Doug Gualtieri, a Talkeetna-based guide, calls Denali Park Road “the best 92 miles of road in the world.” The narrow, dusty track snakes through Alaska’s most popular national park, known for wandering grizzly bears and moose, as well as mesmerizing views of North America’s tallest mountain. Although visitors can still enter Denali National Park and Preserve, they won’t be able to get too far into the park, because everything past mile 43 is inaccessible, due to a landslide that closed more than half the road in August 2021.
Thawing permafrost, fueled by climate change and heavy rainfall, contributed to the massive landslide that erased the roadway at mile 45.4. In its place, construction engineers are working on a 475-foot bridge and elaborate ground-cooling system to stabilize the bridge foundation.
“The Park Service has a lot of facilities that have been neglected,” says John Brueck, a Denali park ranger. “The road has been neglected. There’s just a lot of work to get it back into shape for all the traffic we’ll be seeing.”
The huge project is finally nearing completion, and the road is expected to reopen for normal operations in 2027. For this summer, however, only two ways remain to experience Denali’s spectacular, isolated backcountry and closer views of its famous peak: rough it by backpacking (or bike-packing) from mile 43 onward, or fly in and stay at one of three remote in-park lodges near the road’s end at mile 92.5.
Kantishna Roadhouse Lodge sits at the end of the 92-mile Denali Park Road.
Courtesy of Kantishna Roadhouse (L); photo by Danita Delimont/Shutterstock (R)
I chose the latter, sampling all three lodges in early June. I reveled in views of wildlife big and small, from caribou to beavers. I admired the formally named Mount McKinley (popularly known by its Indigenous name of Denali) in all 20,310 feet of its sunny-day splendor. I biked the road and hiked trails, so peacefully isolated that I heard little more than birdsong and crunching gravel beneath my bike tires and soles of my shoes.
“This is why we came now,” another fly-in lodge visitor, Kevin Pozzi from Lac du Flambeau, Wisconsin, tells me on a morning hike. “We wanted to get back here before the road reopened.”
Getting to each lodge usually begins with flightseeing in a fixed-wing plane or helicopter, depending on the lodge, over the snow-capped Alaska Range, with remarkably close views (weather permitting) of Denali, towering over its neighbors. Peaks, glaciers, and rivers dominate the landscape.
Below us, the empty and temporarily closed park road slithers roughly east to west, drawing ever closer to Denali. The three in-park lodges are clustered near the tiny community of Kantishna, a one-time gold rush locale about 25 miles from the mountain. Most visitors pick one lodge and stay for two to three nights or more.
The lodges share certain traits. All offer small-group hikes and other outings led by knowledgeable guides. Guests can also hike independently, bike the road, or explore Wonder Lake in a canoe or kayak. Meals and excursions are included. Evenings may have post-dinner flora or fauna presentations by guides or guest speakers.
Kantishna Roadhouse prides itself on being the only Indigenously owned and operated lodging inside the park. Cultural beliefs and experiences are an integral part of the programming, where guides describe medicinal uses of plants or show boots made from animal pelts. The 33 cozy log cabins are set near roaring Moose Creek. The two-story lodge has antlers mounted on huge log beams, couches by the fire, and a small saloon for an after-dinner craft Alaska beer or margarita.
Denali Backcountry Lodge is a wellness-focused accommodation.
Courtesy of Denali Backcountry Lodge by Pursuit
Denali Backcountry Lodge is the place to recover, with a full-time massage therapist on staff, two wood-fired saunas, and an outdoor hot tub. It’s also the only in-park lodge with guest Wi-Fi. The 42 cabins are modern and clustered closely, some with decks directly facing Moose Creek. The two-story lodge has deep leather couches and chairs, games and books, and a full bar. Menu options range from thick French toast at breakfast to pan-seared scallops over pasta at dinner.
Picturesque Camp Denali, set on a hillside, is the only backcountry lodge with views of Denali and the Alaska Range from its 19 guest cabins. Meals are simply superb, including sourdough pancakes or braised pork with butternut squash gratin. It’s clear the establishment has been family-owned for over 50 years, with meticulously tended flower beds and quilts stitched by staff and co-owner Jenna Hamm. Camp Denali is also the only backcountry lodge that can offer naturalist-led excursions well east of Wonder Lake, deep into the park’s interior. That greater reach can translate to more wildlife viewing opportunities. Note that the cabins lack indoor plumbing, but the outhouses and showers are immaculate.
Backcountry lodges, having endured some lean years and operational hurdles (such as having to fly supplies in and waste materials out), are eager to see the road reopen.
“We’re very optimistic about the future,” says Jordan Sanford, president of Doyon Tourism, Inc., which owns and operates Kantishna Roadhouse. “Now is a kind of once-in-a-lifetime experience that hopefully will never happen again.”
