In August we are traveling to Alaska for our anniversary.  We need your help.  Please hit reply and share your “Best of Alaska” story.  Mr. Terry was there about 45 years ago; this will be my first time.

I imagine Alaska as the  America’s “Serengeti”.  Impossibly beautiful scenery filled with untamed dark forests, vast green landscapes, snowy mountain peaks and blue glaciers.  We hope to see all things bear from a safe distance …grizzly, black and brown.  And, we will keep our eyes peeled for sightings of eagles, moose, Dall sheep, caribou, wolves and maybe a whale or two which will add to the mix of danger and beauty around every corner.

We begin by meeting friends, Dennis and Pat, the night before we board the Regent Explorer in Vancouver, Canada   I’ve packed each day of the cruise with excursions, including float planes into the back country, a bicycle tour of the rain forest near Skagway, a back country Jeep adventure near Hoonah and an ocean raft adventure near Anchorage. From an elevated platform, we hope to watch bears wading in the river to catch salmon.  No food is allowed on the hike since a hungry bear’s keen sense of smell will cause it to crash through the underbrush determined to eat a trail bar!

The cruise ends in Anchorage.  The day we disembark we meet Sam and Mark, friends who live in Alaska during the summer and go to the Alaska State Fair.  I’m making a beeline to see pumpkins as big as Volkswagen!  The next morning we fly to Fairbanks to visit with Mr. Terry’s cousin.  After our visit, we will join an air, train and land tour with Abercrombie & Kent.

A small plane will take us over the Brooks Range to a landing above the Arctic Circle; a clear dome train will transport us into Denali where we arrive at Talkeetna.  From the lodge we board another airplane to view the remote western end of Denali including the peaks of Denali, Mount Foraker and Mount Hunter.  Weather permitting, we will land on the slopes of Denali and walk a glacier!

The Seavey Family, Iditarod Champions, open their kennels to us for a visit with the huskies. We will travel from the kennels  to Girdwood at the base of Mount Alyeska and board a boat to cruise the Prince William Sound to watch for whale, sea lion, bald eagles and hopefully spy a calving glacier.

At the end of our tour we ride the Scenic Alyeska Tram from sea level to 2,300 feet for a hike.  Later that afternoon there is a visit to the Alaska Wildlife Conservation Center where native Alaskan species including bison, moose and grizzly are rehabilitated.  The following morning we travel from Whittier back to Anchorage for a couple days on our own before flying back to Phoenix and returning to Colorado.

There will be a few evenings we plan is to stay up past midnight until 2 a.m. to photograph the Aurora Borealis.  The solar winds generated by the eruptions on the sun’s surface cause both the Northern and Southern Aurora Borealis to appear.  The solar particles trapped in the thermosphere (Earth’s upper atmosphere layers) are the basis of the brilliant color displays.  Oxygen is green and red light, nitrogen glows blue and reddish-purple. Auroras can disrupt the Earth’s magnetic field resulting in a disruption of radio communications and can be seen as far south as Oregon.

Thanks in advance for sharing your stories; we look forward to reading your adventures!