Kenai Fjords National Park & Seward, Alaska

We spent the week of July 4th in the coastal town of Seward and loved it! Like most of the small towns we’ve been to in Alaska, the campgrounds and RV Parks are in prime locations and at the center of all the action. In Seward, the waterfront land along Resurrection Bay isn’t strong enough for building, so the town has a row of municipal campgrounds and a nice walking path connecting them all. At $45 per night for parking lot-style dry camping, it’s not cheap, but what a view!! We were about 30ft from the water at high tide and it was one of the best views we’ve ever had right from our campsite.

We happened to be there for the town’s busiest week of the year when it swells from 3000 to 30,000 people for the Mount Marathon race. It’s a 5K to the top of the mountain in the photo below on the right. We caught the end of the women’s race and they looked like they were in a lot of pain.

We were there because Michael had some time off work and we knew we’d use it to explore Kenai Fjords National Park. Now one of our favorites, it contains rainforest and ice-covered mountains, fjords, tidal glaciers, and abundant wildlife. And for Alaska standards, it’s one of the easiest to visit.

We took an 8-hour boat tour with Kenai Fjords Tours to the Northwest Glacier.

We saw a couple of transient orcas (left) and some Dall’s porpoises (right) that were too stealthy for good photos.

Near the glacier, we saw tons of harbor seals, and birdwatchers on the boat were excited to see Kittlitz’s murrelets.

We briefly saw a fin whale. But, like in Valdez, the humpbacks stole the show. We witnessed lobtailing, where the whale repeatedly slaps its tail on the water to scare fish into moving around.

And, we saw a group of 3 humpbacks attempt to bubble net feed. This cooperative feeding style involves synchronized swimming and blowing bubbles to stir the fish up to the surface. The green water in the photos below indicates that they are doing this. Unfortunately, they never opened their mouths to feed so I don’t think it was working that well and they gave up.

Besides touring the fjords, the Harding Icefield is the other accessible part of the national park we wanted to see. The trail had just opened for the season the day before and still had some steep snowy sections. We saw a bear family, marmots, and Exit Glacier on our climb to the Icefield.

The views at the top were stunning and unlike anything we’d seen before.

Next up, we spend a rainy week boondocking in the Chugach National Forest.