Day 5: Denali-Talkeetna-Anchorage
On your way back to Anchorage, make a stopover in Talkeetna. We can’t get enough of this charming town. We can live here!
Highlights
- Go flightseeing and glacier landing, booked through K2 Aviation. It was an awesome way of flying close to Denali, see the Great Gorge, Moose’s Tooth, and Broken Tooth, and actually land on Ruth Glacier.
- Eat at Twister Creek Restaurant, owned by Denali BrewPub in Talkeetna. We ordered The Auletian, which is grilled salmon with black seasonings.
- Eat at Wake and Shake in Talkeetna for handmade ice cream.
- Stay in My Place Hotel, which is really a great value.
Day 6: Anchorage-Whittier
A must-do in Alaska is to take a glacier cruise to see glaciers upfront. Instead of going on and being stuck in a huge cruise ship, just do a day cruise. These are the main options: Kenai Fjords if your priority is to see wildlife, Juneau where they guarantee whale sightings, Tracy Arm for dramatic landscapes, Hubbard Glacier for large vistas and icebergs, Glacier Bay for lots of glaciers, or Prince William Sound for lots of glaciers and tight fjords.
We chose Prince William Sound in Whittier because the waters are the calmest here and it has the largest concentration of glaciers (after all, it’s a glacier cruise, so we wanted to see lots of them).
Highlights
- Ride the 26 Glaciers Cruise of Phillips Cruises, an industry pioneer that guarantees no seasickness (a big selling point for us). We saw literally 26 glaciers plus fjords, including Surprise Glacier, Barry Arm, and College Fjord, in this five-hour tour on a catamaran across 140 miles of Prince William Sound. Unlike big cruise ships, this tour took us really close to the glaciers. We saw a glimpse of a spouting whale, a chill sea otter, and thousands of kittiwake birds.
- Eat at packed Moose’s Tooth Pub & Pizzeria again, just because it is so good.
