Tyler, Shizzo and I wanted to flex out back-country muscles by taking a trip to Alaska. It was…..awesome.

Getting there…..

On Friday Shizzo and I flew to Juneau where we met Tyler who had just flown from CT. After hanging at the hotel bar, we grabbed dinner and crashed at a motel in town.

The next day we were scheduled to take a bush plane to gutavus. Our earlier conversation about bushplane airport security was addressed when the woman behind the counter said “that good- can never be too safe” after telling her we had a gun in our carry on.

This is us sizing up the plane as if we had any idea what we were looking for. — This is us sizing up the plane as if we had any idea what we were looking at

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA — This is us sizing up the plane as if we had any idea what we were looking at

We got to Gustavus a little while after and hitched a ride with a man whom I choose to remember as “Bub”. It was pretty interesting; turns our Bub knows a lot and didn’t mind sharing his thoughts ranging from the government’s plan to taint the water to how it’s okay to pour motor oil on the ground because “the dirt is a natural filter for organic things like oil”. Bub dropped us off at Gustavus after arranging to pick us up a week later. Even if the kayaking was terrible, we knew the ride home would be an interesting time. We met up with an English (Australian?) lady who rented us our kayaks an did the “welcome to Glacier Bay” orientation with the guide. The weather was looking rough for sunday, so we decided to stay in Gustavus and let the clouds pass by- start the trip on Monday instead of Sunday like we had planned.

That Saturday night we camped at the Gustavus visitor’s center and woke up to a Jurassic-park style rainstorm Sunday which (1) validated our decision on waiting a day, and (2) allowed us to walk to the lodge and buy some more food for the trip. The rest of the day was spent in god’s greatest gift to man….the WARMING HUT!

We went for a hike in the rain. By the looks of it, Tyler does not look happy to be hiking in the rain

Let’s Go Kayaking!

The remained of this post is more or less pictures of the trip because the beauty warrants it. That being said, here is some context (because I know I’ll forget in a few years). On Monday a tour boat picked us up at Gustavus visitor center and took us (and our kayaks) about 15 miles north into the bay. Before dropping us off they gave us a map and told us to meet them at the same beach the following Saturday at noon. Until then, we could do as we pleased. We chose to Kayak roughly 20 miles north, camping along the way to a glacier then head back.