Alaska sounds cold to most of us. But in the short summer time between June and August Alaska offers almost 24 hours of sunlight. Plenty of time to enjoy an abundance of animals, blooming flours, stunning mountain sceneries while the peaks are covered in snow but the valleys are pleasantly warm. Alaska is an outdoor heaven as there is more wilderness, backcountry trails and mountains to hike you could think of!
Here is my TOP 5 for travelling Alaska:

Overlanding

You might have heard about the cruise lines that travel to Alaska every year providing hundreds of people at a time an opportunity to see glaciers and mainly sea life with seven course meals. Not your style? Overlanding has become synonymous with places like Africa. But now it’s time that North America with places like Alaska and Western Canada is providing these adventurous and off-the-beaten path style of trips to cater for a different style of travelling.

Camping in the Wilderness

Have you ever slept out under the stars or in a place that everywhere you look has no roads and is surrounded by mountains, rivers and glaciers? This experience should not be missed. The Denali Highway is a perfect launching point for such an adventure! It’s time to venture through the bush and hop over creeks while being carefully watched by the local caribou. Take a boat upstream towards the Maclaren Glacier. This hike leads to a great vantage point to view the Maclaren glacier and eat wild blueberries. The following morning you’ll take a picturesque 2-hour canoe trip casually paddling your way back to a rustic lodge.

Ice Climbing and Glacier Hikes

Ever watch one of those films on extreme mountaineering and wondered if you could handle such an adventure? Well, here’s your introduction to the task. Wrangell/St. Elias is largest national park in North America and home to 9 of the 16 highest peaks. Climbing on the Root Glacier is all about technique and fun. Your guide will teach you about the 3-anchor system and the figure-8 knot that will keep you safe. A full day walking the glacier and climbing with your fellow adventurers will allow you to tick off a few boxes on your bucket list.

Sea Kayaking around Icebergs

The fairly casual and moderately strenuous activity of sea kayaking can take you many places other types of craft cannot. With a full day ahead of you, visiting and exploring the massive icebergs of the calving Columbia Glacier is hard to pass up. With a 2-hour wildlife spotting boat ride there and back, you spend the other six hours paddling, photographing, and gawking at the enormity of these turquoise Titanic-sinking pieces of frozen water.

Spotting Wildlife

The animals in Alaska have a quite small window of opportunity to prepare themselves for the upcoming winter. You’ll see a bear eating on hundreds of thousands of berries, a beaver working hard to collect plants and stabilize their dams and lodges, salmon building up their fat reserves, or even an arctic ground squirrel scurrying around collecting nuts and fruit for their den. These animals can be seen on an overland adventure all day and night. Sometimes they’ll even make an appearance at camp to check out what’s for dinner. Well, usually they stay at a safe distance showing respect. If wildlife is something you get excited thinking about sitting in you recliner, then Alaska needs to be on your to do list!

Bio Natalie

Left Germany end of 2010 to backpack West Africa. After feeling the freedom of the road applied for a tour leading job and since then has been driving overland trucks from Cairo to Capetown and Rio de Janeiro to Quito. After remodeling an old school bus into an ultimate overland vehicle and starting her on adventure company together with Dave (who she met travelling and working in Africa) Natalie is on the road again: This time to enjoy the beauty and wilderness of Alaska with like-minded people.

If you’d like to join Natalie and Dave visit their website … www.infiniteadv.com
Facebook: www.facebook.com/infiniteadv
Twitter: @infiniteadv

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