Bull and cow moose, Denali National Park, Alaska

October 12th, 2008 by Carl D

Hey Folks,

So, I’m back to the ‘photos from the past’ section. I’ll post a few more from my recent stay in the park, but wanted to post this, a favorite of mine, from Denali National Park a few years. This was probably one of the greatest days I ever had photographing. I hiked my tail off all morning after this bull moose – I was just finishing breakfast on what was to the be the last day of a 2 day stay in Denali Park, and I really wanted to get something worthwhile. The weather was pretty gnarly, but it was my last day, and I hadn’t much to show for 12 days of staying hunkered down in my little 1 person tent in wind, rain, sleet, snow and cold.

So I sat drinking coffee glassing the surrounding tundra with my binoculars, hoping for some wildlife; any wildlife. At last I see this bull moose wandering over a ridge, WAAAAYYYYYY off in the distance. I mean, far, far away. But what the heck, I hadn’t anything else to do other than pack up my gear and head out of the park, right? So I grab my camera and start walking. It took me nearly an hour of solid hiking, and I mean S-O-L-I-D hiking, through entangled dwarf birch, greedy willows and nefarious alders.

But eventually I caught up with this fellow. He was moving around, as he could smell the cow in the area, I suppose, but hadn’t found her.

Finally, he caught up with her, and I followed the 2 of them around for another couple of hours. I wasn’t getting a lot of great photos, as the area was pretty brushy, and they weren’t really cooperating with me. And the light TOTALLY sucked. Eventually, they came together and nuzzled a little, and I took a few frames, of which this is my favorite. It’s one of my moose photos so far. So I was pretty stoked to catch it.

I sauntered back to my camp, packed up, and hiked off to the road to pick up a ride on the shuttle bus that would take me to the entrance of the park, where I’d throw my gear in my car and drive back to Anchorage, whereupon I’d have a well-earned and much needed shower.

However, what I THOUGHT was to the bus that would take me out of the park turned out NOT to be such a bus. It took me about halfway, just shy of the East Fork River, in fact. And I couldn’t have been happier to get off the bus, in the driving snow and sleet, for a few hours. But you’ll have to wait for me to explain why

Cheers

Carl

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