Ah! Laska

Alaska and the Kenai Peninsula
July 22 through July 30th 2006

What a trip. Alaska has the greenest greens and the bluest blue’s I’ve ever seen. The adventure started off with Flynn, Elias, Katie, and myself driving 4 hours to Seattle to fly out of Sea-Tac. First we met up with Dominic, had just enough time to grab some amazing sandwiches at Smarty Pants. Dom dropped us off at the airport, we said our goodbyes and headed towards our gate, our flight was delayed two hours. After a couple overpriced drinks, including a gummi-worm gin gimlet, we headed out for The Great White North. The plane ride revealed that It wasn’t quite so white in July only spots of snow were seen on the tops of mountains from the plane.

When we landed at 10:30 p.m. it appeared to be about 6:30 p.m. according to the light outside. The sun was just starting to go down, only to rise again about 5 hours later. Juli and Scott welcomed us to their apartment with an air mattress, salmon dinner and a case of beer. That’s what friends are for.

Leisurely the next morning we took off for our first hiking/cabin adventure. An hour drive south took us to Chugach National forest. We parked our cars and began our 3-mile strenuous trek to Crow’s Pass. The all up-mountain trail took us past waterfalls, over rolling green hills, and on zigzagged paths. Just as the wind started blowing and the rain started falling, we turned a corner revealing a slanted green roof. We were there.

The cabin reminded me exactly of camp, back in the day with Darcie. Names were scrawled all over the walls. There was ample room in the cabin perhaps enough to sleep up to 10 people comfortably, we were only six with the occasional pass-by-hiker stopping to warm up. By the evening time the rain and wind had picked up considerably. We managed to keep warm with our friends Merlot and Jack Daniels. Scott on the other hand wasn’t quite as warm, he neglected to bring long pants, pj’s, and a sleeping bag. He made due with flynn’s pajamas (which became quite popular with all the boys that trip) and Juli’s generosity in sharing her sleeping bag.

The first night’s sleep was good except for the occasional wind interruption, at time’s I thought the roof of the cabin would be blown off. The entire cabin would howl and shake.

The rain and wind had died down by morning, allowing for small hikes and exploring the area. About a 20 min hike further up the pass we found the Crow Pass Glacier. This was the first one we were able to see up close. So close we could have walked right up to in, or even onto it (which is not a wise thing to do). Glaciers are something you need to see in person, the color and spectacular of them is something that cannot be captured in pictures. They are a very aqua/tourqoise bluish, looking almost glass-like.

We spent one more night at the Crow Pass Cabin, the night was filled with jokes and Catchphrase. The morning of Tuesday the 25th we headed back down the strenuous trail. We stopped for a bit at the old gold mine.

The next two nights we’re spent at the apartment in Anchorage. Lots of good food including pizza at the Moose’s Tooth. Wednesday we started the day off with breakfast at home and then the boys headed out for a 10 mile bike ride (all uphill) while us girls went shopping for food for the next few days of camping. Then we met the boys at the top of the hill, swapped bikes and cars and we girls rode the bikes the 10 miles back down the hill. The trail was great and followed the bay-front. The boys were lucky enough to spot a moose on their ride.

Later that evening we headed out to an out of season ski jump that over looked the entire city. It would be a perfect place to watch the sunset, but the park closed at 10:30 just an our shy of sunset.

Early Thursday morning we were awakened by a 3.4 earthquake with the epicenter being just 3 miles outside of Anchorage. After a bit more sleep, with breakfast in our bellies and some car swapping with Scott’s cousin, we started the 200 mile drive south to Homer. The drive was beautiful.

Once arriving at Homer Spit we were in search of Halibut and Chips. We found some for a mere $12, very tasty. Next we were off to meet up with Dwayne, Juli’s sister’s cousin’s uncle (or something along those genealogical lines). Dwayne and his wife Tony owned a halibut fishing boat and were kind enough to take us across the bay to where we had our next cabin rented. It was such an amazing boat ride. We were all in ah when we pulled into halibut cove where we would be spending our next few days.

After a .8 mile hike with our backpacks and our one additional item each, we were pleasantly surprised with our cabin. It had a sink, wood stove, padded bunk-beds!!!!! and a deck that led to the bay below. We quickly set up, Elias began chopping wood and Flynn made friends with some hermit crabs, starfish, an eel, and some fish in the bay. The evenings activities included dinner of Tortilla Soup, sitting on the deck yelling “bring me a bowl of wine!” and pointing out porpoises in the bay.

Up and at em, the next morning we picked up the cabin and headed to our next camp ground where we would be spending our first and only night in actual tents. Camp was set up quickly so we could being our day’s adventure. We formed a cheerleading squad in order to hang our food out of any bear’s reach, Elias was squad captain.

On the boat ride over Dwayne had showed us a small artisans town, we thought we’d head our hike in that direction and perhaps make it there by lunch time. We couldn’t have been more off. The trail started out great but after a few miles became very overgrown, particularly with stinging neddles and devil’s club. Elias used his pocket knife like a machete to “clear” the path. We reached a few bays and decided that the town had to be “just the next bay over” we were still wrong. We reached 3 bays never finding the town.

This is when things got interesting, after hiking over unmaintained trails, never reaching the town for lunch we were hungry tired, spread out on the trail and quiet. Not a good thing to be in bear country. Suddenly we hear Katie and Elias in the front, yell back “BEAR!” and as they say this we see a black bear running straight for us! All I see is a bear charging in my direction, while in reality it was just trying to get away from everyone. No one was hurt but our adrenaline at full capacity.

The rest of the hike out we made sure to stay vocal and keep the group together. The entire hike was 5 or 6 hours, we never made it to the town. Once back at our camp I could barely move, sat around and finally I went to bed around 9 p.m.

Saturday morning we had to wake up at 5:30 a.m. to meet Dwayne back at the dock by 6:30 because the bay we were in is only accessible during high tide. Tired and hungry we rode the much rougher ride back across the bay. We stopped for breakfast at a little organic cafe. They were known for their Ah! Laska Chocolate, needless to say, I had the best mocha I’ve ever drank accompanied by delicious french toast.

Four hours later, back in Anchorage. Our final night was filled with more Catchphrase and Smashed Bros. Our final day was spent running last minute errands and saying our goodbyes.

The flight back went quickly, watched Good Night, Good Luck, which was much better than Aquamarine on the flight over. We met Scott and Juli’s cousins at the airport to pick up some bags that we brought back for them. Dominic picked us up right on time. After a short visit with Dom and Tyson we headed back on the road for our three hour drive to Portland.

I finally made it back to my own bed on Monday night. Overall the trip was absolutely amazing. Without a doubt some one of the most beautiful parts of the states I’ve ever been to. I would recommend anyone visiting Alaska, just make sure to get out and do some hiking and camping, the town’s can be a bit blah.

What’s next? Ireland?