In Seattle

Ravens -- an important bird in Tlinglit culture, raven brought light to man
Quaking aspen trees -- they sound really cool when the breeze blows through them
The Copper River -- home of great salmon


Liberty Falls in Wrangell-St. Elias
At Pioneer Park in Fairbanks
Wrangell Mountains as seen from the Glenn Highway.

We're currently hanging out in Seattle and looking forward to getting home to Austin on Sunday. Brandon is excited to be starting kindergarten and Andrew will be in 3rd grade. Our departure from Anchorage was uneventful. The final drive between Wrangell-St. Elias and Anchorage was another nice drive, with glaciers and high mountains along the way. I didn't take many pictures -- I think I got burnt out after taking around 1600 pictures. It will take me a while to sort through them all and find my favorites, but I thought I would post a few here, in my last post for our Alaska trip.

Fairbanks to Wrangell-St. Elias

Princess Wilderness Lodge
If it were clear, a view of the Wrangell Mountains

The Trans-Alaska Pipeline
Another glacier...
More mountains...
A beautiful lake along the way to Wrangell-St. Elias
Visiting the Christmas House in North Pole, Alaska
In Pioneer Park, Fairbanks

It was a nice drive from Denali, but rainy, so I didn't take any pictures along the way. We passed by some of the burned forest from recent forest fires. We got to Fairbanks around lunch time. We went to the Museum of the North at the University of Alaska, which was very similar to the Anchorage Museum. Lots of history on various indigenous groups, gold rush history, natural history and Fairbanks history. It was a nice museum and since the kids were so patient, we took them to the playground at Pioneer Park afterwards. They had a great time playing with the local kids, who were starting school the next day.

The next morning we made our first stop at North Pole. The have the world's largest Santa along the side of the freeway, and the Christmas House. Unfortunately Santa wasn't there on Mondays, but we looked around and bought a couple of ornaments. We also spent some time looking at Santa's reindeer.

The drive was another spectacular one, particularly going through Isabelle pass. The pictures really don't do it justice. We got to the park's visitor center late in the afternoon and got some info on hikes. We stayed at the Princess Wilderness Lodge, which is run by the cruise line, and is very nice. It was actually the cheapest lodging option in the area when I looked online, only $99/night. They had great views of the mountains, and a great restaurant. I thought the food was the best we had during the entire trip, with the exception of our cruise.

More later...

Denali

Caribou (aka Reindeer)
Ptarmigan
Along savage river

with the Park sled dogs
Taking the Junior Ranger pledge

It rained while we drove to Denali, so there was no chance we would see Mt. McKinley along the way. We later learned that it is visible only 20% of the time, so we weren't surprised that we didn't see it at all. However, it was still a beautiful park and we really enjoyed seeing all of the great vistas and wildlife. We were lucky that it didn't rain and the sun even came out during most of our hikes. The hard part about Denali is that you can only drive in about 15 miles, then you have to schedule a ride in a shuttle bus to go in farther. Our first evening there we took a hike near the visitor center. The next day we had scheduled a rafting trip on the Nenanna river -- it was great fun, we had to get dressed up in dry suits, and the boys got to experience some mild rapids. The only problem was that is was still cold, and my feet were numb by the time we finished, despite the fact that I wore my skiing socks.

That afternoon we went to see the park sled dogs, then we drove in as far as we could and took a hike along Savage river. It was sunny and beautiful and we saw some cool wildlife including moose, a weasel that took a liking to Mike, eagles, falcons, caribou, and a big group of ptarmigan, the state bird.

The next day we had scheduled an 8:30 bus to Eielson ranger station. The ride would take about 3 hours, and the drivers are good about stopping to look at wildlife along the way. The ride takes so long because they have to go about 25-30 miles per hour, and some parts of the road go along steep cliffs. Along the way we saw fox, snow hares, a grizzly bear mom with 2 cubs, and lots of birds. When we got to Eielson, I told them that Brandon wanted to get his junior ranger badge (you have to fill out a little booklet), so the ranger made a special announcement and everyone watched as Brandon took his junior ranger pledge. We took a hike with a ranger and learned all about the tundra and the plants that manage to live on it. Then we hiked up a rather steep hill -- Brandon practically ran up the hill and we had to slow him down to take a look at the sites along the way. We took the shuttle back to the park entrance after some lunch and saw lots more wildlife along the way, including a beaver that Mike spotted in his pond.

We ate at the local Salmon Bake restaurant -- Salmon was a recurring theme (and dinner) throughout the trip. We also had some fabulous berry pie -- blueberries and other berries grow very well in the tundra.

The next day we headed up to Fairbanks. We decided that if we were to come back to Denali we would camp inside of the park so that we could spend more time inside the park, and less time on shuttle buses.

Anchorage to Denali

We spent a couple of nights in Anchorage, and checked out the Anchorage Museum which had a lot of information on Alaskan history and a few galleries with art. They are in the process of expanding so a few of the galleries were closed. We enjoyed some microbrews and lunch at Glacier Brewing and wandered around the many stores and art galleries on 4th street. We left early Thursday morning for Denali. We stopped at a historic roadhouse in Talkeetna along the way.

A few more pictures from Seward-Anchorage

Alaska railroad depot in Anchorage



Andrew spent a lot of time reading during our trip.

From Seward to Anchorage

My internet connection is spotty, so I'll load a couple more pictures when we get to Seattle. The train ride from Seward to Anchorage was yet another spectacular set of vistas. I didn't want to take any more pictures at first, but after a few miles it was clear that there would be some shots I wouldn't want to miss. We also saw some good wildlife, including a baby eagle in it's nest, moose, and various birds.

Kenai fjords national park

Chiswell islands -- lots of birds roost in this area, since they are well-protected from predators. Also, Steller sea lions haul out and have their pups in the grotto area.

Brandon gets a ride on the bridge of our tour boat with captain Brad.




Our second day in Seward was spent on a wildlife watching trip on a small tour boat. We went out into a set of fjords that are part of Kenai Fjords National Park. Every time I think Alaska can't get more spectacular, it does. We had a beautiful sunny day, and saw tons of wildlife. Even the captain remarked that it was a great day. We started off seeing otters (the last picture) as we left the harbor. Then a few Dall porpoises decided to come and play in the wake of the boat. They look a bit like Orcas and are very fast. We headed over to some cool rock formations, then went and watched a glacier calving. You'd think we would be tired of glaciers by now, but it's still exciting to see them up close and wait for that cracking sound as they break up into the ocean. We saw TONS of birds, including puffins, cormorants, murres and gulls. We also saw a lot of endangered steller sea lions. There was a grotto in which they would haul up and have their pups. We saw several humpback whales and even some minke whales, which was exciting. Overall it was a great trip. It lasted about 7 hours, and we got a nice salmon and prime rib lunch along the way. The crew was very friendly and helpful, and we had a park ranger narrating along the way. I would highly recommend Major Marine's tour if you ever make it to Seward.

The next day we spent almost the entire day at the Alaska Sea Life Center where we learned a lot more about the wildlife we had seen the day before. Next entry will be about our train trip from Seward to Anchorage.

More from Seward

At Exit Glacier, Brandon being sworn in as a Junior Park Ranger, the Iditerod monument in Seward.

I forgot Skagway, and on to Seward

Behind me is Harvard glacier in Prince William Sound.



Skagway was actuallybefore Prince William sound and College Fjord. In Skagway, we road the Klondike narrow gauge railroad just across the border into British Columbia. It was a very scenic ride, and the boys enjoyed being on a cool old-fashioned train. Afterwards we went to a gold mining camp where they did a show for us about life during the gold rush and we panned for gold. Later that afternoon, Mike and Andrew went rock climbing while Brandon and I went shopping in town and did a hike up to a nearby lake. We also saw lots of salmon going upstream.

After a gorgeous ride through Prince William Sound, which was even more spectacular the Glacier Bay, we enjoyed our final night on the ship with a farewell dinner. We arrived in Seward in the morning and dropped our things off at our bed and breakfast. We spent the day visiting yet another glacier (Exit glacier in Kenai Fjords national park). We weren't quite able to walk up to it, but we got pretty close.

More on Seward later...