Denali National Park and Preserve is a large national park located around the mountain Denali, formerly Mount McKinley. At 6,190 meters, Denali’s summit is the highest point in North America, and with a topographical prominence of 6,155 meters, it is surpassed in prominence only by Mount Everest and Aconcagua. The mountain was named Mount McKinley in 1896, when a gold miner named it after one of the presidential candidates of the time. Since 2015, it has been called Denali, which is the Kojukon tribe’s name for the place.

The park has a size of 24,464 km2, and there is a rich variety in nature, which includes both forests, taiga, tundra, glaciers, snowy landscapes and rock formations. It was the conservationist Charles Alexander Sheldon who in 1906 got the idea to establish the national park. He presented it to others in The Boone and Crockett Club organization, and they worked to establish the national park for the next 11 years until President Woodrow Wilson signed the necessary legislation on February 26, 1917.

The park’s area was expanded several times, and in 1957 the Denali Highway opened, which in the same year as the opening saw the number of visitors to the park increase fivefold. With the new road, traffic to the park had become easier, and this also happened with the opening of the Parks Highway in 1971.

There is only one way in and out of the large national park. The road is called Park Road and starts at the eastern end of the park as a side road to the Parks Highway, which connects Anchorage and Fairbanks. Close to the entrance to the park is the Denali National Park Visitor Center, which is a visitor and information center about the park. The visitor center is open during the summer, and during the other seasons the nearby Murie Science & Learning Center serves as the visitor center.

There are large parking lots at the Denali National Park Visitor Center, and both the Denali Park Depot and the McKinley National Park Airport are also located here. This makes the visitor center a natural place to start exploring the national park, regardless of how you get here.

From the Denali National Park Visitor Center, the Park Road goes southwest, and all the way you are in the area on the north side of the Alaska Range, and thus also north of Mount Denali, which is literally the peak of the park. Along the way, there are many good places to stop to enjoy the nature and wildlife in the park and of course also experience the beautiful panoramic views of Denali and other parts of the park.

The most popular for visitors who, for example, have half or a full day in the national park, is to take one of the park’s buses from the visitor centre. In the summer there are free shuttle buses, and here you can drive to the Savage River, where there are good hiking opportunities and where you can enjoy your own food by the river or simply enjoy the nature. There is also a free bus that runs to the park area for learning about sled dog breeding and use of the dogs. It happens at a kennel with the dog breed Alaskan husky.

You can also choose to take your own car to Savage River, and you can hike here. That part of Park Road is open for own cars in the summer, but for walks all year round. Savage River is in the distance at Mile 15, and if you want to go further into the park towards the end of Park Road at Mile 92, you must take one of the park’s buses, where you can choose between tour buses and transit buses.

Both types of buses enter the park along Park Road, and both buses stop to see the park’s wildlife etc. The big difference between the buses is that the tour buses have a driver who guides along the way, and on the longest trips there is also a park ranger on board the bus. The tour buses can also be regarded as excursions, where you drive back to the starting point. The transit buses do not have a guide with them, but these stop at several places on the route where you can get off.

The various bus tours in Denali National Park and Preserve can of course be supplemented with separate tours in the large area. Many visitors spend half or a full day on one of the park’s organized bus tours, in addition to the hikes or excursions you make yourself. The most popular hikes are around the Savage River and along the Triple Lakes Trail, which starts near the Denali Visitor Center.