Kenai Fjords
With the only road access limited to a single road-end glacier area, vast Kenai Fjords National Park is best visited by boat.
Link to Kenai Fjords Map (use your browser's back button to return). We marked up the map with notations from one of our early trips.
Kenai Fjords National Park encompasses most of the coastal area to the west of Resurrection Bay. The west headland of Resurrection Bay, Aialik Cape, is itself a 3-1/2 hour trip out of Seward on the Forget Me Knot. Once we round the Cape, we leave most of the boats behind.
Some of the waters in this direction are exposed to weather and swell so we are watchful of marine weather forecasts. Aialik itself is notorious for confused seas caused by intersecting currents and tidal flow. We have had some rough and exhilarating rides around the Cape but the country is so remarkable we never regret the journey. In unpleasant weather, we give Aialik a two or three mile margin. We are also very aware of our status as beginning mariners and so we are conservative in deciding whether or not to travel across exposed waters. Call us chicken if you will but we want this to be fun, not scary!
Kenai Fjords has good fishing for halibut, rockfish and, seasonally, silver salmon. Whale watching can be great, especially early in the summer.
Kenai Fjords coastline is rough and rocky. The shore is often so steep that it can be difficult to get Buzz to shore, even in a sheltered peaceful anchorage. It is truly wild country and rivals Prince William Sound with its rugged beauty. Glaciers abound. In fact, many of the summer day cruise boats operating out of Seward take their load of 100 or so passengers around Aialik to view Holgate Glacier and continue further out to the Chiswell Islands to see bird and sea lion rookeries. We used to recommend to our summer visitors that they take such a cruise as it is always a highlight. Now we can and do go there ourselves.
The various Kenai Fjords destinations lend themselves to anything from an overnight trip to a week long adventure.
Here are some links to our cruising in Kenai Fjords: In 2004 we did take a great two day trip to Nuka Bay - 2004.
Here are some gorgeous full screen photos of Harris Bay/Northwestern Fjord from Labor Day, 2006
Here are some pictures from 2003 but be sure to hit the links above for considerable more content.
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Jenny Celebrates - Hiking above Northwestern Fjord
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At Anchor - Far SW corner Northwestern Fjord
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Verdant Cove, west side of Aialik Bay
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At anchor in Taz Basin, Granite Island
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Yeah, that's rain on the lens
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Jon and Susie at the helm
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Hiking can be a challenge
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Sarah and Ben hone their rowing skills
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The Chiswell Islands sit out in front of this area and are an absolutely wonderful area to explore. Unfortunately we have done a poor job thus far taking pictures there but here's one from 2005
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