Planning Alaska Trip for august. 2 senior sitizens (75), 45 and 18 yr old. So far budgeted 8 days. Here is my wish list:
Day 1: Fly to Anchorage
Day 2,3enali - optional
Day 4: Girdwood- Tram, Winner Trail, Dog sled on Glacier (what is the best co. to use?)
Day 5,6,7: Seward - Kayak trip 1/2 day (need operator),Kenai Fjords NP cruise all day with Renown, Alaska wild Life Conservation Center,
Day 8: Need HELP - would like to go on fishing/bear watching combination trip, Prince William Sound kayaking, snorkeling, rafting.

Is there anything to do in Homer other than bear watching (very expensive $575pp)?
Is it better to stay centrally in Cooper Landing or Moose Pass? or move around?
Since we will be visiting NP and do other activities is the trip to Denali really needed?
This will be my parents only trip to Alaska, and I would like it to be inclusive but not overwhelming (they are 75 yrs old).
Please HELP. Thanks in advance.

We went to Alaska last summer and drove around in a RV for 2.5 weeks. Denali is a great national park but it was really not a highlight of our trip. We took the bus tour to the very end of the road, and we hiked around on our second day. There is so much natural beauty everywhere in Alaska. I don't think you would miss anything by skipping Denali. I think Denali gets its reputation as a "must do" from the hordes of cruise ship passengers whose only "inland" Alaska experience is Denali.
In Denali, we saw wildlife (and we saw 4 of the Big 5) from a distance (even with the use of binoculars). We saw more wildlife up close on the side of roads while driving around the state.
The bear tour out of Homer was the highlight of our trip. Yes, it's expensive but it's really a once in a lifetime kind of experience. (Perhaps we were not so enchanted with Denali because we did it after bear viewing).

In my opinion Denali is a must and different from you other options. If you are going end of August you should see a lot of bears they are on the side of the park road eating berries as they are fattening up for winter. You can go white water rafting there.

Keep in find that the prices drop about 50% for hotels rooms after about the 16th (check) of August.

There is not a lot to do in Homer.

I don't think you want to be in Homer on day 8 if that's when you have to be driving back to the airport. It's about 5 hours from Anchorage. I loved the Pratt Museum in Homer. You'll see lots of eagles. I would pack more into activities around Anchorage (like Independence Mine) and south rather than spending the driving time to Denali. You'd be on the road most of two days getting there and getting back to Anchorage/Girdwood. The drive isn't anywhere near as scenic as the drive south of Anchorage to Seward. Because of distances, you'll want to move around. Keep in mind that the 2-3 hour drive to Seward could take up a whole day if you also stop at the tram in Girdwood etc. Your parents might enjoy walking around Seward. It's a small town.

there is not a lot to do in Homer.

Wow, haven't heard that one before.

There's plenty there -- although I don;t know if it makes sense for the OP on this schedule.

Of course, there's the Pratt Museum, which is very nice.

http://www.prattmuseum.org/

There's tidal pool exploring.

There's the ferry over to Halibut Cove for a great meal and art gallery featuring octopus ink art. Or a trip to Seldovia.

There's whale watching (Seward is better) and halibut and salmon fishing.

http://www.homeralaska.org/

Also disagree that Denali is gets its reputation from "hordes of cruise ship passengers whose only "inland" Alaska experience is Denali."

For many residents (including me when I lived there), it was a great place to visit from time to time. Other than an expensive fly-in or lodge-based bear viewing, it was and is the most reliable viewing area for the widest variety of wildlife.

You could see more wildlife there than on some remote floats ... because of hunting restrictions in the park.

Sounds like padams was a bit unlucky there -- as well as being fortunate to do a bear viewing. Side of the road grizzly sitings are fairly common and its also your best bet for close up caribou and occasionally wolves. Many visitors will get better views of moose and sheep elsewhere, but overall Denali is tough to beat.

Other suggestions: Consider a silver salmon trip for your fishing excursion -- or an upper Kenai River fishing float. Silver salmon (coho) are tremendously fun to catch, especially in the saltwater. Add a flightseeing trip out of Talkeetna on Day 2 -- en route to Denali.

This is virtually the same trip we took this past summer. We used Alpine Air. www.alpineairalaska.com

We found the dog sledding to be a really good experience. The helicopter ride up is outstanding. It is as good as a ride into the Grand Canyon if you have experience that. Dario is an Ididarod sledder. He has his dogs along with two other dog teams from other owners. They stay on the glacier to train all summer and stay in shape, similar to an athlete in the off season. When the dogs are hooked up they get really excited and ready to run. You are on a huge isolated snow covered glacier miles from anything. Dario lives on this glacier for 4 months out of the year with no running water, or electric. They haul everything out by helicopter. Even the dog poop, of which we didn't see any. Which is pretty remarkable, considering there was about 70 dogs there. Dario is on the Travel Channel. He is on the episode of the wierd eats in Alaska. The one with fish fat ice cream. It is expensive, but worth it. The dog sledding will even be fine for your 75 year olds to do. It is a little bouncy, but if they don't want to go a long way on it,I am sure he would cut it short. He just takes you around the glacier for a mile or two. You can stand up or sit down. We tried it both ways.

Alyeska is very fun. Be sure and ride the tram to the top for at least at bowl of Salmon Chowder for Lunch. We did the Glacier hike on the top with a guide, and it was probably our least interesting thing we did in Alaska. I am still glad we did it. The crossing of Winner Creek on the hand car is really cool. Unique. If you are adventurous, try parasailing off the mountain in Alyeska.

We used www.kayakak.com for kayaking in Seward. Our guide (Wolfy was his name) took us on a cool short hike to a waterfall as well. We took the midnight sun tour. It was 3 or 4 hours long. This might be strenuous for 75 year olds unless they are in very good shape.

You might want to spend 1-2 hours at Sealife Center. You might want to hike to Exit Glacier. Do take bear spray on this hike and be sure and hike in groups. I would guess that odds are pretty high in seeing black bears here. We did tour with Renown and really enjoyed it. I think they have the best tour, the food is weak. You might want to take a little snack of your own, because there snack isn't much.

We did a flyout/fishing/bearviewing from Soldotna. Very scenic HWY from Seward to Soldotna. It was cool to take a floatplane and land in the water. We saw a couple of grizzlies from a long distance. We saw 15-20 bears eating salmon within 20 feet of our boat. I have never seen so many fish. Literally thousands of sockeye salmon. You could catch your limit in 30 minutes pretty easily. We saw numerous bald eagles as well.

One thing that we really enjoyed that you don't have mentioned here is a train ride from Anchorage to Seward(can be done in reverse also). You can rent a car from Hertz in Seward. We really enjoyed the train ride. We drove the Seward HWY down and took the train back. This way we got to experience both routes. They are similar, but still very different views along the way. It is my understanding that this is the most scenic of train rides in Alaska. It is about 4 hours. You can sit in the Dome Cars, have dinner, drinks or hot tea at the bar, or even shop at the gift shop car.

Alyeska resort had very good blinds on there windows, so we were able to sleep even though the sun never really went down. Everywhere else we stayed at had poor shades, and it was hard to sleep.

Also, before you go snorkeling in Prince William Sound, IT IS EXTREMELY COLD WATER, I don't care how thick or what kind of wet/dry suit you might use. I would be scared a 75 year old might have permanent shrinkage that no Viagra could ever fix. LOL. Have fun, Alaska is truly a wilderness and very very very scenic. Your entire age spectrum will enjoy it.

Thaks all for your responses. Spirobulldog, which operator did you use out of Soldotna to go flyout/fishing/bearviewing? If you do trips out of Soldotna, where did you stay that night? What would be the most efficient sequence of travel and stays?

Spirodog,

I have been waiting for someone to give details of the glacier dogsledding. I appreciate your comments with all the details. We are going to try to put this into our schedule.

Did you have to schedule it ahead of time?

There is another place to do dogsledding, similar to that in Girdwood. It is in Seward and is Godwin Glacier dogsledding. I looked into it and you can also spend the night there on the glacier with the dogs. I can imagine that it would be hard to sleep on a snow-covered glacier where the sun never sets, with 50 dogs howling and barking. We elected to go with Alpine Air in Girdwood. I think both of them would be good. We were very pleased with Alpine Air and Dario. Strangely, Dario's lead dog is named Godwin.

We used www.highadventureair.com for our fishing/bear viewing.
The person that I spoke with told me that he doesn't guarantee bear sightings, or catching fish. It would have been very hard not to catch fish. They were there by the thousands. You could see more fish per square foot than water. He said they see bears on probably 98% of their trips at the time of year we went. We saw 15-20 bears. I don't know if some of them we were seeing over again or not. The most that was at the mouth of the small creek where we at one time was 5. Lots of eagles and a couple of nests. I suspect that in August you would be at a different salmon run than where we were at. The type of fish and location changes a little bit every couple of weeks. However, where the fish are, is usually where the bears are also. High Adventure takes off from a small lake about 3 miles from Soldotna. Taking off and landing in water is unique experience. It was a very very smooth flight in a 50 year old plane. The instrument panel looked less complicated than my lawn mower.

We stayed one night @ B&B. It was about a mile away from High Adventure Air. The name of the B&B was Spurrview. www.spurrviewhouse.com

It was new home. We only stayed for one night, but should have stayed for two. We didn't have time to enjoy there full breakfast as we were in a hurry to get to an early flyout fishing. The place houses the owners downstairs and 3 bedrooms upstairs. I think there were 2 or 3 baths upstairs as well. Very new, very clean, very nice. The wife looked like she new what she was doing in her posh kitchen. They will also serve you an evening meal with prearrangements.


we traveled in this order. Anchorage,Girdwood, Soldotna, Seward. At Seward we dropped of the rental car on the last day and returned to Anchorage on the train. You arrive in Anchorage about 10:00pm. Our plane departed at 1:00am that night/early next morning. It is easy to get from Hertz to train in Seward and is easy to get from Depot in Anchorage to Airport.

And yes, I would schedule anything as early as possible in advance.

By the way, a lot of people just fish in the Kenai River.

You might consider a river float trip somewhere along the way also. Alaska is just so scenic, wild, and raw.

Re: Homer
Check out the Center for Alaskan Coastal Studies. My family and I went on their guided natural history tour during the low tide and we had the best time.