TALKEETNA FLIGHTSEEING
 

we are planning our trip for June- July and would like opinions on the flightseeing tours and whether or not we should include a glacier landing. Please let me know your experiences.

I'm interested to see the responses you get as I'm booking one now too for July. I did ask my Inn owner for recommdations and was told to look at these three: The ones recommended to me were:
Talkeetna Aero services, Timberline aviation or Denali Air.

Good luck.

went several years ago. did not land on glacier and i had no plans to circle mckinley but when the rest of the group i was with wanted to go, well, i didn't want to sit and wait at the airfield.... LOVED IT. even just seeing it all from the air, we flew over summer camp for the hikers heading up the mountain. this also showed how vast alaska is, from the ground you don't see beyond the first mountain range or ice field!

A lot of my guests go flightseeing from Talkeetna, and I recommend it highly, THE #1 thing I recommend to do. Probably 30% do the glacier landing. They say it was so worth it and they can't imagine not having done it. Then the other 70% say the trip was so perfect (the 1 or 1.5 hr loop around Denali) that they can't imagine it being any better even if they did stop on the glacier...So I guess, if it's calling to you, do it, if not, you'll be wowed either way! I've gone up with most of the outfits, Talkeetna Air Taxi, Talkeetna Aero, Hudson, and maybe one other. They are all very safety-conscious and provide good "entertainment" through narration and pointing out interesting things. My fave is Talkeetna Air Taxi.

My parents did the tour and landed on the glacier. They said it was the highlight of their trip.

Sadly,

I wanted to go but couldn't as my travel buddy didn't have the money.

Go for it!

I did the tour but did not do the glacier landing. Either would be a win-win choice.

The flight itself was absolutely amazing. A great memory of Alaska.

I have done a lot of flight seeing out of Talkeetna, including the ski planes with landings, Denali view flight seeing and summit flights. By far my clear preference are the summit flights, just spectacular for the vastness of McKinley. I have gone with Talkeetna Aero the most, but also K2 and Talkeetna Air Taxi.

Our group of 8 did a glacier landing with Talkeetna Air Taxi in early Jul.04, a most wonderful trip. Our pilot rated the day a 9 out of 10. It was very warm on the glacier and most of us were in shorts!The snow was in fact getting soft & the 2nd plane got stuck in the snow for a bit... I think we were up there for about a half hr. It was simply amazing. We chatted with folks who were up there camping on the glacier. Our photos were spectacular given the clear blue skies we had. Have to say I almost decided NOT to go & not sure I could do it again. It was very overwhelming to me to be zooming in & out among the peaks! Enjoyed it, but was on the edge of my seat the whole time.

Thanks alot everybody. I booked our flight with Talkeetna Aero.

I booked today with Talkeetna Aero Services. I learned that also operate the Fly Denali flights.

There were 4 flight options, you can add a landing to 3 of these options. They fly our of Talkeetna and Healy so if we have bad weather on the day we go through Talkeetna, I can go out of Healy 2 days later.

We went with the Circle Denali Tour (90 minutes) for $250 and added the landing (30 minutes) $75.

BTW, the tour saver coupon can NOT be used with the tour you add a landing too.

Geri was very helpful and informative. I hope to report back on a great flight.

Kristine