ALASKA ROADTRIP: Alaska's Kenai peninsula

I'm Melanie Tucker, chief designer at Tough Love Travel, and a certified Alaska Expert.

I offer an Alaska, like you've never imagined. 

Call and let me inspire you today:  (609) 923-0304. 

The word "road trip" and "Alaska" are rarely found in the same sentence - for good reason!  Alaska's size usually makes floatplanes much more practical than Fiats....but not always!   One great exception is the Kenai peninsula, that cone-shaped piece of land jutting south from Anchorage.  It holds the only walk-on glacier, world-famous King Salmon runs, artisans and eagles, and access to not one -- but 2! - more national parks.  

ALASKA ROADTRIP step 1:  start in Anchorage

There's no need to spend much time in this hub, but on your arrival afternoon, you may want to rent a bike and explore the 11-mile Tony Knowles Trail.  It's paved, relatively flat, and runs along the shoreline of scenic Cook Inlet, from downtown to Earthquake Park (where you'll learn all about the devastation of 1964)

I'd also buy myself a ulu knife, critical to Inuit native culture (and to my kitchen too) or taxi out to the Native Cultural Exhibit. 

ALASKA ROADTRIP step 2:  26 glaciers

Early the next morning, rent your car and drive down to Whittier to hop on the 12:30pm boat cruise called "26 Glacier Express".  Yes, you WILL see 26 glaciers.  You'll also learn the difference between tidewater and hanging glaciers and why the glaciers were named after Ivy League schools.  You'll probably see Orcas too!

Did you know that there's a 2.5 mile, one-way railway tunnel to enter Whittier?  It's part of the fun, but you better time it right.  It costs $12 and runs on a half-hour schedule.  Here are the details. 

When you exit the boat, head over to Seward, 2 hours south, for your overnight. 

ALASKA ROADTRIP step 3: Seward's Resurrection Bay

You can sleep in a restored railroad car, in a picturesque log cabin on the bay, or in a saltwater lodge, but when you awake, you'll want to get out on the water to see the wildlife of Kenai Fjords.  My favorite boat is the intimate, family-run Stellar Explorer that'll show you whales, calving glaciers, and natural history. 

You'll also want to tie on your boots for a remarkable coastal hike out at Lowell Point.   Yes, that means you'll have to drive the short but sketchy gravel lane OUT to the point, but that's part of the fun of this Caines Head Trail. 

Note of caution:  this trail is 100% tide dependent, so make sure you check a current tide chart before you set out, and consider hiring Miller's water taxi for a pick up if hiking and tide times don't jive. 

ALASKA ROADTRIP step 4:  fish, fish, fish

The Kenai peninsula is all about fishing!  Salmon run throughout the summer months, and the prized King Salmon can also be caught.  Permits limit an angler to one King per day, so you'll have to choose whether or not to keep a fish.  If he's a 45 pounder, should you put him back and wait for a 70 pounder?   What about bait?  waders and other equipment?  These are all things that a good guide will help you with.  They'll even make you lunch in the boat as you practice your fly casting from the riverbank. 

ALASKA ROADTRIP step 5:   Homer's eagles and artisans

Homer is one of my all-time favorite towns in Alaska.  Perched on a 2-mile spit of land at the bottom tip of the peninsula, Homer is all about halibut fishing, hand-knit sweaters and caribou earrings (yes, foraged straight from the tundra by this artist!),  kayaking, and seafood dinners. 

For dinner, take the Danny J ferry out to Halibut Cove, an abandoned herring fishing village that's turned its boardwalks and cabins into an artist colony.  Stroll the studio wharf and then enjoy dinner dockside at the Saltry Restaurant! 

ALASKA ROADTRIP step 6:  the grizzlies of Katmai  

From Homer, you can contract a guide for day trip out to Katmai National Park. It'll take you a bush plane, a float plane, a full day, and about $680 pp to do this, but it is a day in your life that you will never, ever forget!   Here's a story about the journey OUT to Katmai, and here's another tale about my own family's encounter with a grizzly bear, Awed by the Claws. 

Wondering how to pull all these ideas together? 

Don't have time to plan this trip? 

Want the coolest, off-the-beaten-path places to stay... cabins right on the bay catered fishing cabins, flats on Homer Spit where you'll have a front-row seat to watch the eagles? 

I can help you.   Schedule your complimentary 20-minute call now, but clicking here. 

Valley of 10,000 Smokes: Katmai National Park's Swath of Sand

Katmai National Park - on the Alaskan peninsula across the Straits from Kodiak Island -- is the site of my big grizzly adventure:   Awed by the Claws!

But Katmai National Park is also home to a giant barren crater,  and you can daytrip there from Brooks Falls Camp, and experience this wrath of nature for yourself.

In June of 1912,  the volcano Novarupta exploded.  It had threatened with serious earthquakes for more than a week, but when it finally erupted,  the results were mind-boggling:

It was 10x more powerful than the 1980 eruption of Mount St Helens.

Nearby Kodiak town was buried in 700' of ash!

Skies as far away as Chicago were blackened for days, and they say that the acid rain caused clothes, drying on the line in Vancouver, to disintegrate.

In fact, they call this explosion at today's Katmai National Park the 20th century's most dramatic volcanic event, affecting the majority of the Western Hemisphere!

ONLY ONE ERUPTION IN HISTORIC TIMES DISPLACED AS MUCH ASH, and that was Greece's Santorini, in 1500BC.



It broke thousands of small holes and cracks in the riverbed of the Ukak River and across the valley of Katmai National Park, so that National Geographic explorer Robert Griggs marveled, 4 years later,
"the valley's landscape is riddled with steam vents.  It's a valley of ten thousand smokes!"

In 2005, it no longer smoked, but the bizarreness of the landscape still beckoned us.

From our home base in Katmai National Park' Brooks Camp, we van-tripped ($90pp) , for about an hour, to Overlook Cabin.   There was a small snackbar, and a huge back deck, perched at the brink of the destruction.  




We sat awestruck, considering what sort of power of nature could turn this evergreen-laden loamy forest of Katmai Park, into the arid, monochromatic wasteland before us.  It sprawled for as far as the eye could see!

After lunch, we hiked down into the moonscape.  Baseball sized rocks were weightless in our hands -- pumice, of course!

I remember the air feeling cool, but the sun still threatened to blister our cheeks with its fierce overhead blaze as well as reflection off the endless sand dunes.


At points, the sand had piled up in spires (see left). Now, over 100 years later,  small scrub is starting to entrench along the crater's edge and creekbank, but overall, the scene is blurry with blowing sand.  Blinding with sun glare.  And silent.

Unless you're a geology buff, you won't travel to Alaska just for this.  But if you're in Katmai National Park -- of even on Kodiak Island -- this is a very worthwhile detour!

Want more info?   Check out my YouTube: Alaska, Like you've never Imagined!

Need a little help with YOUR Alaskan adventure to Katmai National Park? 

 Grab a complimentary 20-minute session here!

Landing in the Bush: an adventure out to Bear Country

Although being in the presence of a 8' grizzly -- damp slobbery nose, smooth black lips, curved claws and deeply-furrowed coat-- is awesome, 
it's the plane  trip OUT to  bear country that is the REAL adventure! 

Your first plane -- a small bush craft -- lifts you out of the civilization of Homer's Spit and over the wide waters of Gulf, running west away from the rising sun.   You bump around in the air currents, gazing below at the islands of deep forest which look still gray in the early dawn! You're above the world, yet you can't see a single sign of humans.

In short time, the plane drops steeply towards the trees, and you're alarmed, half expecting to hear branches brush the plane's belly.   Just as it bumps down, a slice of brown appears out of the green. You've hit the dirt strip.. i mean,  "runway".

  

Dust and screeching, a jiggle of parts, a taxi that feels more like an ATV than an aircraft.  You look out and wonder...Where am I?  But no time to ask.  Only a minute to grab bags and jump out, before the pilot is buckling up again.  "But... wait!", you spurt out.  With a casual, "take that trail" thrown over his shoulder, the propellers are already whirring, and he's gone.  

Across the field, into the woods, down the trail, you serpentine through this lonely forest, hearing only the skitters of small creatures and the footfalls of your fellow adventurers, to find a  weathered green wooden lodge, silent on the lakeshore. 


Inside, 2 sturdy looking men in heavy oilskin
jackets mumble over their coffee cups and you just hope that one is your guide! 


Sure enough!   They're expecting you!  Ahhh!   Smiles all around, as you head off once more, following Mr Trusty Pilot out the screen door, down the shore path, to 2 float planes, looking so small and shiny red that you think they might be toys!   These float craft only seat 4 passengers each, so you split up, bid adieu, and buckle up for Leg #2 to Katmai! 
Now the green wilds that had felt so remote and intimidating just an hour before, are left nostalgically  behind.  You coast deeper into desolation, high up in the currents, over mile-high glaciers, to  endless vistas of snowy craggy mountains!  Your mind conjures memories of Lost In Alaska movie footage and you try not to think about your chances of survival should bad luck cast you in that ice world.  


It's easy to distract yourself though...  the  sparkly snowfields shine brilliantly in the morning sun and you realize you feel a blessing, as one of a select few in this world who get to behold this sight!  You're on top of the world.  


The plane dips towards alpine lakes, and you catch a glimpse of a large brown creature. Is it a bear?   A moose?   It's gone.

You finally are spit out of mountain clouds, and find yourself soaring above sapphire water.  You can feel the small plane descend and you can see the evergreen-edged crescent shoreline below,  but the pilot circles, again and again, over the bay. 

Now you're lower still.  The shoreline comes alive with activity.... it's the bears!  A big lone male plods along the edge,  a Mom rests on her haunches as her small cubs roll around nearby,  and another smaller juvenile-- only 20 yards away -- paws into the sand, searching for breakfast.  
  
The plane continues to circle downward, and your heart beats faster. You keep counting bears.  You're up to 7! 
The big Daddy on the shoreline pauses, stands, and studies your plane.  
You're in Bear Country, and they know you're there! 
                         

There is nothing like this sort of adventure to give you that sharp "I'm alive!" feeling!  But you'll want to trust experienced outfitters and have a watertight plan!  You can trust TLT for your adventure out to Bear Country!