Gulf of Alaska

[Texan11285]

Scratched this off the bucket list. Went out September 4th with J-Dock charters in Seward Alaska. We flew in to Anchorage August 31st and spent a couple of days there. Then got on the Alaska Railroad train into Seward. Breathtaking scenery. Spent a couple of days there. I was supposed to take a helicopter ride up to the mountain for a dog mushing expedition but fog rolled in and had to be cancelled.
Those 3 young fellas, Zach, Isaac and Ben worked their tails off to get us on fish. There were 12 of us and met some great guys from all over the U.S. I caught one halibut, two silver salmon, three rockfish and an undersized lingcod. Seas were smooth and it was a beautiful day. Got my fish processed and shipped to my son's house before I even got back.
We got on a cruise boat in Seward the day after my fishing trip and and did the Inside Passage and had a great time with awesome weather in Juneau, Skagway, Icy Strait Point and Ketchikan. Took a couple of excursions and saw black and brown bears. Black bear out cruising the shoreline by the Hubbard Glacier which was an awesome sight. Seals, eagles, blacktail deer and a couple of moose. My wife got to video a whale right outside the balcony of our room on the boat while we were docked. Weather was cloudy most days but didn't rain, just had a slight drizzle one day. Temps were between 50-60 degrees. I'm ready to go back.

 

[Iroquois]

Awesome trip! Glad you had a great experience and decent weather.

 

[Griff2694]

Sounds like a great trip. Would love to get more details regarding the train, the cruise and fishing charter if you dont mind. My wife hasnt been to Alaska and wants to go. She wont do the fishing that would be for me but the train and cruise she would love.

 

[PossumSlayer]

Cool!

 

[TNlandowner]

Sounds like a great trip. Would love to get more details regarding the train, the cruise and fishing charter if you dont mind. My wife hasnt been to Alaska and wants to go. She wont do the fishing that would be for me but the train and cruise she would love.

Same request and reason. My wife really wants to go on an Alaskan cruise with an opportunity to view the northern lights.

 

[thirdwilliam]

buck l;ist here. Congrats

 

[Texan11285]

This was my retirement trip. I really want to go to have a better chance at seeing the Northern Lights but the best way is closer to winter and going inland to Fairbanks. My wife is too cold natured. I sat at our airbnb drinking my coffee staring out the big picture window but didn't catch a glimpse.
We had went back and forth about getting on a boat in Seattle and gong up and then coming back down. But we wanted to go inland so we decided to fly into Anchorage and and get on the boat in Seward. Anchorage is a neat airport.
This cruise gets full quick. We were going 2024 but it was booked full. Celebrity Cruise Lines and it was a smaller boat just held 2,000. Which is fine by me. So we got an early start to make sure we got it this year. It is called The Inside Passage because you stay in between the south east panhandle of Alaska. This was the last trip for the cruise ship because everything is already shutting down for winter. JDock was going to stop shipping fish on September 10th. Talking to folks some say it's best to wait for the end of season but prime time for fishing is July-August. The previous week they had fished in what they called "9' rollers" One fella was headed to Anchorage after fishing and going out to the tundra for a 16 day moose, grizzly bear hunt.
The Alaska Railroad was awesome. when my wife booked she was asked where she wanted the seats. She told them close to the front. Well, we wound up on the first car on the front row. I can't explain the awe I felt at the mountains, glaciers and just wild beauty. At Skagway they have a train trip up to Canada. One of the guys i talked too really enjoyed it because they saw a lot of the old trails from the goldrush.
We kept waiting for the weather to get bad but it was nice. At Icy Strait Point One of the natives told us it was going to start raining there and they were expecting 4-7". That the whole Panhandle was going to get rain. That was our second to the last stop. We left and the next day was beautiful as we rolled into our last stop, Ketchikan. Didn't do an excursion there so I hung out with my wife and oldest son. Watched some seals eating salmon in town. Clouded up some but no rain. That was thursday nite and we were going to get to Vancouver to disembark the boat at 8am Friday. The Captain did a nightly report on how all was going and he told us that we were one day ahead of some real bad rough weather. That some of the other cruise ships didn't get to get in to see the glacier. Got to Vancouver and it was 60 degrees.
I want to go back again to fish and try to catch those lights. Sorry for the long post. Any more questions, shoot me a DM. Joel

Sounds like a great trip. Would love to get more details regarding the train, the cruise and fishing charter if you dont mind. My wife hasnt been to Alaska and wants to go. She wont do the fishing that would be for me but the train and cruise she would love.

 

[MFDfire15]

Sounds like an amazing trip and you can't beat the name of the boat. lol

 

[Texan11285]

Sounds like an amazing trip and you can't beat the name of the boat. lol

It did get a chuckle from us old farts in the boat. But those boys worked none stop.

 

[GUNNERX2]

I really enjoyed Alaska. We flew into Anchorage for a convention and several activities were arranged by the convention committee. One was a tour of the Gulf of Alaska on a tour boat that was kind of unusual. It looked like a normal boat but as it picked up speed, the boat came up on plane on "skies". We saw a lot of wildlife up on the mountains...mountain goats, grizzly and black bears. We had taken the train from Anchorage to Seward and on the way back, had dinner on the train. The conductor explained that the train was used by hikers and hunters to get back to civilization. They would just stand by the tracks and the train would stop to pick them up.
They had a 5.3 earthquake while we were there. We were on the 16th floor of the Capt. Cook hotel and it was strong enough to slosh water out of the toilet bowl. There were quite a few very nice gun stores in Anchorage with some very, very nice guns.
I'd go back in a heartbeat.

 

[Shanman]

Had a different crew but went out on that same boat before, glad you got to experience it .

 

[DoubleRidge]

Sounds like a great trip! Hope to make it to Alaska someday.