Kundalini and the Art of Being ... 111miles away. We drove all through that day and late into the night. He
eventually dropped me off at the north end of Wasilla, at three in the
morning where, once again, I slept in my tent in the woods just off
the highway.
After sleeping in late the next morning and then mulling over my
options, I decided to head towards Denali National Park and look for
work there. I knew that, as long as there were positions open, I had
a good chance of getting hired, since I’d worked there for two sum-
mers previously when I was going to school in Fairbanks and Juneau.
I hitched from Wasilla north to Denali, arriving late in the afternoon,
and then walked with my pack into the personnel office at Denali
Park Resorts.
An hour later, I had a job in one of the restaurants, a room in one
of the employee cabins with two other roommates, and a little more
security in my life. I was lucky to end up rooming with two great
guys—Eddie, a musician from Las Vegas, and Chris, a half-Chinese,
half-Irish aspiring photographer from Kansas, who had driven all the
way up the Alcan Highway alone in his Jeep.
I worked at Denali Park through to the end of their tourist season
in late September, two months later. Though I didn’t particularly en-
joy the work—especially since I got stuck with the early morning
shift, starting at 4:1 a.m.—I worked four ten-hour shifts, so at least
I had three days off to explore the park.
Chris and I quickly became good friends. We went on a backpack-
ing trip into the park together a few weeks after I arrived. Though it
was just for one night, since we had only one overlapping day off, it
was great to be back in the heart of the Alaskan wilderness. We took
the bus about halfway out to Wonder Lake, a good fifty miles inside
the park. I always enjoyed the bus ride. Though it was bumpy, dusty,
and seemed to take forever, it was also a welcome decompression
chamber on the way out of civilization and into the wilderness.
Once the bus dropped us off, it continued down the road and dis-
appeared over the next ridge, leaving us in complete silence. It was a