Reminiscing: AK 2001

Our upcoming trip to Alaska will be our fourth time in the 49th state ... but our first time doing a road trip in our RV.

As we’re working on our trip plans, we’re also taking time out to reminisce about our various trips to Alaska. In this footprint, I’m going to go back to 2001 ... our first trip to Alaska ... the one during which we fell in love with the state that some refer to as the “Last Frontier.”

It was 6 June when we flew up to Anchorage for a cruise tour ... plus a couple of days on our own based out of the state’s most populous city ... all told, 17 days.

Why a cruise tour? Because we wanted to go all the way up the state to the Arctic shore and Mui did not want to drive. No sirree. He wanted to be able to focus on the beauty that we expected would surround us in every direction.

We weren’t disappointed. Not only was there spectacular landscape all around us, but we lucked out with spectacular weather as well. It’s been 20 years, and my memory could be faulty, but the only rain I recall was the one that soaked us to the skin as we wandered along the Married Man’s Trail in Ketchikan.

ON OUR OWN ...

During the three days we had in Anchorage, we spent very little time in the city, focusing instead on day trips that took us into nearby environs.

We made fond and everlasting memories galore. Driving down Turnagain Arm and going through the tunnel to Whittier for a glacier tour; making friends with Hugo, an orphaned grizzly bear cub and other critters at the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center; watching black bears in the wild ... tumbling down snow-covered slopes; spying a pair of moose feeding in Potter Marsh; visiting ice-age mammals at the Musk Ox Farm; being charmed by the haunting Spirit Houses in Eklutna; flightseeing over the Kenai Peninsula and the Harding Ice Field aboard a historic plane ... a DC-3.

Not that we didn’t make fond and everlasting memories galore in Anchorage, too. Dining on fresh halibut and Copper River salmon; viewing documentary movies at the AK Public Lands Information Center to get a visual-taste of what Alaska has to offer; watching float planes landing and taking off at Lake Hood; strolling to Resolution Park at midnight ... in search of a sunset that just wasn’t going to happen this close to the Solstice; saying good morning to people we met on the streets because it was so bright and light at 11:00p; experiencing — virtually — the dancing lights of the Aurora through a slide presentation set to hauntingly beautiful music.

BY TRAIN ... BY BUS ... BY PLANE ...

Once we joined the land portion of our Princess cruise tour, we headed north and kept going. First, we were transported to Denali National Park on the Midnight Sun Train.

We made fond and everlasting memories galore. Chopper-seeing and landing on Yanert Glacier; visiting the kennels of Jeff King, an Iditarod champion; taking a brief drive into Denali National Park and seeing moose on the run, grizzly bears laying about, and Dall sheep scampering in the hills; Denali — then Mt McKinley — throwing off its usual cloak of clouds to share its wondrous beauty with us for an entire day.

From Denali, we continued by train onto Fairbanks where we had a chance to learn about the Trans-Alaska Pipeline, pan for gold and do a boat trip ... on the Riverboat Discovery. All very touristy ... but fun, too.

Next ... a two-day bus ride up the only road reaching into the far north ... the Haul Road ... aka the Dalton Highway. What could have been a boring drive turned out to be a wonderful experience … with the Trans-Alaska Pipeline a constant companion. Even with the blow-out that shredded one of the tires of the bus, it was an amazing drive. (Luckily, the tire was on a tag axle that could be raised up so we could continue on our way.)

We made fond and everlasting memories galore. Spotting wildlife ... lynx (three of them right next to the road), grizzly bear sow with her cubs, musk oxen, caribou, golden eagle perched on the pipeline ... and more; having picnic lunches in out-of-the-way spots known only to our driver ... where we put our cans of soft drinks in the icy meltwater coming off a glacier; overnighting at an ATCO-unit “motel” in Coldfoot, the northernmost truck stop in the world, and having an amazing salmon dinner with truckers hauling provisions; overnighting at the oilfield camp in Deadhorse. Got to love those names!

After a tour of the Prudhoe Bay Oil Fields — with a chance to dip our fingers and toes in the Arctic Ocean — we flew back to Anchorage on an Alaska Airlines plane.

We made fond and everlasting memories galore. Checking in for our flight while standing on the frozen tundra at the oilfield camp in Deadhorse and watching our luggage being piled into the bucket of a front-end loader for the transfer to the airport; take-off being delayed due to a bear on the tarmac; the pilot flying a wide circle around Mt McKinley ... not once but twice, because the great mountain was once again out in its full glory.

SEWARD TO VANCOUVER BY SEA ...

And then it was time for our cruise ... but to get to the Dawn Princess, which was awaiting us in Seward, first we had to take a ride on the train.

We made fond and everlasting memories galore. Beautiful views along Turnagain Arm ... eagles on the mud flats; a black bear by the train tracks ... for which the train stopped so everyone could take photos; jaw-dropping mountain scenery once the train deviated from the route along Turnagain Arm; Spencer Glacier glistening under the sun a mere 1.2 km from the train tracks; the train pulling right up alongside Dawn Princess in Seward.

Tearing up to the strains of Andrea Bocelli’s “It’s Time to Say Goodbye” as Dawn Princess set sail from Seward, we knew we had each left a bit of our heart in Alaska.

Our cruise was an amazing experience in and of itself ... our first real cruise ... all the more exciting.

We made fond and everlasting memories galore. Having breakfast on our veranda as Bryn Mawr, Harvard, Wellesley, Vassar, Yale — glaciers named for colleges — slid by the ship in aptly named College Fjord; standing in awe of Margerie Glacier from a secluded spot on the ship ... munching on croissants and sipping hot tea; seals rafting by on ice floes; eagles flying overhead; whales fin slapping in greeting; listening to the snap-crackle-and-pop of the ice riddling the channels of Glacier Bay. We were, at that moment, truly bitten by the “ice virus” that would eventually lead to many a polar adventure.

More adventures awaited us in Southeast Alaska ... Skagway, Juneau, Ketchikan.

We made fond and everlasting memories galore. A streetcar tour; a train trip into the state’s gold stampede history on the Yukon & Whitehorse Railway; a cruise through Lynn Canal. A whale watching tour that brought us into close proximity with the gentle giants of the oceans; quiet time meditating in front of Mendenhall Glacier. Eagles and salmon runs; totem poles of yesteryear; rain, rain, and more rain on the Married Man’s Trail to the once-infamous Creek Street; boat ride into the swirling mists of Misty Fjord; orcas playing all around the boat; taking a floatplane back to Dawn Princess awaiting us in port.

Simply put ... just amazing. The whole trip was spectacular. We loved it all. This was no longer a once-in-a-lifetime trip. We would have to return to explore more of Alaska.

Who knew then that it would take us nine years to do so. But that story is for another time ... another footprint.

(Yes, we have both photos and videos from this adventure. But this trip being our first foray into the world of digital photography and videography, we have nothing uploaded that is shareable.)Read more