July 27, 2024 – Saturday – Day 34
We left our camp along the Turnagain Arm of the Cook Inlet around 10 am. This camping spot was about 25 miles outside of Anchorage. As we were going through Anchorage we stopped at a Farmer’s Market.
This was a real farmer’s market with 95% of the booths selling produce. They had several types of vegetables that we had never heard of. Anchorage is close to the Mat-Su valley, which is short for the Matanuska-Susitna Valley. This valley has very fertile soil and with the long summer sun, they grow a large variety of of very big vegetables. The farmer’s market was very interesting.
Just north of Fairbanks we hiked to Thunderbird Falls. It was a short, but steep hike. It was nice to get out for a walk on a sunny day.
Our final adventure for the day was something we had been looking forward to. We drove through the Knik River valley to the Alaska Glacier Lodge, which was at the end of the road in that valley.
We had a 2-hour helicopter tour of several of the glaciers in the area. After a short safety talk we boarded our AStar helicopter with the pilot and another couple from Arkansas.
The flight took up the mountain through a narrow gorge and over the top into the Knik Glacier Valley. Christian was our pilot, and he zoomed all around the mountains. The copter was on its side as he followed the mountainside. This was the first time on a helicopter for both of us and it was the most fun we have had on our trip.
Our first stop was at the face of Lake George Glacier. We saw several big chunks of ice calf off the glacier face. We were able to get pretty close to see the beautiful blue ice.
After 20 minutes we loaded up and Christian flew us over the glaciers to the top of the mountain. We followed the glacier up the mountain and were able to see the many crevices and cracks in the ice. It was an amazing view and flying over the ice was a lot of fun.
We landed on a high mountain meadow and were able to see the massive Knik Glacier from a birdseye view. From the top of the mountain you get an appreciation of the size of these glaciers.
We loaded up again and flew over more mountain ridges and peak and landed on the Knik Glacier near a clear blue pool of water. We were able to walk around on the glacier and get some glacial water from the blue pools. We were lucky that we had a mostly sunny day with no wind. It was a beautiful day.
After the stop on Knik Glacier we flew back over the mountains to the lodge to end our flight. Our two hours flight went too fast. We were sad to see it end. We were all able to take turns riding in the front, next to the pilot. That was the most amazing place to ride as you had a full view of everything you flew over.
From the helicopter we were also able to see a lot of wildlife. We saw a bear with two cubs, a couple of moose and a several of herds of mountain goats. This was our first time on a helicopter, and it was worth the money to do this tour.
We arrived back at the lodge around 7 pm and we found a campsite along the Knik River by 7:30 pm. We ate our dinner on the riverbank with a fire in our firepit. A good end to a fun day.
Corey & Eva's Travels 