The great Alaska trip report

[Ghoulish Delight]

***Yikes, this came out long. I'll be shocked if any of you actually read my whole rambling here.***

Okay, we have 390 pics and video clips to sort through, so a full photo tour will be slow in coming. But I'll start to debrief what we did (if I can remember it all!).

Going in, we had very little in the way of actual plans. Our main objective was to visit CP's brother, meet his knew wife/in-laws, and get to know our new niece (his 3 year old step daughter) and nephew (their 2 month old baby boy). With 2 kids to attend to, we weren't exactly expecting to do a huge amount of site seeing.

Shows what we know. From day 1, we were on the road, seeing anything CP's brother could think for us to see that was withing an hour or 2 of Anchorage. The kids were fantastic. The 3 year old kept up with us driving and hiking all over the place, with barely a complaint. She's amazing, her definition of "throwing a fit" being quietly crying for a coule minutes while still doing what Mom and Dad ask her to do. And the baby was more than happy to spend hour after hour being toted around in his carseat (which doubles as a carrier and triples as a stroller).

So, here's how it went down:

General Notes:
CP's brother has started himself a wonderful little family. We couldn't have been happier to meet them. His wife is great, she's raised an amazing daughter so far, and her parents are incredibly nice people who have been wonderful to CP's brother.

Alaska is nothing short of spectacular. And we picked the absolute perfect week. It had been cold and rainy the week before, but it was sunny and warm 90% of the time we were there. Lots of snow still on the ground, so it was gorgeous. And since the salmon don't start running for another week or so, we beat the tourist rush. There were times when we were the only souls for miles around. And we really packed in the activities, so even with just a week, we felt like it was a good, long vacation.

Day 1
We arrived at about 5PM local time on Saturday, grabbed our rental car, and settled in at the in-law's house where we'd be staying. They spend all of their summer weekends on their boat in Whittier, so we didn't see 'em. VERY gracious of them to let us intrude like that. We went out to dinner with CP's bro and family at "Arctic Roadrunner", a local burger joint that sits right on a creek that runs through town. And we got our first taste of the flavor of Anchorage locals as we saw a few guys in a tiny canoe floating down the creek Spent the rest of the evening hanging out with the family, getting to know everyone, and freaking out over the late sunset (cannot stress enough how bizarre it is to have daylight at 11PM).

Day 2
Up bright and early for breakfast at "Gwennies", a local cafe chock full of mounted animals, hunting and fishing gear, etc. Think "Moose Burger Lodge" at Magic Mountain. Spent the rest of the morning at a weekend local crafts market where we picked up a couple gifts for family and friends, as well as ourselves and saw more oosiks thank you can shake a stick at (go ahead, look up oosik). Then, into the cars for the first of many road trips. This time to a big game park near Portage. They had moose, caribou, musk ox, bison, grizzlies, black bears, a bald eagle, coyotes, an owl, deer. And all with just a chain link fence in between. AND most of the animals had just given birth, so lots of cute little ones running around. It was great. After the drive back (the drive is fabulous, btw, with miles and miles of beautiful coastline), we spent the remainder of the day lounging about the apartment, as we would spend the end of every day, playing with the baby and watching movies.

*Side note: Because there were 7 people including the kids (one of CP's younger brothers came up for the week too), we were in two cars, with CP's brother leading me everywhere we went. A large percentage of my time in Alaska was spent tailing a blue Jeep Grand Cherokee. I began to worry that if I got back, I'd start absentmindely following blue Jeep Grand Cherokees to God knows where.

Day 3 - Memorial Day
Started off with a little local ceremony in the park downtown, organized by a few different veterans clubs. A very nice ceremony with memorials, a bagpipe band, and Airforce band and color guard. Then, into the cars and off to Thunderbird Falls, about an hour north of Anchorage. A beautiful
hour or so hike to the base of a waterfall. Surrounded by trees, lots of families, very peaceful and beautiful. It's been a while since we've been camping, it was nice to do something like this. I just hope that our failure to follow instructions when paying the parking fee doesn't result in a $500 citation (we paid the fee, just didn't display the stub on the car...oops).

Then came dinner. The in-laws returned from the boat and put together a Memorial Day bbq. And we got our first taste of real Alaska seafood as they came back with a fistfull of fresh-caught rock shrimp. They were so plump and unbelievably delicious, grilled up with some butter and garlic...damnit I'm drooling now. Good meal, good company.

Day 4
We went to Portage to glance at the glacial lake there. It's been receding for the last century or so, so you can no longer see the actual glacier from the visitor area on the shore, so we decided to spring for the boat ride...and boy was it worth it. Nothing can really describe a glacier if you haven't seen one in person. It's such an imposing thing. When you look at it, even though it's just sitting there, you can plainly see what it's done, and is continuing to do, to the mountains around it. You can just sense the raw power it has. And then there's the blue. Because glacial ice gets so compacted under hundreds of feet of snow, it absorbs almost all wavelengths of visible light, except blue, it's stunning. As is the color of the lake that comes off of it. Filled with the silt created by the stone it pulverizes, it's an other-worldly steely gray. And, of course, bitter cold.

From there, we headed to Whittier for a quick lunch. As Moonliner mentioned in an earlier thread, there's a 2 mile long one lane tunnel heading in and out of Whittier. They allow one direction of traffic through at a time, alternating every half hour. It was dug as a military train tunnel during WWII to reach the Whittier port, which was a submarine port. Whittier itself is a nothing of a town, consisting of docks, a few small stores and restaurants, a hotel, and abandoned naval barracks. We had the best fish and chips ever (someone remind me to tell the red snapper story), then headed back for another evening at the apartment.

---continued below---

[Ghoulish Delight]

Day 5
This was definitely one of the highlight days. We headed out to Matanuska glacier, a couple hours north east of Anchorage. This is a glacier that you can actually walk down to and walk on. Unfortunately, being very early in summer, the ice was still really slick, so we couldn't get as far as we might have wanted. But CP's younger brother and I managed to get a good ways back, even without proper shoes, and had the pleasure of getting to the rim of a pretty large ice valley with a river of melting snow and ice running through it. Really spectacular, and worth the risk to our ankles and necks A truly awe inpsiring experience, not soon forgotten by me.

Day 6
This day was a bit of a bummer as CP's brother got a call while were on the glacier to come in to work in the morning (despite the fact that he had this vacation time planned well in advance, and they already owed him for doing the exact same thing to him the last time he had vacation). But he was able to get stuff done and be back by noon, so the day was not lost. We stayed in town, visiting the Alaska Wild Berry Producst store which houses what they purport to be the world's largest chocolate fall, a 20 foot tall fountain of melted milk chocolate. I was very diappointed to not find cups for dipping. But CP's younger brother did manage to purchase a moose turd on a necklace as a gift for their other brother who couldn't make the trip. Yes, actual moose turd. There is a disturbingly large industry of stupid tourist gifts made with moose turd in Alaska. Go figure.

Day 7
Another drive up north to visit an abandoned gold mine. We got up there to find that they hadn't really opened for the season yet (there was still a lot of snow on the ground, though all the roads had been well cleared). Not a huge deal since that just meant that the gift shop wasn't open, we could still walk around and see the mine. But it did mean a good half mile uphill walk as the last stretch of road to the parking lot was blocked off. But well worth it. It was an impressive mining town, complete with rushing river, huge barracks, a crumbled power generator building that ran on diesel, rusted mine cars, and rickety train tracks suspending across perilous mountain gaps. Sadly the camera battery gave out JUST as I was about to take the best photograph of those tracks, with the spare battery in CP's purse a couple hundred feet bellow. Oh well, still got some good shots.

Our dinner that night was at a nifty restaurant in Anchorage called "The Bridge". It's built right across a large creek, with people fishing for salmon (though with the real runs a week or more away, the pickins were slim). The food was really good, but the side they put us on faced the sun and was uncomfortably warm. And the service sucked. Bleh.

Day 8
Our final day before out flight, and boy did we make the most of it. This was the one day we actually had a plan for going in. We booked a river rafting trip down the Kenai canyon river. Mom and Dad pawned the kids off on auntie, and off we went. And, as a good omen, we finally saw a moose and her calf in the wild on the drive there, a first for the week.

What an amazing trip. There were 4 rafts, a total of 23 people. And we just sat back as our guides did all the rowing. 19 miles down the river, not a nother sould in sight. Within a week, the banks of the river will be shoulder-to-shoulder with fisherman, the waters teaming with salmon. But not that day. Just the river, the rafts, and the wildlife. Beautiful. We saw bald eagles galore, 5 or 6 of them. I got a couple really good photos of them.

We stopped for lunch on a small island. We were expecting some carppy lunch like granolla and water. But these guy knew what they were doing! They put out a hell of a spread. Bagles, rolls, reindeer sausage, turkey, smoked gouda, pepper jack, homemade pickled onions, smoked salmon, smoked halibut, salmon spread, hot and cold drinks galore! It was an awesome meal. But even before the meal started, as they were explaining the drill for getting food, someone spotted a moose across the river. We all stopped to watch as she came to the waters edge...and just walked right into the river! As the current swept her down stream a bit, she just calmly swam her way across, and the next thing we know, she climbs on shore about 100 yards (maybe less?) from us! Paid us know mind, just stood there for a minute and wandered into the woods. It was awesome.

So we got back on the rafts to complete the 19 mile trip down to the lake that the river empties into. We went though some rapids...if you can call them that. Pretty tame, they're considered a class "2+" on the scale from 1-5 of passable rapids. And they only got the "+" because the water temperature in the river is bellow 40. Honestly, if those were class 2, I'd call Grizzly at least a class 3. But we had a really good guide who made the most of them, splashed us pretty good and got us pretty close to the rocks that he could safely. When we reached the lake (Skilak lake), they fired up the motors and we spent another hour on the lake (HUGE lake, 17 miles long, 4 miles wide) until we reached their landing where we piled into vans to take us back to base camp. Unforgettable journey all around.

So there ya have it. Our trip in a nutshell. A very large nutshell. Photos will be forthcoming (I promise to not be too lazy about that). They tell the story far better than this endless boring trip report ever could.

[Moonliner]

Good report, I'm glad you had a great time.

I'm sure you will beat me putting together a trip report... I'ts been ten months and I'm still working on mine...

[wendybeth]

It sounds like you had a fantastic time, and I'm glad you got to see and experience so much! Looking forward to the pictures....

[scaeagles]

Good read. Cool trip.

[BarTopDancer]

Sounds like an amazing trip! Thank you for sharing!

[cirquelover]

It sounds like you got to see many things and have a good time with family! I'm glad the weather cooperated for you, it can make a big difference.

Did you see the Northern Lights?

[Ghoulish Delight]

Originally Posted by cirquelover

It sounds like you got to see many things and have a good time with family! I'm glad the weather cooperated for you, it can make a big difference.

Did you see the Northern Lights?

Exact wrong time of year for the Northern Lights. Those appear in the dead of winter, when it's very cold, very clear, and very dark.

[mousepod]

Thanks for the trip report! I'm so glad you guys had such a good time. Can't wait to see the photos...

[tracilicious]

That sounds awesome. We hope to one day go to Alaska, so thanks for this pre-taste of it.