid summer in the interior Alaska with over 20 hours of day light when the mountain slowly revealed itself.

In just a few hours, the veil was gone; Mt. McKinley was out! The clouds moved away and by late afternoon the sun also came out. In the northern latitude, sunset takes a long time... which is a photographers dream! The lower-angled sun lit up the mountain with golden orange light. As the sun slowly shifted above the horizon, McKinley was aglow in pinkish orange for quite some time.

Mother nature sometimes shows us magnificent and beautiful views.

 

Camping in Denali National Park, Alaska

Early July.

After photographing bears along the Katmai Coast, my next destination was Denali National Park, located in the interior of Alaska. Denali NP is famous for the highest peak in North America - Mount McKinley ("Denali" in the native language), and its abundance of wildlife: grizzly, caribou, moose, Dall's sheep, lynx and many small animals.

After 6 years, I was back in Denali again. During the summer of 2001, I worked at a hotel at the entrance area of the park. Since then, I have been in love with Alaskan wilderness. My main purpose for going back to Denali was photographing Mt. McKinley and its reflection on Wonder Lake during sunset and sunrise time with "magic purple light." So we stayed at the deep end of the Parkroad at Wonder Lake Campground.

A huge cow moose greeted us before getting on the camper shuttle bus by the Visitor Center. Everyone grabbed cameras! She likes to hang out in the area because the predators will most likely stay away from busy tourist areas. Since she came too close to people, the park management put a collar on her in order to track her.

It was lightly raining when we got on the shuttle. I was hoping it would clear up later. The mountain was hiding behind the clouds most of the time; only 1/3 of visitor ever get to see part of the mountain during their trip! Only lucky visitors ever seen a whole mountain. The French photographers in Katmai told us that they couldn't see the mountain at all for 3 days.

Unlike my expectations, I didn't see so much wildlife from the bus on the way. I only saw several white dots (supposed to be Dall's sheep) and a few gray dots supposed to be caribou. and one more, a moose far behind of bushes. Where were the bears? At that point, my closest wildlife sighting was the collared moose at the Visitor Center. After a quiet 6 hours, the shuttle arrived to Mile 85, Wonder Lake Campground.

The rain stopped, but the mountain was far behind heavy clouds. The campground was luxurious for that remote wilderness area. We picked a nice site where there is supposed to be a Mt. McKinley view. There was a food cache house with covered cooking/ eating area nearby, and flush toilets and running water. The whole area was an open view with alpine tundra - vivid green! It was also peak season for the wildflowers blooming! Only problem was mosquitoes... a lot! There were crowds of them following whenever I go. We had to wear head nets!

Although it was overcast, the sun didn't set until 2 a.m or so, and without getting real dark, the sun rose again a few hours later. Denali NP is located in the far north.

Next morning, the mountain only showed its middle part - a long strip line between the clouds - then, it hid behind of the clouds again, all day.

The clouds got lighter at night, I was hoping it would clear up in the middle of the night, so I set the alarm clock every one hour and checked if the mountain was showing up. It would be my last opportunity to photograph the mountain with purple light. I periodically checked outside every one hour until 5 a.m when finally the bottom part of the mountain was visible.

Around 6 a.m, most of the mountain was shown up! It had already passed the magic hour time, but I was very excited to see the entire mountain. The sky cleared up while we were having breakfast. I photographed the mountain and reflection on the pond. However, when I was rush walking to the point where I can look down Wonder Lake, small clouds forming around the mountain. The clouds grew so fast! when I finally got to the hill, most of the mountain was hidden behind clouds even though other parts of the sky were still clear! I was glad to see the entire mountain for a while. We packed our camp down, and rode an afternoon shuttle out the park.