Alyeska, Alaska

So it turns out we're very charming people. So much so that the airbnb owners entrusted us with their vehicle so that we could take a trip down the coast! After cycling to Paul's (new friend) downtown yurt, we picked up our wheels for the next day.
We took a day to drive down the coast (Turnagain Arm) down to Portage, Girdwood and on to Seward. Our first stop was to take the cable car at Alyeska and we had our first bear encounter about 30 seconds after leaving the car... Walking down the road, about 500m from the large hotel complex, cars started pulling over and reversing towards us. Maddie's extensive experience in Canada last year ('when I was in Canada..') has trained her to spot a bear jam when she sees one.. But not so hot on what to do when on foot. Cowering behind a van we spotted 3 first year bear cubs - the man with the van happily snapping away and pointing out the mother 'just behind that bush in front of you'. After several seconds of dithering between 'aw how cute' and 'holy feck, we don't have an escape route', a kindly bus driver pulled up to tell us how dangerous a position we were in. Our panicked expressions made him take pity on us and let us on, although it might also have been Andy's foot in the door...
The rest of the trip was thankfully uneventful, although we nearly fell over a few times due to constant over-the-shoulder looking. Everywhere was SOLD OUT of bear spray due to unusual dangerous bear activity in the past few weeks. Very reassuring. But we managed to obtain some and resisted the urge to spray it at every squirrel we saw.Read more