Hi Tom,

I have taken everyone's advice and cut down out time in Denali. Now just 2 full days, with 3 overnights. We will have a car, any recommendations for lodging?

Thanks!

MissyT
As usual, I am late to the party and don't know if you will even see this. I am trying to plan a last minute trip to Alaska this summer either in July, August or early Sept. I just wanted to know if you were able to find a car rental that isn't ridiculously expensive and would be willing to share your discovery. Thanks in advance...

The outlook is pretty grim for cars. Go to the facebook page All About Alaskan Travel. Under announcements there's a long post that includes suggestions for folks without cars. There is also Turo, a car sharing company, which I know nothing about

Yep bucket listed you have likely missed the boat on car rentals but the train goes to Seward and Denali.

Good luck.

I wonder if doing a September cruise would work out better.

As far as I know none of the cruise lines are planning to offer one-way cruises between Seattle and Whittier or Seward, so Denali would be out.

I proposed it as an alternative for bucketlister.

September is a good month for bear and eagle viewing in the panhandle since the late salmon run is on. So they'd be able to get some of the wildlife experience and still should be less crowded than a full on cruise season.
Port stops are usualy long enough for day hiking and or kayaking.

We reserved a car from Avis in early April, 15 days $1,100, out of Anchorage downtown location.

Good Luck!

Great price MissyT! We ran into a couple around Denali, they had flow in to Fairbanks and found a rental car there.

We did see plenty of wildlife from the bus, including grizzly, caribou, hoary marmot, collared pika, red fox, "bear burritos", Dall's sheep, and moose. Really, we only missed wolves but I believe it was a low year for snowshoe hare.

There was no issue with the brush being too thick to easily spot wildlife, but we may have been especially lucky with our bus driver Justin Harkins who was a substititue driver that day. In fact the two people who we picked up from another disabled bus said "Boy are we glad our bus broke down". Justin indicated that that wildlife sightings the second week in June are normally very good.

By the way, the Denali bus depot was open. Eielson had an outdoor tent thing going. No cash was accepted at the bus depot but they had restrooms, and a gift store including snacks and clothing. Masks were still required inside buildings and on the bus.

We got lucky and had a driver who normally narrates on the Tundra Wilderness Tours on our green transit bus to Eielson (the TWTs are running, see website).