On the Outside Looking In Fly-in Recreation Day Use Visitor Experiences in the South District of Denali National Park and Preserve

• Main Authors: Alan Watson, Katie Knotek, Neal Christensen
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: alaska range; glacier; glaciers; Alaska
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.596.5727; http://www.fs.fed.us/rm/pubs_other/rmrs_2008_watson_a001.pdf

accesses wilderness in the same way, however, or has the same experiences. Wilderness recre-ation experiences at Denali vary tremendously. Interviews with flightseers at the park have created a better understanding of the recreation experiences for these day users and helped us recognize glacier landings in the backcountry as unique aspects of that experience. In self-reports about their visits, day users focused heavily on the unique scale of the wilderness of the Alaska Range, seeing climbers in the park, and landing on glaciers. Many of the flightseers recognize this place as a national park, and many recognize it as wilderness, though the recreation experience they are engaging in is more likely to be described as one of “on the outside looking in, ” rather than as a wilderness experience. SCIENCE and RESEARCH