Putmans: 10th Anniversary Trip to Alaska

The kids stayed with my parents in Paris, ID at the birthday party and I headed down to Salt Lake to catch a flight to Alaska to see Chris and celebrate our 10 year anniversary. Chris went weeks earlier to help his friend Devin build a shed so I went up to meet him. I loved flying Jet Blue, I had a layover in Long Beach, CA. Which consisted of walking into the terminal, down to the next terminal and right on to the next plane. I think it was the record for shortest layover in history, it was awesome!

Our first stop was to Next Year Island. It was wonderful to visit with Kate and Larry Call -which Larry made the best ribs, oh they were good! We were sitting around talking in the sunshine and I got a slight sunburn, oops!

We headed to Eklutna Lake to hike the Twin Peaks trail and saw our first wildlife. Yeah a porquipine!

We had some yummy Glacier Silt Ice Cream here.

We went and stayed in Girdwood and went up 2,300 feet in the tram to the top of the Alyeska Ski resort and had some yummy dessert. The clouds would come in and cover the area then they would quickly leave it was amazing. You can see all the way to the Turnagain Arm.

We stopped on our way to Miller's Landing and looked at this amazing gorge down below. Here you can see the really cool color of the water that is from the glaciers.

Here is a bald eagle that perched in a tree right by our cabin. There were also some crows in the tree and they were no very happy to see him there and chased him off.

Our friends were dip netting and we went to see all the action, but first we had to find them.

Here is a picture of all the fisher's trying to get their freezer stocked with salmon, it is shoulder to shoulder.

I finally saw a cow moose and calf on our trip back to Seward. The water hear has an amazing color to it because of the glaciers. Everywhere is so beautiful!

Back at Millers Landing we went out when the tide was low to see what we could find in the water.

Here are a few pictures of a cruise ship coming into the Seward harbor. They are big from a distance but massive up close.

It's a mohawk rock. This was for Ryker - ever since Chris had a mohawk for the spartan race he keeps saying how he never wants a mohawk.

Chis and I enjoying a fire at 8:24pm in front of the "Spruce" cabin. Yep it is that light it was a little nuts! I managed to get some sparks on me that melted holes in my new fleece jacket.

We missed the low tide but still had a fun time on this side of the beach then we headed back to the cabin to pack up.

Chris surprised me with a cruise to the Portage Glacier. It was really amazing! The was ice that floated right by the boat and there were kayakers that were really close to the glacier. It has the most amazing blue color. It didn't calf -have a chunk fall off- while we were there. We did get to feel the ice and water, brrr!

We took a short hike to see Byron Glacier which you can see in the back ground.

We headed up north to Hatcher's Pass were there is an abandoned gold mine.

We panned for gold - we kept a few flakes but they are probably fool's gold but still a fun experience.

We couldn't cook at our cabin at Hatcher's Pass so we cooked our hamburgers here at the parking lot that is just a little down the mountain. It started raining but Chris was determined to eat outside.

This was the view up the mountain from our cabin window. I am not sure how I didn't get a picture of the cabin they are cozy!

Here we are hiking of the Reed Lake's Trail. Amazing hike I highly recommend it!

Bolder field and a marmot.

We are almost to the upper lake the water is so amazingly clear.

Finally at the top! Chris and I love this hike and want to do it again as an overnight hike and go to the top where there is an old plane that crashed.

This is the falls that feeds into the lower lake and if you look close you can see Chris taking a picture of the lower lake. This was an amazing hike, it was the best way to end my trip to Alaska.

Here I am at the airport ready to take my red eye flight back and to Utah. Jet Blue provided me with an eye mask and earplugs to make my flight better.