The ferry system on the Alaska Marine Highway. They offer a bit more flexibility than a cruise and are less touristy. (Of course, they have plenty of tourists.). That’s how I saw south east Alaska, and I’d fully recommend it. I got to go on my own schedule, I got to choose exactly where I wanted to go, and it was a bit lower key than a cruise.
If you don’t go on a cruise and do go to that area, I’d also recommend talking to a travel agent. A lot of the sights & events & attractions seemed to depend on the cruise directors telling cruise patrons what to do, so they don’t advertise (or don’t advertise well) or promote themselves well. When someone not connected to a cruise shows up, it seems to take them aback. There were a few things that I simply couldn’t find out about until I was there that I think a good, local travel agent would have known about.
Sorry I’m a bit late to this party. I’ve been to Alaska a number of times, and absolutely love it. Now that you’ve narrowed your trip down a bit, I can give my 2 cents:
Flying into/out of Anchorage would be best, and as you’ve found, cheaper. They’ve really fixed up the airport, and it’s really nice.
Taking the train up to Denali is a fine idea. We looked into this for one trip, and it seemed a bit expensive. But if you’re going to spend time in Denali, would be worth it (better than having a rental car sit idle).
Denali: I would plan on at least 3 or 4 full days there. Since you’re not into camping, there are a number of lodges just outside the park, and then you can ride the (free) buses each day. Taking the whole trip out to Wonder Lake and back will take a good part of a day - the buses move slow, and if there’s wildlife to be seen, they will stop. I think Denali should be a key part of your Alaska experience, and the more time you spend, the more you’ll have a chance to see (like the whole mountain. Here’s a tip: we got the best full views early in the morning - like 4 and 5am. It will be plenty light at that time in August).
I would opt for renting a car (from Anchorage), and then driving down to Seward and the Kenai Peninsula in lieu of the cruise. You could spend a few nights in Seward (nice town - particularly if the cruise ships aren’t there), and take day (boat) trips out to the fjords and even some glaciers.
Continuing down the Kenai, you could drive all the way down to Homer (only half a day’s drive from Seward - depending on how much you stop). Note: if you do this drive, be sure to stop at Sal’s in Soldotna and have one of their monster cinammon rolls !
Once you get to Homer, if you would like, you can take the ferry over to Kodiak. We did a “red-eye” ferry (it is a 6+ hour ferry ride), and saw some cool stuff: humpbacks right next to the boat, puffins whizzing by, volcano islands on the horizon. It was a bit “rolly”, so Dramamine would come in handy.
Kodiak is a pretty cool town, but you won’t get much of a feel for the island as a whole from the town alone. Not sure what you were looking for on Kodiak, but you could maybe hire a floatplane to give kind of an aerial tour of the island. This could be kind of iffy due to weather, though. We actually had a floatplane drop us off at a remote cabin on a lake, and we camped for a week or so. But it depends on what you want to do/see.
If you didn’t see enough grizzlies in Denali, you could go for a bear viewing trip: floatplane to a river, and then watch the bears fish for salmon. We saw bears fishing on Kodiak, but some friends did the floatplane trip, and I could get the information on the operator they used.
This would give you a good overall experience (IMO) of the “bulk” of Alaska, but not much of the southeast (Sitka, Ketchikan, etc.) part of Alaska. I have yet to visit that area, so I can’t give any recommendations. But not to worry, if you fall in love with the state as I have, you’ll be back !
Feel free to PM me if you have any specific questions.
See a glacier? How about walking on one? Matanuska Glacier is accessible from the road system. Drive north about two hours from Anchorage on the Glenn Highway past Palmer and the cutoff to (shudder) Wasilla. You’ll come to an overlook on the right that gives you a spectacular panorama of the glacier and the valley in which it sits.
Get back on the highway and drive a bit further and you’ll see a dirt road off to the right that will take you down into the valley, accross the river and to an entry point concession where you pay a fee (not cheap, but worth it). Proceed down the road until you come to the glacier terminus. From there, you can hike out onto the glacier, following the trail and then the cones that have been placed to show the most likely route. The ice shifts and changes, so the cones are changed at least daily. Once past the dirt-covered ice, you will enter the ice field proper. Just be careful where you walk, do NOT step into any streams, and try not to get out of sight of where you came from: it’s easy to become disoriented. If it looks like rain is approaching, get the hell off the glacier. The tiny creeks that you jumped over on the way out can become unfordable with a larger volume of water. I’ve been there many times and it’s always a thrill.
On the way back to Anchorage, take the turnoff for Hatcher Pass and the Independence Mine before you get to Palmer. This is a paved road that will take you along the beautiful Little Susitna River and then up into the mountains for some of the best scenery you can imagine. At the top sits the mine, which has been somewhat restored. There is a fee for entry to the area. You can hike to your heart’s content, and in August you will be able to pick blueberries on the slopes. Stop for lunch at the Hatcher Pass Lodge, which is a winter ski haven. Have a turkey sandwich and a piece of razzleberry pie. This is hands-down one of my favorite day trips. I grew up in Alaska, and recently moved from there to Oregon.
Whenever friends would fly in to visit I’d often take them to explore the Matanuska Glacier. It is beautiful and accessable indeed, just wear the proper shoes and clothing. The cowboy boots Brian had on made it look like a scene taken from Downhill Racer. Hatcher Pass is a great drive and, yes, easy to reach from the M.G.
Your narrowed down preferences look good, Dinsdale, and you’re getting some really good advice from everyone. Just make sure you keep Homer in your plans. It’s a great place to Spit. Catch a draft at the Salty Dog if you can and there’s a really cool hardware store next door that’s interesting just to browse around in. If you want a Halibut charter, Tony DiMichelle’s your guy. It’s an artist community and, for Tom Bodette, the end of the road.
This looks like it ought to shape up to be a really nice trip for you and the missus.
And it’s Jewel’s hometown, if you want to make the holy haj.
Yeah, the Kenai Penninsula would be my other choice for a scenic drive. Either Seward or Homer are worth visiting. A side trip to the tiny town of Hope may also be of interest, but the real attraction of this trip is the drive along the Seward Highway, which winds along the base of the Chugach Range. On a sunny day, it’s a preview of what heaven would be like.
If one doesn’t mind bad roads, a drive over the Denali Highway is worthwhile. The scenery is amazing, but the road is potholed and washboarded. You can do the trip from Anchorage in two days. Three, if you’re dawdling. Drive to Paxon, spend the night. Drive over the highway the next day and explore the area around Denali Park. Stay the night and take the tour bus into the park next day, at least as far as the Eilson Center.
A tip for you: Buy a copy of the Alaska Milepost, even if you’re not driving the Alcan. It’s a mile-by-mile guide of all of Alaska’s roads and byways. It’s available online.
When we planned to do the Denali Highway, we stopped by this store somewhere between Palmer and Glennallen. They guy operated a general store/salvage operation. He told us that it was a bad idea to drive the Denali, that we probably would not make more than 15mph, and to expect a 10-12 hour drive. Also, he had recently had to pull someone’s vehicle from off the road, and it had cost them a lot of money.
Then, at a store in Glennallen, a local told us, “You’ll be OK. Just take it kinda slow and use some common sense, and it’s not that bad.”
Well, the weather took that decision away from us, so we ended up doing the big loop to Fairbanks. So. . . would it have been as bad as the first guy led us to believe? I knew that the road wasn’t great, but we thought we might make as much as 30 mph, and had counted on a six-hour trip max on the Denali.
I’ve driven that road probably ten times in the past 12 years – in a motorhome. Does that tell you anything about guy #1? It’s a slow drive, for sure: I think we averaged about 25-30 mph with the motorhome. It’s foolish to go any faster, as it’s narrow and bumpy, unless you don’t care about the vehicle you’re driving and don’t mind changing a flat tire. Six hours is probably about right, depending on how often you stop to photograph the jaw-dropping scenery and fish for grayling in the streams. We used to drive up from Anchorage on the first day and pick blueberries at the campground just past the end of the pavement. On the second day, we either drove the rest of the way to Denali Park or camped at Brushkana Creek, depending on the aforementioned factors.
And people who feel they have a need (or a right) to drive offroad in a National Park deserve every misery that arrives on their doorsteps.
All right - the plans are firming up (and it looks like our marriage may even stay intact thru August!) My big current question concerns Denali vs Talkeetna. We are planning on taking the train up towards Denali Park from Anchorage and staying in a lodge for 3 nights. I believe we were looking at the Denali or McKinley Princess lodges.
We’ve had people recommend Talkeetna instead of Denali, but I’m not readily finding great info to compare them. Basically what we would want is ready access to day hiking. Thoughts?
We decided on one of those 4 night cruises of Prince William Sound. Just really appealed to kick back and let someone else do the driving and all. And we’re going to splurge and do one of those bear-watching fly-trips.
So we’ve got a couple of days left in and around Anchorage. I have a SIL in Eagle River, so we might just stay in a B&B around there and explore Chugach and the area. Or we could rent a car and head down towards Seward/Homer. But I’m not sure I want to do that amount of driving in the time we have.
One thing we’ve learned about how we like to travel is that we prefer to miss some big things, rather than rushing around and trying to see everything. And we also like to be able to spend the money to be comfortable, which kinda limits your alternatives.
Denali Princess sits up on a hill and is more than a hike from the park. You could catch a shuttle to the park center, then pay to take one of the tour buses into the park. They will drop you off anyplace you like and you can hike to your heart’s content. Then catch one of the buses either continuing on or returning to the center, if you haven’t been eaten by a grizzly.
If you stay in the Talkeetna hotel, specify a room that faces Denali. If it’s a clear day, you have a great view from your room. Talkeetna is mainly tourist stores with not much in the way of hiking, but it’s quaint in a boozy, fuck-you sort of way. Three nights, though? Nah. You’ll be bored to death.
Too bad you don’t have a bit more time to stay in the North Face Lodge deep inside the park. Great place.
I know you’re probably not looking to visit other countries while you’re there, but I have it on good authority that, if you stand on your tiptoes while looking West, you can see Russia. So there’s a fun morningtime after-coffee activity. Economical too!
We’re going north in August, too, but I think we’ve pretty much decided to go east to Yellowknife instead of west to Alaska. Too bad; we could have met up and hoisted a few in Anchorage.
We used to drive up from Anchorage on the first day and pick blueberries at the campground just past the end of the pavement. On the second day, we either drove the rest of the way to Denali Park or camped at Brushkana Creek, depending on the aforementioned factors.