Alaska Wilderness 2021 — Carol & Scott On The Road

Our goal with our visit to Alaska was to get “off the grid”, and experience and enjoy the wilderness of Alaska. By staying at the two lodges run by “Within the Wild” we certainly accomplished this objective! After flying into Anchorage, we took a small float plane to Winterlake Lodge. This lodge is northwest of Anchorage and just south of Denali. There are no roads, cell service or electricity on demand (electricity was available certain hours by generator). All supplies need to be flown in by the periodic floats planes that bring guests to the 20-person capacity lodge. The staff does an amazing job providing comfort given the isolation of the location.

While staying at Winterlake Lodge, we hiked both local trails and took several helicopter rides to access hiking at 3 different mountain ridges and a glacier. We spent the day hiking and enjoying a packed lunch provided by the lodge cooking staff. In addition, the famous Iditarod Trail Sled Dog Race (1,000 miles - Nome to Anchorage) runs through the property in early March. The lodge has sled dogs at a private glacier camp and guests can choose to drive a sled (musher) on the glacier as one of their activities.

After 3 days at Winterlake, we took another float plane to the second lodge located in Tutka Bay, which is just about 10 miles from Homer, across Kachemak Bay. Tutka Bay Lodge is not as remote at Winterlake Lodge but is still located in a private area along the coast of this beautiful bay. Our stay at Tutka Bay included hiking local trails, and hiking the nearby Grace Ridge point-to-point Trail, which was accessed by boat. A highlight of our stay at Tutka Bay was our day trip on a bush plane to Katmai National Park to view the brown bears. This park allows skilled guides to get their guests within “uncomfortable” proximity to the many bears that occupy this park. In fact, during one encounter we were within 8 feet of a bear making aggressive moves toward our group. Fortunately, the guides were skilled at deterring the bear from making us his next snack. During the day, the guides shared with us many insights about the brown bears. For example, during this time of year, bears typically eat 50 lbs of food per day, so they can gain the needed weight for hibernation at the end of the season.

We were fortunate to have wonderful weather for most of the trip. We had no rain or strong winds, and our only complaint could be a few days had a smokey haze in the sky. There we no major fires in Alaska, so it was most likely the large ongoing fires in Siberia, Russia.

Our time in Alaska just flew by, so we are already planning for a return visit to other areas in the wilderness of Alaska!