Fond Memories of Denali
In my list of books that I would like to write, there is one that chronicles the modern history of Alaska. I had the pleasure of living there for a while, and the memories are all wonderful. I worked at Mount McKinley National park, catering to tourists. It was a great way to meet people, and wildlife as well.
I was the night desk clerk. Not as quiet a job as it sounds because most of our game runs occurred in the late evening after the sun went down. Surprisingly, a lot of wildlife in Alaska is active in the evening hours, and our vans would go out (private cars were not allowed, for the tourists' own protection) and drive through the wilderness in search of bears, moose, caribou, wolves. One night, as I was staffing the desk (and most guests were out in the adventure vans) I heard a terrific racket on the front steps (the hotel in those days was very rustic and made of logs). I looked up to see a baby moose standing at the glass windows, peering in. A few minutes later, kitchen workers on the night shift started shouting. I went to see what was up. Wolves had gotten into the garbage cans. When we saw the menacing silhouette of an enormous grizzly bear shambling a little too near the hotel, we all ran inside the locked the door. A short while later, grumpy tourists returned in their adventure vans. They had been out for two hours and hadn't spotted a single animal. I hadn't the heart to tell them what they had missed.
The hotel staff were city folk for the most part. I remember one young man arriving fresh from San Francisco. He checked in at the personnel office, then headed out back to the employee trailers, suitcase in hand. A few minutes later, we heard screams. We all ran out to find the young man up a pine tree, with a moose at the base, trying to sniff him. We all chased the moose away and helped the young man down. He picked up his suitcase, marched back into the hotel, said, "I quit," and caught the next bus back to Anchorage.
We experienced a total eclipse of the sun one summer day and we all went outside to observe it. Sam Ogilvy, who worked in the restaurant kitchen, climbed up on the hotel roof. When we asked why, he said it was to get a closer look.
The old rustic hotel is gone now, with flashy new ones in its place. And a lot of the wildlife has retreated from the new highway and the march of civilization. But in my memories, Sam and the tourists and the wildlife are still there. Maybe I'll pay them a visit someday.
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