We got there too late to make the lake and instead camped that night on a river bar just inside the park just out of site of the road. It was rainy and the clouds hung low over the Alaska range. A late August snowfall of 9 inches was evident on the foothills. I recall seeing a Grizzly bear track on the muddy river bottom. The next morning we caught one of the yellow school buses to Wonder Lake and began our walk into the wilderness.
Wonder Lake is the largest lake in the park and is surrounded by black spruce.
It is very picturesque - so much so that many photographs of Denali, the highest peak in North America at 20,320', are taken with Wonder Lake in the foreground. It is amazing that Denali is so imposing from Wonder Lake, in spite of being 25 miles away. About 2 miles from Wonder Lake is McKinley Bar. Crossing McKinley Bar was the real challenge of this experience. The trick was to maintain balance.