Scenic pics of Alaska

[TrainNut]

As some of you probably saw, I posted a buncha pics of Alaska train shots in another section. However, most of these are just scenery shots I thought you all'd enjoy so I put 'em here instead.

Let me start by saying that the geological features of Alaska have a way of making you feel small, tiny, miniscule! ...insignificant! So, to try and capture that with a camera is... hopeless! Never-the-less, I tried my best and here are some of those shots.

The first day there, I took a float plane from Anchorage about 65 miles west. Most of the mountains in this area are around 10,000 feet tall and two of them are active volcanoes. The reason a lot of the glaciers here are so filthy is because when those volcanoes erupt, they cover them in ash!




After about an hour of flying, the pilot landed down below one of the glaciers on Beluga lake where we were able to unload and stretch our legs just a bit. Let me tell you, putting your hand in that lake was like putting it down inside an ice chest full of ice water! Pilot said we'd only last about 45 seconds if we fell in!


Later the same day, now down south of Anchorage in Alyeska, I took a tram ride up 2,000 feet above the valley floor and did some light hiking...






Next day out on the Kenai peninsula headed towards Seward...
I have never seen such vibrant colored water in the streams nor lakes as clear as those.


Of all the shots I took, this is probably my favorite... there's ducks out in that mist too.


The ground foliage was absolutely amazing. It was like this everywhere you looked...


A mediocre shot of the train sneaking through the trees along Upper Trail lake near Moose pass.






Ressurection Bay off the Gulf of Alaska...


The harbor at Seward...


This is a view across the valley of Exit glacier. Just off to the left of this picture, I watched a little blackbear play in the creek for about 20 minutes.


Sometimes it seems the prettiest places are off the beaten path...


And then you realize, in Alaska, the prettiest places are everywhere!




Independence mine...








The only thing I found disappoining was the lack of wildlife. Evidently it was hunting season (moose) and everything was hiding out. I only saw three black bears, 1 brown bear, 2 sea otters, 1 Hory Marmot, 1 bald eagle and pods n pods of Beluga whales feeding on Salmon.

[nachoman]

Excellent! These photos remind me of the many slideshows during my glacial geomorphology class...

It's funny how the wildlife thing works. I was in the tetons one time doing research, and tourists kept running up to us to tell us there was a moose someplace. Good grief. Of course, we were already "moosed" out and really could care less. When you regularly do research in wyoming, you are used to seeing those things all over the place, having to shoo them out of camp, have them run in front of your car...

[TrainNut]

Yep. The locals told me the best place to find moose was to wander around, of all places, the residences of Anchorage after dark. Evidently they are a real problem. One woman told me they come into her backyard and eat the apples off her apple trees. They also talked about chasing the problem bears away from the garbage cans like we do stray dogs.

[e-paw]

Beautiful landscape, looks like you had a good time.

[Beamish]

Great pics. Beautiful scenery. Great place to visit.

[sgtcarl1]

Absolutely astounding photograohy! You certaainly have a good eye for photographic composition!

[TrainNut]

Thanks for the kind compliments guys. It's hard to mess up when there is beautiful scenery everywhere you look! In my other thread showing the trains shots of Alaska, I mentioned having taken pretty close to 500 pictures. Upon returning home, I deleted nearly 100 of those. Gotta love digitial!

[Russ Bellinis]

Nice pics of the most impressive scenery I've ever seen. Of course I saw it from the deck of a Coast Guard cutter and not a cruise ship! I'm planning to take my wife on an Alaskan cruise in the near future if I can. If you want to see bald eagles and golden eagles relatively close to home, go to the Verde Canyon Railroad.
<!-- w --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.verdecanyonrr.com">www.verdecanyonrr.com</a><!-- w -->. My only regret on the trip we took on it was that we were there about 2 weeks to a month before the arrival of the migrating eagles from Alaska.